John Hall steps down as president of Goose Island, Anheuser-Busch Craft Advisory Board established

Pretty sure he's talking about the starting-your-own-business-that's-so-successful-that-it-supports-you-and-your-family-for-life part. But having an influential role in a multinational corporation ain't bad either.

 

I am not surprised that John Hall and Tony Bowker have been ‘displaced’ from Goose Island. The disappointing news is that they named Andy Goeler to be President and CEO of Goose Island. Within the press release they mention:

“Andy has led the growth of Shock Top from its infancy, while taking established global brands, such as Stella Artois and Beck’s, and bringing them to new levels in the United States, carefully maintaining a consistent, quality brand position.”

There has been much discussion on other BA threads that the Beck’s that is being brewed now in the US is a shell of its former self primarily due to cheapening of the brewing process. Is this Andy’s ‘claim to fame’?

Very disappointing news indeed.

 

Not to threadjack, but what was Beck's like before? It's always been a pretty generic pale euro lager in my experience.

 

I was thinking the same thing. He may have helped improve the level of profit from Becks, but the level of quality of that beer brewed in America has clearly dropped.

 

I personally do not drink Beck's (either made in Germany or the US)

Here is ajthegreat’s opinion: http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/budweiser-sees-big-sales-drop.48319/#post-620902

Cheers!

 

The author of this article is doing a big "I told you so!" right now.
http://www.businessweek.com/printer/articles/78186-the-plot-to-destroy-americas-beer

 

Anheuser Busch has "more than 500 independent wholesalers" that make up the majority of their distribution network in the US, and owns a mere 13 distributorships (plus, thanks to a recent ruling, are partial owners of a Chicago area AB house, IIRC).

http://anheuser-busch.com/index.php/our-company/operations/wholesale-operations/

 

The Tribune recently updated their story:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/featu...ceo-for-goose-island-20121116,0,2990494.story

I doubt it will change anyone's mind about what this means for Goose or craft beer but for anyone looking for information rather than baseless speculation might want to take a look.

ETA: Conspiracy nuts always make me think of this passage from Alice in Wonderland:
"Alice laughed: 'There's no use trying,' she said; 'one can't believe impossible things.'
'I daresay you haven't had much practice,' said the Queen. 'When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.'"

 

Thanks for that link to the Tribune article.

I took note of:

“Goeler made clear that his focus is expanding Goose Island nationally with four core beers – 312 Urban Wheat Ale, Honker’s Ale, India Pale Ale and a rotating seasonal (Mild Winter, Summertime or Fall Harvest), all of which will largely be brewed at AB plants in Baldwinsville, N.Y. and Ft. Collins, Colo.”

It will be interesting to see how the Goose Island beers being brewing at the AB plants taste like given what has happened to US brewing of Beck’s.

Cheers!

 

They control enough of distributor's revenue to heavily influence the decisions those distributors make, including leaning on them to lean on their retailers to devote shelf space to InBev products.

 

I would if I could cash that paycheck every 2 weeks -- besides, it's a board of directors discussing new beer trends -- think about it...

 

Did I misread? I think it's a "Craft Advisory Board" not any sort of Board of Directors. I think that translates to sitting around in a conference room once a month, Thinking Great Thoughts, generating Vision Statements, until six months down the road somebody from A-B comes in and says, "Hey guys? You know, we don't actually need you to come in, why don't you just conference call these things from home? And....don't bother printing out all these Strategic Reports, just e-mail 'em to my assistant, we'll take care of circulating them...um, and we're going to have to go ahead and, um, re-assign your personal assistants, and the receptionist here...come with me, folks, we'll get you all set up on the 11th Floor"


Of course the checks will continue, for however the initial agreement called for....

 

"led the growth of Shock Top since its infancy", fuck me. Poor Goose Island! I wonder how long they'll keep the old brewery open?

I can hear it now: "Going forward, we've decided to concentrate on our flagship entries in this brand, 312, Honkers, IPA and a rotating seasonal. Having made that decision, we'll continue to focus on these flagship brands, constituting 95% of our sales in the last quarter, in our Ft. Collins and Baldwinsville facilities. Given the cost, however, in maintaining the expensive yet ultimately not significantly income-producing Fulton Street property we'll be closing that plant and discontinuing the under-performing SKUs we had been producing there. We've sold the brewpubs as well, to industry leader Gordon Biersch/Rock Bottom; operating these sorts of facilities are much more within their core competency than ours, so we feel confident this is a win-win for both companies."

[the words "beer", "brewery" and "brewers" will not be used]

 

Lemme see if I have this right - AB/InBev have taken the cornerstone of GI's foundation and placed them on a craft beer advisory board. In other words, AB/InBev is looking for "street cred" with drinkers of craft beer. Then, they replace them at GI with a gentleman whose pedigree includes Shock Top. Shock Top? It seems to me they have placed a fox in the henhouse; one of their own to make GI one of their clones. You've heard it said, "if ain't broke, don't fix it". It's hard to believe that they'll take that approach. Getting the "brand" (and sadly, that's what GI has become to them) to more consumers will probably mean subtle changes to recipes to save money. 312 with a touch of orange flavor or even tampering with BCBS. (Something I have yet to try . . . quickly, now.) Then giving the "brand" a spokesman. Honker, the talking goose? I could be a little extreme here. We will, after all have to watch and wait to see what happens. Beside, what do I know? I am just a consumer.

 

A slowly driven nail, might I add?

 

I agree, and am happy for their success. Maybe, they could make a difference at the mega-mogul. I just hope it doesn't turn out like being a freshman congressman in the U.S. House. Thinking you can really make a difference only to see frustraion and disillusionment.

 

Realizing you are referring to ABI's Andy Goeler, I looked up John Hall's bio on the Goose Island website:

I'm looking for John's 'single brewing degree'. Same goes for both Koch's.

My point? While the Craft side of the business is seemingly more about passion and innovation than it is about money, neither Goose Island, Boston Beer or Stone were created by a brewing legend...but by very, very astute businessmen.

 

i'd say the point is that his (the A-B guy's) resume has bullshit like shock top. the halls and the kochs may be businessmen first and foremost, but their model obviously prioritizes respecting talent and quality.

it's unlikely that A-B vets will do the same, (and everyone who gets up in arms about "why would A-B be so dumb as to ruin goose island!? why did they buy it then!?" listen carefully) because the A-B model of sacrificing quality for bland lowest-common-denominator choices and marketing works better and sells more beer than the craft model. the reason A-B wants to break into craft and run it like it were a macro is that they know their method works.

this is why comments about how GI quality will likely go down are not conspiracy nut nonsense. rather, such comments come from avoiding the magical thinking of misguided capitalism fans who aren't as smart as the businessmen they worship.

 

Amen! I'm sad for GI and the (very likely) genericization of the brand. But no one ever seems to talk about this aspect. Has no one ever noticed there is no exit strategy in the craft beer world? I know lots of owners and brewers personally. They all seem to avoid that subject very carefully. Everyone wants to grow and be profitable. Everyone does it for the love of great beer. But no one has any idea how they will retire or exit when they are old and tired, or successful and ready. Who sells a brewery? Who goes public? A brewery dies when the creative force is gone. Period.

Do we begrudge the GI boys for finding the four leaf clover and having a way to cash out when it got too big and the brand (dirty word, I know) got too valuable to ignore? The craft beer world is a tiny bit less diverse. AB has a tiger by the tail. But two true believers built something great and then walked away with giant bags of cash. Good for them.

 

This is going on right now in my company as well... (we were the ones bought out). A year grace period is spot on. Good summarization.