Monday’s holiday ad is for Miller High Life, from 1952. A table of holiday foods — including some pretty odd ones — but I especially love the Christmas tree of finger foods.
Beer In Ads #2122: Christmas Cheer
Sunday’s holiday ad is for Pabst Blue Ribbon, from 1912. Interesting illustration of Santa Claus peering through a beer glass and you can also see his ear through the bottle. And I love their tagline. “Nothing but the best will do at Holiday Season — especially if you expect to entertain.”
Beer In Ads #2121: Foam Christmas Tree
Saturday’s holiday ad is for Natakhtari, a brewery in the Republic of Georgia, from 2014. It was founded in 1991, but was bought by the Turkish brewery Efes in 2008. In this ad, a very simple one, a nearly empty glass on a red background, and the residual beer foam left behind is in the shape of a Christmas tree.
Beer In Ads #2120: Blue Ribbon North American Game Birds
Friday’s ad is for Pabst Blue Ribbon, from the 1980s. In this ad, a poster by Pabst, entitled “Blue Ribbon North American Game Birds,” it shows illustrations of nine popular game birds. Presumably it was intended to hang in bars frequented by hunters, or perhaps people who love birds. Speaking of which, there are far fewer beer ads using birds that I thought there would be, so this will be the last one for now (not including the many John Gilroy Guinness ads featuring toucans). I must be in the minority, because I love birds.
Here’s a second view of the poster, though for the life of me I don’t understand why they displayed it on a Coors tablecloth.
Beer In Ads #2119: The ‘A’ And Eagle Has Learned To Fly
Thursday’s ad is for Budweiser, from 1943. In this ad, featuring the Bald Eagle soaring with U.S. war planes in a nakedly patriotic ad (it was mid-WW2 after all), you’ll be surprised to learn what the ad is actually about. Despite the all-American imagery, the ad is about refrigeration, and gliders, and how A-B converted their refrigeration division to make gliders for the military to help the war effort. And if you look at the bottom, A-B was doing a lot for the war effort, and wasn’t shy about letting people now, probably still smarting from the prohibition years and trying to get back in their customers’ and especially the teetotalers good graces.
Beer In Ads #2118: The Beer Round Here
Beer In Ads #2117: Nature Unspoiled
Tuesday’s ad is for Carling Breweries, from 1945. In this ad, featuring five birds, the “Spring Heralds,” the birds whose very presence means the end of winter. At least this ad talks about protecting nature and doesn’t try to make some weak analogy between their beer and the birds. Them and their “cheerful and lusty songs.”
Beer In Ads #2116: Springtime … And All Time … For Good Taste
Monday’s ad is for Blatz Beer, from 1945. In this ad, a Robin sits in a tree, singing its heart out, and another tortured analogy. “As surely as spring follows winter, you’ll find Good Taste in Blatz … always smooth and mellow.”
Beer In Ads #2115: Never A Bitter Note
Sunday’s ad is for Schlitz, from 1945. In this ad, a bluebird sits in a tree, singing its heart out, allowing Schlitz to make the analogy that their beer is “as free from bitterness as a songbird’s lighthearted melody.” As tortured analogies go, it’s not a bad one.
Beer In Ads #2114: British Birds
Saturday’s ad is for Worthington White Shield, from 1977, although this is a reprint and I’m not sure when the original is from. In this ad, a very British bird, wearing a Union Jack vest, is perched on the edge of his nest, looking over four Worthington White Shield eggs. I always thought a “bird” in England was slang for a young woman, but maybe there’s another meaning?
