“Heavy” AAL Comeback?

What seems less sustainable to me is when Pabst BC takes a different approach and goes to contract brewers that are more on a craft volume level than a macro one - like Lucky Lager at 21st Amendment or the boutique Stroh's spin-offs at Brew Detroit. You get the nostalgic image of pre-craft cheap beer (be it historical fiction or legitimate) but without the economies of scale to make it a reality. I'm not familiar with the details or status of such endeavors... but to me they seemed like a Hail Mary when seen from the outside.

 

I actually have been hearing that recently. At a sporting event concession stand, I asked for a Bud Regular and was met with a reply of "oh you mean Bud Heavy"
Now there is a beer bellied cult hero looser pro wrestler named Budd Heavy.

 

I have had the same issue. Ergo, I buy it at Total Wine & More (Claymont).

Victory (really ABV?) seems to have more of a 'hazy' priority (and Hard Seltzers?) it seems? With that out of the way I do appreciate they decided to produce Storm King this year and I recently purchased a case of that beer at my local Retail Beer Distributor.

An 'interesting' craft beer scene these days!?! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Cheers!

 

As for the OP.

The 3 main "light beers" from AB and MC, the 3 best selling beers in the US, were all down in 2020.
Bud Light -6.5% / Coors Light -5% /Miller Lite -3.6%
But their full-calorie equivalents were down even more.
Budweiser -6.6% / Coors Banquet -9% / Miller High Life -7.9%
Also down were two other US-brewed non-light beer.
Pabst Blue Ribbon -7.1% / Yuengling Lager -9.8%

OTOH, Anheuser Busch two largest growth brands were both lights.
Michelob Ultra* +13.7% / Busch Light +15.1%

* M.U. is now the fourth best selling beer in the US, pushing Budweiser down to #5.

--- Beer Marketing Insight figures; this being December, 2021 stats won't be available for a few months.

 

Perhaps the sales of those brands are getting so small, or are declining so persistently, or the potential sales are so small, that there is less of an economy of scale which can be had with them, to where it makes business sense to have them brewed by smaller craft breweries with excess capacity instead?

 

In the case of Lucky Lager, it wasn't a case of dwindling sales, but a case of them re-introducing it after an absence... for possibly a new audience. Here's one article. And here's another. They went to certain breweries because they had the proper location to increase the perception that the beer belonged to a specific place (and therefore people). It seemed like the effort was disproportionally focused on visually reimagining the brand... not just in terms of packaging, but (if I remember correctly) in terms of clothing and whatnot. It was as if they were trying to make something fashionable for a specific audience. In my eyes, the problem is that in a crowded market an audience is unlikely to materialize if the product space isn't well thought out. Such beers have no easy space in a macro/craft dichotomy... and they were intentionally reimagining the brand instead of pushing retro nostalgia.

 

Perhaps they were attempting to capture the 'lightning in the bottle' aspect of PBR and the hipster crowd in a similar manner?



As far as I can recall (you know about my memory ) the whole PBR and hipster thing was more of a consumer choice thing vs. being 'manufactured' by Pabst so....

Cheers!

 

I'd be surprised if that wasn't a consideration. Keep in mind that I was leading the witness with that bit you quoted, and the way it looked to me might be far from appropriate.

 

It's likely that Pabst is licensing those brands to the brewers, rather than having them contract brewed. But Pabst has had small brewers contract-brew for them, including special Ballantine Ales at Schell and a special Rainier Ale at Red Hook Seattle. They also were apparently thinking of purchasing the Red Hook plant, but finally declined.

 

Hmmm... that was done by previous owners of Pabst - as well as by Stroh & Heileman (from which much of Pabst's current line-up originated, of course) - that's why brands like Narragansett, Augsburger, Rheingold, Haffenreffer, National Premium, Piels & Grain Belt aren't part of their current portfolio.

But there's no evidence I've seen of that with the current ownership of Pabst when these revived or brand-extensions are announced in Press Releases, etc., from the company, and the beers are typically labeled as being from Pabst or one of their many 'dba' brewing co. names (Rainier, The Stroh Brewery, Inc., G. Heileman, P. Ballantine & Sons, etc).

Here's a quote from the intro to a 2017 MarketWatch interview with Pabst CEO Kashper, noting that Pabst has:

And the later deal with Brew Detroit (where Pabst brewed the new Stroh brands and, later, even some Heileman and Rainier branded-beers) was announced as Pabst Inks Deal to Produce Stroh’s Beer at Brew Detroit in an article based on the Pabst PR.

~90 miles off. That was the other Minnesota legacy brewer, Cold Spring/Third Street. Pretty sure that Ted Marti & family eventually stopped most of their contract-brewing in recent years. (I guess Hauenstein is still being brewed there? @Chaz )

 

Yep, they still brew Hauenstein along with two n.a. / soda brands (1919 Root Beer and Buddy’s).

On one tour with Dave Berg he referred to the “soda mixing room” as the most profitable place in the brewery.

 

Who?
The dude from MAD Magazine?
There's no Dave Berg around here (anymore ).

 

Was gonna, but you & @zid probably would've been the only ones to get it.

 

Unfortunately I don't think this is true. Budweiser, PBR, High Life, Coors Banquet, etc. continue to decline in popularity every year. Hipster bars seem to sell a lot of these but when I go to "regular" bars, most people drink Bud Light.

The light AALs (other than Michelob Ultra) are declining too, but Bud Light and Coors Light are still way ahead of the non-light AALs. Modelo is getting more and more popular though, but that's not an American brand.

 

I've seen a criticism that the hops they use are more appropriate for say, an APA rather than an American lager. Plus it's only 4.4% ABV. If a craft brewery makes a really good AAL with higher ABV than that, I'm all in.

 

Seems like seltzers (and maybe hard tea + canned cocktails) are taking a big chunk out of the beer market in general. But yes, you've confirmed my suspicion that the big light beers are losing popularity while the big non-light beers are losing popularity even quicker. I'm sad to see Banquets decline so rapidly, I thought they were a hot seller for some reason.

Do you happen to know if the figures for 2021 are available?

 

I can't remember the last place I've seen a non-light AAL on draft in northern Minnesota other than Pabst and Hamms.

 

My local bar in New York has Yuengling and Narragansett. But at bars I usually see AALs sold in cans and bottles instead of drafts.

 

From what I've read, Busch Light seems to have a growing share of the beer pie. Who'd have thunk?