MillerCoors Shuts Down Brew Blog

I saw today that MillerCoors has shut down the Brew Blog, which Miller launched roughly two years ago.

The Brew Blog was written by Jim Arndorfer, who had previously written for Ad Age. I just met him in person for the first time at the NBWA Convention earlier this week in San Francisco, but we’ve corresponded routinely. I wish him well in whatever he does next. Here’s what he has to say in the last post:

You’re reading the last post from brewblog.com. If you’ve come to rely on this blog to contribute to your perspective on the beer industry, rest assured that MillerCoors will still do that. But we are a new company, and it’s time to move on to new and different ways of communicating.

When Miller Brewing Company launched its preview edition of Brew Magazine in the fall of 2004, it said, “Our company is changing fast, and we wanted to create a magazine that captures the spirit of the new Miller, the spirit of the ‘Able Challenger.’” When the franchise expanded to a Web site and daily blog in June 2006, the opening post said the blog would give the brewer the ability “to contribute to the conversation about the American beer business every day.”

And it’s fair to say Brew met these objectives. The blog broke industry news and highlighted industry trends, while the magazine covered the big changes that transformed the U.S. beer business. One of the most dramatic changes was, of course, the creation of MillerCoors.

As the strongest No. 2 the beer industry has seen in decades, the new MillerCoors needs to communicate differently than the old Miller did. And so it’s creating a variety of new communications tools to establish a new voice and perspective with its employees, distributors and retailers, and to help it become America’s best beer company. You’ll soon hear more about these initiatives.

Good luck with your next endeavor, Jim.