Goodbye, Michelob Original Lager.

Sounds like it was your local AB house which discontinued carrying it, not that Anheuser-Busch no longer brews it. Still on their TAP INTO YOUR BEER website MICHELOB LAGER (not that websites aren't often incorrect).
AB's toll free number operators usually have the accurate story.
1 (800) 342-5283
(1-800-DIAL BUD)

 

My first beer, aged 9. I still think it's among the best in category. Not easy to find these days.

 

Wow, that's too bad. Normal Michelob became an all-malt lager something like 10-12 years ago and was pretty damn tasty even if it probably needed some more hops.
On top of that, several of the other Michelob beers like Dunkelweizen and Marzen were quite good. In at least a couple cases, they were well liked AB pilot beers from the Ft. Collins location.

I think my fondest Michelob memories are from the Casino Royale in Las Vegas. They had $1 Mich bottles with no limit going back to the early 2000's.

 

That actually happened at my distributor here in Southern AZ as well. We were able to get it in Phoenix though. A friend of mine is a GM for Chili's and he ordered me a case of bottles. It actually was a bit of a hassle for him to get it too, so I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually discontinued.

 

Wow, memories! I graduated from high school in the late 1970s, and that was our go-to lager, in those wonderful brown bottles!

 

Have not seen this beer in many years

 

Always liked this beer, I did not pay attention it was going away. That sucks.

 

Paying for drinks in a casino? When I was in Vegas in 2008 I was getting a gratis bottle of SNPA at every slot machine I plunked. Sure wasn't looking for Mich.

 

I suppose I should enjoy the few Michelob Amber Bocks that I have while I can. It's a shame that perhaps soon, the only association Michelob will have will be those tasteless, watery Ultras.

 

They still have the waitresses circling around, but it's a pretty elaborate game to spend less than the cost of a $1 beer while you're waiting for them. There's also the tip for each one, which offsets things. I honestly like Michelob, so I'd usually buy several and wander with them. That deal is gone now, though. They went from $1 to $2 and eventually $3 (same price as their craft beers) before the Casino Royale dropped Michelob altogether. A $3 Black Butte is still a pretty rockin' deal, so I'm okay with that. A lot of the free drinks options don't include SNPA or Guinness anymore, but just about everyone has Stella and Sam Adams.

 

It's been awhile since I've seen Michelob Lager in Ohio as well. It used to be a go-to for me at bars that priced it similar to other domestics. One of those beers that disappeared and I unfortunately did not notice it.

 

Just checked the web site from the place I buy beer. $27.55 a case in stock 30 of cans is $27.99

Enjoy

 

You may want to buy them now. Might not be there next visit?

Cheers!

 

I'd have tipped anyway, so that wasn't a factor when I wasn't paying $8 for a beer.

I figured that might have gone away, too bad. Couple of spots I was also getting Gordon Biersch taps on the house for feeding the slots. Was a fun time.

 

All of you lamenting the passing of the Michelob line, check the link @jesskidden posted, the beer is still being brewed in all its ilks.

 

In the very least Michelob had a foil neck wrapper.

And you have to admit, if a beer bottle could be sexy, that bottle is fishnets, heels and red lipstick. Or whatever your thing might be.

Still I don't miss it, have not bought it since college, maybe?, and don't really care if it's gone.

 

Fond memories of buying cases of Michelob for .99 for a 6pk at the local Grand Union in Pompano Bch Fl early 70's

 

I will check our local Food Lion here in NC and get back to you.
They have been pretty reliable about having Michelob.

 

Those early bottle labels (60s and 70s) were paper with a metallic finish, perforated just below the crown so they split off nicely when opened. Nicer than some of those more difficult imports where the actual foil was glued to the neck.

That first design (left - an Industrial Designer Institute award winner from Jerome Gould) gave AB a lot of trouble so they did a slight re-work (right) to make them more stable. "Every fifth bottle fell off the bottling line," according to one article, which referred to the original as the "perfume bottle" shape.​

 

Not a drinker of Michelob anymore. Was a beer I drank in high school and occasionally in college. I did curbside so I did not get to look to see if this was still around.

I opted to get 2 week old Jai Alai for $27.59 a case. I know I talk bad about this beer quality wise but I took a chance at the price and freshnes. I will report back.

Enjoy

 

That 70s bottle really is gorgeous

 

Please do.

A month+ ago I was in Florida (St. Pete & Cocoa Beach) visiting friends. The Jai Alai I had on draft was very good! The cans were hit or miss. Maybe the 'good' cans were those that were refrigerated for much of the time?

Cheers!

 

Michelob was the beer we choose to serve at our wedding, That was is 1981when Michelob was considered a top shelf brew. Still drink it once in a while now.

 

I had one of those revamped bottles ,empty, that my dad got in a 6pk he bought. Wonder if that was when they were transitioning?
Lost it in the flood of '11. Wooden shelf in the cellar floated off the floor, & dumped everything.

 

Worst decision ever to stop their unique bottle, I do buy it when I see it. Bring that bottle back.

 

Yeah, that would have been pretty much smack dab at the peak of Michelob's heyday. In '81, it was the Sixth best selling beer in the US at 8.3 million barrels, so around 5% market share.

That sounds damn cheap alright. AB slowly brought Michelob's suggested retail price down - and their marketing/pricing strategy differed from market to market based on a number of conditions - a few years after it's release it was nearly twice the price of a Budweiser sixpack in NJ in 1964 ($2.25 v $1.25)*.

Here's AB's full line-up's pricing in another Florida store's AD in 1972:


* According to the DoL's Inflation Calculator those prices, in today's dollars, equal:

1964 sixpack at $2.25 = $18.79
1972 case at $5.99 = $37.62

 

Assuming Budweiser was #1 what beers were 2,3,4, +5? I'm guessing in no order Miller Lite, Schlitz, PBR & Coors.

 

That article is 8 years old, yet they're still brewing Michelob Original. I'm not going to stick up for a beer I never look for anymore, but freaking out over assumptions is just crazy -- especially when it's the distro making claims.

How 'bout it Jess? @jesskidden

Michelob.com -- ©2020

 

Ha. Ya know, I was gonna list 'em... but figured "TMI" for some folks. You're pretty close - missed High Life (Schlitz was well-into its tumble into oblivion...).

Yeah, I was going to look for that article (well, series of articles...) since I recall they listed Michelob's then current tiny barrelage.

 

Oh, I wouldn't say that. In that period - 1960s-1980s (previously it has been an all-malt beer, one of the few in the US, and available only in kegs) it was certainly different than Budweiser - only 2-row malt, all imported hops, smaller percentage of rice adjunct.

I had it fresh at the brewery in Columbus Ohio in the late 1970s and it was the hoppiest US lager beer I'd ever had up to that point. Granted, it never tasted that good before or again to me - the industry scuttlebutt had always been that the recipe conversion to an adjunct bottled product wasn't as successful as they'd hoped, tastewise, but the sales figures more than made up for it.

 

I guess distribution for this thing has been pretty spotty, not giving it a fair chance from the outset. What has caused the drop in sales for this beer? The same trend towards light beers?

In any case, that’s a shame. It sounds like a beer I’d like. I guess the closest thing to a light all-malt lager would be Heineken or a craft lager?

 

I have not drank this beer in over 40 years, so I wouldn't miss it if were to disappear.
But the old bottles were very cool, and you'd be viewed as a pretty cool dude if you were drinking one of these back in the early 1970's, either this or a Heineken. LOL!

 

With that description, I suppose that Stella Artois is the spiritual replacement for it within the AB-InBev portfolio, except that the caramel malts must have made Michelob Original darker and sweeter than the Belgian import.

 

My post was about Michelob, circa 1960 - 1980 - its first two decades as a bottled (and, later, canned) product. The recipe was changed in 1961 when the beer was first packaged and the rice adjunct was added (usually quoted as being around 20% of the grain versus Bud's 30% at the time, IIRC). It was converted back to an all-malt beer in 2007.
Circa 1970s ad text (labels also noted "rice"):

 

It's still around locally.
I bought a 6pack several months ago and I
thought it was particularly bland. For an all malt, I was disappointed. Like I was when the likes of Erlanger, Andeker, and Augsburger were around.