Thursday’s ad is a 1960 ad for Budweiser. It’s yet another in the “Where there’s life … there’s Bud” series. In the ad, apparently the sound of beer being poured into a glass is enough to turn her head fast enough that her hair flips around and the expression on her face screams “surprise!”
Thanks to Angelo from Brewpublic, who posted a link to this on Facebook. A couple of days ago, the humor paper The Onion posted the hilarious picture below in their News in Photos section with the headline Samuel Adams Apologizes For ‘Boston Sucks’ Pilsner.
According to a short item today in CNN Money, “[a]lcohol sales climbed with little interruption throughout the recent recession, and have continued to expand in recent months.”
Over the last, for the period ending May 31st, “[a]lcoholic beverage sales grew by nearly 10%,” according to the financial information company Sageworks. During that same period of time, “the average unemployment rate during that time exceeded 9.3%.”
Sales expanded more than 9% in 2008, the first full year of the recession, when the average unemployment rate was 5.8%. Sales slumped dramatically the following year, but were still 1% higher, as the unemployment rate shot up to about 9.3%.
In 2010, sales jumped more than 9% as unemployment grew to 9.6%.
The only other industry showing similar growth is apparently health care. Sageworks analyst Sam Zippin quipped that apart from “going to the doctor, [alcohol] is another need to have.” By which I assume he means there are only two certainties during a recession, that people will either get sick or drink. And the article concedes that the old saw about beer being recession-proof “appears to be true.”
Except that Esther Kwon, who’s identified as “an alcohol industry analyst for Standard & Poor’s, says just the opposite, stating “I wouldn’t say it’s recession proof. People will buy less and they will move to different venues, meaning moving to home instead of a bar. But people will continue to drink, regardless.” Um, maybe she’s been misquoted, but isn’t that contradictory? I’m not trying to pick a fight with Kwon, but I just don’t quite understand her point. I agree with her statement that “people will continue to drink, regardless,” and that to save money, many will choose to drink it at home. But concluding from that information that alcohol isn’t recession-proof doesn’t seem to logically follow or make any sense to me.
Where they buy their alcohol, or where they drink it, has no bearing on how much people buy, apart from the price they pay. And if it’s cheaper to drink at home, that would mean they could actually buy more, doesn’t it? And if the sales growth of all alcohol companies is up nearly 10% that would likewise suggest that people are not just continuing to drink, but are drinking more. It’s a simple ipso facto, isn’t it? There’s a recession. People are drinking (or at least buying) more. Ipso facto. What am I missing that would cause a so-called “beverage analyst” to conclude otherwise?
That confusion aside, this is more good news for the craft beer industry, as within the beer industry, that’s the segment that’s showing the most growth by a very wide margin. In fact, it’s practically the only segment showing strong growth.
With Father’s day less than two weeks away, I thought I’d share this fun project done by the folks at Every Guyed, where they designed eight beer can dads.
Here’s the idea:
To celebrate Father’s Day, EveryGuyed and Moxy Creative House have teamed up once again to deliver the second installment of the ‘Cheers!’. This time we had creative director Glenn Michael raise a glass — and his brush — to 8 iconic animated dads, re-envisioning them as beer cans.
When you were a kid, Father’s Day was a pretty boring affair. Now you’re of age, and all of a sudden you have the chance to do something with your dad that he’ll actually enjoy: share a cold one together.
See if you can guess all of the cartoon dads. The answers are below, just under the slideshow, where you can see the eight individuals posters for each beer can dad.
Now I want my own dad can. What would yours look like?
You can even buy any of the prints as a poster at Moxy Creative House.
Wednesday’s ad is a 1956 ad for Budweiser. It’s another in the “Where there’s life … there’s Bud” series that was common in the late 1950s. The ad shows a can of Budweiser Lager Beer, freshly poured. Is it just me, or this ad just one big double entendre? Between the look on the guy’s face, who just poured the beer, and the woman bending down, who looks as if she’s about to kiss the head … something’s going on there. Or am I reading too much into that?
Here’s a fun video forwarded to me by Push Eject, who’s both the Production Director with The Brewing Network and also involved in Heretic Brewing. The commercial is for the Hahn Brewery, founded by legendary Australian brewer Chuck Hahn, who today runs the Malt Shovel Brewery. The Hahn brands were bought by brewing giant Lion Nathan in 1993. In 2005, Lion Nathan launched Hahn Super Dry. I confess that I’m skeptical of any beer that calls itself “super dry,” but I love the notion in the ad that you can imbue the beer with the soul of different ideas by the way you brew it. If you just expose the beer to cool things, it will become cool, too, by osmosis. It’s not quite Rube Goldberg, but it has similar elements. And most importantly, it makes me want to try the beer, even though I know I probably won’t like it very much because I’m not a fan of this type of beer.
Tuesday’s ad is a 1959 ad for Budweiser. Using the “Where there’s life … there’s Bud” slogan that was common in the late 1950s, the ad shows a Harpist paying little attention to her harp with all eyes on the beer.
Monday’s ad is a 1948 ad for Budweiser. Using the “There’s nothing like it … absolutely nothing” slogan that was common in the later 1940s, the ad features a pair of waitresses some pretty odd uniforms. They look like something out of Sinbad the Sailor.
This week’s work of art is by a Dutch Artist, Jacob Jardeans, who was better known in his own time than he is today. Unlike his contemporaries, Rubens and Van Dyck, Jardaens never left Antwerp or found the success that they did. But in his hometown, he was one of the most popular artists. He painted a lot of allegories and mythological pictures, such as The Satyr and the Peasants, seen below, which was created around 1640.
The portrait includes a peasant and his family, along with a satyr and a servant is bring beer. The satyr’s face is odd, almost seems to mocking his hosts. But it’s the peasant’s face, bursting with food, that has the really strange expression. He looks like he was caught mid-bite in a snapshot.
Curiously, Jardaens also painted a very similar scene, the main difference being the canvas is a bit wider to accommodate more area, and two more children, though the satyr has been replaced by another man (another peasant?) who’s draining his own mug of beer. The second painting is known as “Eating Man” but I don’t know if it was painted before or after the other one.
You can read Jardaens biography at Wikipedia or at the Jacob Jardaens official website. And you can see more of his work at Olga’s Gallery, at the official website gallery and the Web Gallery. And there are links to even more paintings at ArtCyclopedia.
Our 71st Guinness ad is also from the “Guinness For Strength” series, with the yield of vegetables a direct result of the bottle of Guinness peeking out of the basket the gardener is carrying on his head. Now that’s a green thumb.
And here’s a variation of the ad, presumably from just after World War 2, since the word “victory” is crossed-out and “plenty” written in just above it.
