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Beer Birthday: Gary Gillman

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Today is the 69th birthday of Gary Gillman, an attorney in Toronto, who also writes online at Beer et seq. He describes himself as a beer and food writer with a historical focus in these areas. He’s also published full-length, referenced articles in beer historical and food journals and he’s done two brewing collaborations with Toronto’s Amsterdam Brewery, to recreate an 1870 English AK Bitter recipe. In addition, he’s been a beer enthusiast for over forty years, and started participating online as soon as that became viable. In his daily life, he represents several breweries, as well as other food and beverage businesses, so brings a unique perspective to his writing. He’s also contributed articles to several beer magazines. Join me in wishing Gary a very happy birthday.

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Beer In Ads #2659: Break For Canadian Wild Life

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Saturday’s ad is for Molson, from 1994. The ad shows a great cartoon of — what is that? — a Canadian Goose wearing shades and leaning up against a giant bottle of Molson on the beach. He also has a fairly large bottle on his hand. He actually looks more like a duck, but Canadian Goose makes more sense in context. Whatever bird, he certainly looks satisfied.

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Beer In Ads #2323: Carling’s Nine Pints Of The Law

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Friday’s ad is for Carling, from sometime between the early 1900s and the 1950s, sources vary. The ad, or ads, use an illustration entitled “Nine Pints of the Law,” by English artist Lawson Wood. It’s an obvious play on the legal term “nine points of the law,” or more fully “possession is nine points in the Law,” which was apparently a common saying, forst appearing in 1616 by Thomas Draxe, in Adages 163.

One print from the 1940s has text on the back that claims it was “Based On An Original Photograph Taken At Carlings Brewery, London, Ontario – 1881,” although the artist would have been only three at the time. Of course, he could have painted this from the photograph when he was olders. Another sources claims it was created in the early 1900s, and Wood started working as a commercial illustrator at last by 1896, so the timeing works. Other sources give various decades, such as the 1930s, 1940s or 1950s, although it seems likely that Carling continued to use the painting in ads for many decades. Below are several different uses of the artwork in Carling advertising, though I’m uncertain of the exact date of any of them, apart from most likely the first half of the 20th century.

Here’s a simple poster framing the art, with just the brewery name, “Carling’s” below the picture.

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This green poster is for Carling’s Red Cap Ale.

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And so is this one, but with a white background.

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And this tray appears to be from a little later.

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Beer In Ads #2131: For A Tree-Trimming Treat

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Tuesday’s holiday ad is for Carling’s Red Cap Ale, from 1957. It’s a frenetic scene, as an unseen person’s hand opens — or snaps a cap open — of beer as he watches the army of cartoons he’s invited over to trim his cartoon Christmas tree. The dog’s loose and grandpa’s smoking his pipe by the tree. What could go wrong? Have a beer.

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That was version of the ad in French, below is the same ad, though not nearly as good a scan, in English.

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Beer In Ads #2117: Nature Unspoiled

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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.”

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Oh, Canada Day: Friends, Neighbours, Partners, Allies

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This is somewhat of an inside joke. When I was in D.C. a few years ago for the Craft Brewers Conference, I went for a long walk around the city, a little sightseeing. I made my way past the Canadian Embassy, in part because I had been invited to an event there later that same night by my good friend Stephen Beaumont, and I wanted to know where I would be going so as not to get lost. As I ambled past the embassy, I noticed four sleeves on four columns, part of a circular ring of columns, in front of the building. On each, was a word expressing the nature of Canada’s special relationship with America: Friends, Neighbours, Partners, Allies.

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I chuckled to myself, but for some reason it stuck in my mind and when I saw Stephen later that day, I badgered him incessantly, repeating to him — in a low, serious voice — Friends … Neighbours … Partners … Allies. I changed the delivery, the emphasis and inflection, each time, like an actor trying out different versions searching for just the right one. If it was funny the first time (and I say charitably it was), by the fiftieth, Stephen’s patience was wearing understandably thin. But I was too far gone, it was an earworm caught in my head like an annoying song that you can’t stop from replaying over and over again until you want to scream. To his credit, he suffered through it for the next few days until the conference was over. But seeing that today is Canada Day, it brought back those four little words and so I’d like to say to everyone I know in Canada: “Happy Canada Day to my Friends … Neighbours … Partners … Allies!”

ABI To Introduce Budweiser Prohibition Brew, Non-Alcoholic Bud

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Anheuser-Busch InBev is introducing a new non-alcoholic beer, at least in Canada (for now), called Budweiser Prohibition Brew. According to AdAge:

Budweiser is introducing a buzz-free version in Canada. The new non-alcoholic beer is called Budweiser Prohibition Brew. It could enter other countries, including the U.S. “Budweiser Prohibition Brew is only available in Canada for now, but we’re excited by the prospect that it could eventually be offered in the U.S., the birthplace of Budweiser, sometime in the future,” said Ricardo Marques, VP for Bud in the U.S.

The beer “leverages the latest de-alcoholization technology to create a beer that has 0.0% alcohol by volume and yet delivers the great taste of Budweiser,” according to Budweiser Canada. It is “an ideal choice for a work lunch or casual afternoon with friends, as well as designated drivers and people with active lifestyles,” said Kyle Norrington, vice president, marketing for Labatt, which is the Canadian division of Anheuser-Busch InBev. In the U.S., A-B InBev currently markets the non-alcoholic O’Doul’s brand.

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It certainly seems like ABI is beginning to take some radical marketing steps recently. First, there was renaming Budweiser as “America” and now using the Budweiser brand for a non-alcoholic beer, both of which seem like steps the old management would never have taken, because of concerns of harming the core brand perception. But ABI, of course, has no loyalty to the brand, or indeed anything, as long as profit can be squeezed out of it. Their approach seems more like a scorched earth way of thinking.

And we still haven’t seen what they’re planning to do, if anything, with all of the area codes that they tried to trademark. And you know there’s an end game with all of the acquisitions of smaller breweries they’ve been buying up. If history is any judge, the last time there were over 4,000 breweries, consolidation was rampant in the next few decades, and by 1900 — just 25 years after the high point — there were only a little more than 1,800. And by the time Prohibition took effect, there were less than 700, which represents only 17% of the 4,131 in 1873. So there is some precedent to watch out for, consolidation is nothing new. Some is inevitable due to market forces, the fact that not every brewery can compete in their local market for a variety of reasons (quality of their beer, business acumen, etc.), but sometimes its predatory as a way to squash competition. The next decade will certainly be enlightening as everything plays out.

Here’s the reaction from the Canadian press, or at least the Globe and Mail and the Financial Post.

Beerish Birthday: Nathan Fillion

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This is not, strictly speaking, a beer birthday, which is why I called it a “beerish” one, but my wife and I are both Browncoats, fans of the criminally short-lived television show Firefly. Like many Browncoats, we’ve continued to follow its cast members, especially the star of Firefly, and its companion film Serenity, Nathan Fillion. Today is Nathan Fillion’s 45th birthday.

Fillion is currently one of the stars of the hit TV show on ABC: Castle, which is now in its seventh season. He was also Captain Hammer in Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-Long Blog (in fact a few years ago in All About Beer magazine’s “It’s My Round” when I wrote Living In The Silver Age, the photo showed me wearing a Captain Hammer t-shirt). Some of Fillion’s films include Waitress and Slither, and he was the “wrong” Ryan in Saving Private Ryan. Some of his television appearances include Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Lost, Drive and Desperate Housewives, and he got his start on the soap opera One Life To Live.

Before he’d had a hit TV series, my wife attended a Firefly convention in Los Angeles and Fillion not only attended it but was at one of the after parties that she was involved in. Thanks to me, she brought the beer — a collection of whatever I could part with from the cellar at that time. Sarah snapped a photo of Fillion drinking one of those beers, Drake’s IPA, through a curly straw. Join me in wishing Nathan a very happy birthday. And if you aren’t watching Castle or haven’t seen Firefly, you owe it to yourself to right that wrong.

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Storm Brewing Releases $1,000 Beer Bottle

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I suspect that by the time you read this, all ten bottles of the newest release from Storm Brewing, of East Vancouver in British Columbia, will already have been sold, despite the hefty $1,000 per bottle price tag. The new beer is Glacial Mammoth Extinction, and is described on Storm’s website. Essentially it’s a sour beer that, according to brewer James Walton, was frozen “into one big, solid ice cube at -30 degrees Celsius, a process that took him about a month to complete.” Then the water was removed, and the remaining liquid was “aged in French oak barrels for two years until it was ready.”

Part of the expense of the beer is the packaging, with a hand-blown glass bottle fashioned by a local artist, using a 14K gold clasp and 35,000-year-old ivory for the pendant hanging from the neck of the bottle. The beer weighs in at almost 25% a.b.v. and is described as “quite sweet, almost like a port.”

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The Beer: The Glacial Mammoth Extinction is the first beer of its kind (in the world!!) and the result of freezing a strong sour beer to -30C in two stages over a one month period. The sweet alcoholic liquid was separated from the extinct ice glacier that was left in the tank and then aged in French oak barrels for two years until it was ready. The final product is a rich, complex, and viscous 100% malt beverage that resembles Port more than beer.

ALCOHOL – 25% ABV
RESIDUAL SUGAR – 80grams per litre
VOLUME PRODUCED – 400 litres

The Brewery: For over 20 years brewer James Walton and the Storm Brewing team have been bringing Vancouverites innovative and unpretentious craft beer. James is hailed as a craft beer pioneer by both media and trade and is proud to be one of the very first brewers in North America to brew sour beer. The brewery sits at the corner of Commercial Drive and Franklin Street in gritty East Vancouver and is considered a “must-visit” destination by craft beer fans worldwide.

The $1000 Bottles: A total of ten bottles were designed and made of hand blown glass by Terminal City Glass Co-op’s Brad Turner. Adorning these bottles are one of a kind prehistoric mammoth ivory pendants made by local sculptor Richard Marcus. The ivory used for these pendants is from a tusk estimated to be 35,000 years old and they are complimented with a 14K gold clasp. Both of these East Vancouver artists are renowned for their craft and their studios are located within walking distance from the brewery.

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