Beverage Dynamics is the largest national business magazine devoted exclusively to the needs of off-premise beverage alcohol retailers, from single liquor stores to big box chains, through coverage of the latest trends in wine, beer and spirits.
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/82861
on the digital medi- um, that speak direct- ly to confident, mil- lennial, multicultural consumers," said Heineken USA's Lysyj. "Our break- through campaigns such as Heineken's 'Open Your World' and Dos Equis' 'Most Interesting Man' break from the tradi- tional 'beer codes' that rely on sopho- moric humor." Dos Equis, up 15% in 2011, led Heineken USA's portfolio of Mexican brands. Though the verdict is still out on the Heineken brand's "Open Your World," which is centered around engaging, worldly men, there is no doubt that "Most Interesting Man" has had a galvanic effect on Dos Equis' sales, to a degree that some had thought was no longer possible in beer. The relevance of those two brands to consumers is attested to by their vast arrays of Facebook fans, with nearly 8 million worldwide for brand Heineken and 2 million for Dos Equis. The latter weigh in by the thousands on new most-interesting tropes. The explosion has forced even the most established craft and import names to strive continually to reestablish their credentials. As Beer Marketer's Insights' Steinman noted, "several of the biggest craft brands are challenged in an environ- ment where the consumer always wants something new." Thus, Sierra Nevada, which for many years stubbornly nurtured a mere handful of flavors, was able to bring in 40-odd brands, some of them one-offs, for a recent tap takeover in New York. New items like its canned Torpedo have won broad followings. Boston Beer, whose Sam Adams can claim much credit for bringing craft to prominence in the first place, has reached outside its own walls to stoke its innovation, recognizing that its brand name can be a limitation with some younger con- sumers. It's teamed up with Magic Hat founder Alan Newman on an incubation company, Alchemy & Science, whose first initiative was the foray into LA via an investment in Angel City. More recently, Boston Beer has even teamed with craft beer pioneer Jack McAuliffe to bring his legendary New Albion brew back for the first time in 30 years. Rogue has gotten out in front of C the move into terroir, touting its Rogue Farms barley- and hop-growing initiatives while also offering cutting-edge brews via such stealth outposts as its Buckman Botanical Brewing spinoff in Portland, Ore., where it counters the hop-extreme tenden- cies of locals with low-IBU entries that may contain no hops at all. Among the importers, Heineken USA has offered a wheat beer under its Amstel brand, while Diageo has offered a more intensively flavored Guinness Export Stout that has garnered good reviews from geeks. A-B Seeing Successes The beer companies seem to be moving aggressively into the hard cider arena. Two among several include Strongbow, the world's top- selling hard cider brand, newly acquired by Heineken USA, and the recently debuted Michelob Ultra Light Cider. ertainly Anheuser-Busch can boast its share of suc- cesses playing where spirits roam. Stella Artois con- tinues to surge, thanks to sophisticated marketing that ties the brand and its chalice glass to the upscale rituals of on- premise consumption. It seems to have a bona fide hit – limited by production constraints – with Lime-A-Rita Margarita with a Twist of Bud Light Lime, which goes directly after a spirits-consumption occasion. And even as A-B has sought to contemporize the marketing of its flag- ship Budweiser brand by showing it in the hands of more cutting-edge consumers, it's also sought to place it more squarely in the spirits debate with the Bud Light Platinum exten- sion, which lifts key pack- aging, positioning and promotional cues straight from spirits. It boasts of "triple filtered, smooth finish, top shelf taste," and is packed in a cobalt blue bottle with a silver strip that wouldn't be out of place on a bottle of gin. Though it's still early days, ABI ceo Carlos Brito has told Wall Street that he believes a signifi- cant share of Platinum's business is coming from "hard liquor" and another 5% from "outside the alcohol category" entirely. That suggests it's meeting its strategic goal, even at the cost of some cannibalization of Bud Light. UBS' Gajrawala goes so far as to say that Platinum "is still a great idea even if it's 100% cannibalistic of Bud Light" because it's doing so much to "premiumize" the image of the brand. "Platinum is having a halo effect on the strength of the brand," he said. s Beverage Dynamics • www.beveragedynamics.com • September/October 2012 • 23