Bell's Lineup - Time to Retool?

Finally for the first time this year I got Expedition, and I'm stoked to age a few of those. I've always love Kalamazoo (and of course Hopslam).

My two cents on the Amber -- it might be a bit "outdated," I don't know, but it's solid. It's a standard. I'd drink a few of those ambers during the day instead of most beers. I think it's got a heck of a lot of flavor in its offering and prefer it over Fat Tire and a lot of the other standards.

That being said, I can only get it at our major retailers, so I don't go out of my way to get it because it's not available in grocery stores near me.

For some reason, I've never had the desire to try Oarsman or Third Coast.

 

I love unexciting beer.

 

Well, we use the name Bell's for most of our other brands and people don't get confused. It is a trademarked brand, just like Bell's, or Miller or....you get it.

 

that's the perfect amount of smart-assery that I can appreciate

 

I am from Michigan and agree that Bells probably has too many different beers floating around, but if it is working for them, then so be it. I pretty much only buy Kzoo stout, special double cream, oberon for the wife, and a shitload of two hearted for myself. As a previous poster stated, their amber ale is very under appreciated and is probably the best one out there.

I look at Bells as a brewery who is big into craft, but also understands the mass appeal of the styles that many BA's find mundane. They are going both the craft and BMC markets and doing a pretty good job at it.

 

I gotta agree. Get rid of the Midwestern Pale Ale. That stuff is awful. Winter white is nothing special. But I would keep the Porter. I love that stuff.

 

I actually really enjoy Winter White, especially on tap, and Oarsman. I believe Oarsman is a little underrated in the Berliner style.

Not to mention that they have their cash cow in Two Hearted and could be losing money on the rest of the lineup and still break even.

 

I wish more breweries offered more low gravity dark ale options. Do you only drink IPAs and BA stouts I guess?

 

Yep,this right here. Don't know about the rest of the country, but Bell's is the big daddy of Michigan brews here,you can pretty much find it on tap or in the cooler just about anywhere, including gas stations and 7-11s. Don't know if I'd call them boring; but they're solid and consistent.

Aaaaaand now I'm craving Two-Hearted.

 

Bell's has been down here for 7-8 years while Founders has been here maybe 2-3. Guess which one has their full lineup stocked everywhere, fresh, while the other is represented by a couple of dusty sixers and 4 month old Two-Hearted cans. Oh, I guess that gave it away. Yeah, Bell's could use some re-tooling.

 

I have to be honest, I haven't seen much "hate" of your original post. Maybe some mild disagreement...

Don't get me wrong, it's fun to talk about these things. But part of that conversation involves the recognition that our perspective is extremely one-dimensional. I'm not suggesting that Bell's is beyond reproach because they are successful--rather I'm getting at the fact that we, as consumers, only have access to a fraction of the information that is used to make decisions about the topic you raised. It's hard to postulate on a retooling a product portfolio or imply that their beer isn't selling based on an anecdotal observation that certain beers aren't moving off shelves.

The interesting thing is that if we're going by personal preference, I too would drop Midwestern PA (I'm just not a fan and never have been) and make Smitten year-round in its place. I also agree with you that having two beers named more or less the same thing is questionable/confusing marketing at best.

It's just hard to really objectively evaluate the need for a lineup re-tool without some kind of deeper insight into the reasoning behind the existing lineup and some real metrics into how it's performing. I'm just not sure you've sufficiently demonstrated your premise that Bell's needs to catch up to the "modern craft drinker".

If anything, Bell's continued success suggests to me that maybe the "modern craft drinker" has more desire for the type of "unexciting" tried and true staples across Bell's lineup than we give them credit for...

 

I don't buy much beer off of the shelf anymore, but there are only a few of those Founders beers I will buy. Many of those do't have the flavors I am looking for. Do some Bell's beers need a tweak? Maybe. I could say the same for Founders.

 

I guess I am in their target market, Bell's has become one of my favorite breweries. I have gotten tired of trying the latest brews all over town and just want to purchase some nice tasting, easy to find, great quality beer. They very good at this. Keep making Third Coast Beer, Lager of the Lakes, Amber, and Porter and I will keep buying them. They have a variety of really excellent Stouts too, great for the winter months.

 

I'm curious as to how you can tell the beers are not being sold as opposed to the retailers doing a good or better job keeping the shelves stocked?

 

Wondering why the retailer even stocks them in the first place then. Sound a lot like possible poor inventory control might be involved as well. The food products company I once worked for had a special rep whose job it was to help retailers estimate sales in advance. Some were pretty poor at it and made blanket brand range orders without actually tracking individual items so some items wound up being way overstocked.

 

SNPA is a classic, and Bell's MWPA needs to go away because it is stuck in time. Got it.