Given that today is the 70th anniversary of Champion Brewing changing their name to Lone Star, it seemed only appropriate for Monday’s ad to be for Lone Star Beer. And it’s an odd one, in several ways. I’m guessing from the art that it was published in the late 50-early 60s. Are the couple at the beach? At night? It looks like a starry background and possibly ocean waves, but it’s awfully bright. Must be a full moon. There are a couple of humorous taglines. First, they’re “now in GLASS cans!” That’s an interesting way to market Stubbies. I knew that Stubbies were created by glass manufacturers to compete with the popularity of cans, but I hadn’t heard that so nakedly admitted in an ad before. And Lone Star claims to be the first “Certified Quality Beer,” with the footnote reading “Certified ‘As Fine A Beer As Is Brewed In The World,'” whatever that means. But the real crack-up is just how happy they seem to be with their food. The main tagline might be “have FUN with your thirst..,” but they’re looking at that sandwich and especially the hot dog way too longingly.
Great ad! I love it.
The whole certified thing is their marketing department and/or advertising agency trying to come up with a point of differentiation. Thing is, having some lab somewhere say Lone Star’s good probably isn’t going to persuade people to switch brands.
As for “glass cans,” I’ve seen that term on paper six-pack carriers before. It was used to equate no deposit, no return bottles with cans — as bottles were traditionally returnables at that time.
Check out this article from Time Magazine — which ran around the time this ad was published (1962). Cans were taking market share from bottles — so the glass industry was subsidizing ads which featured bottles: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,896482-1,00.html
And the only time I’ve ever seen people happier to see food is at frat parties after a bong has been passed around.
The “glass can” terminology seemed to have been adopted particularly by Texan breweries and retailers, tho’ I suspect it was more an individual bottle mfg.’s term – for the very specific “slanted straight shoulder” no return bottle, as opposed to the “true” stubby (w/round shoulder), or the several other US variations. (Pabst, for one, used the term in national ads for their “glass can” and called in “real glass”.) The bottle and term seems to have been an early 1960’s creation, later than the first “can fighter” bottle design of the Stubby and the Steinie (just a few years after the can- so their 75th anniversaries are coming up in a few years, too).
Illustration and Texas ad at:
http://sites.google.com/site/jesskidden/various
In the 50s and early 60s, Lone Star used the “Certified Quality” tagline as a marketing gimmick. Allegedly, after each batch, it was sent to the lab to be certified. I have a link to a “brewery tour” on my website, TexasBreweries.com, that shows the lab.