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Lucky Lager Returns

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Pabst announced today that they’re re-introducing Lucky Lager in the Bay Area. The iconic local beer has been absent from store shelves for four decades, but I’m pretty sure it was still around when I moved here in 1985. By then, according to Wikipedia, beginning in “July 1985, the Olympia Brewing Company in Tumwater, WA began to produce Lucky Lager in the US. In July 2003, this brewery was also closed. Lucky Lager continued to be sold in its original Northern California range at Lucky Stores supermarkets, which although not affiliated, sold Lucky Lager as an unofficial value store brand, until Lucky Stores supermarkets were bought out by Albertson’s and the name of the supermarkets was changed around 2000.”

But as long as I’ve been here, people have been waxing nostalgic about the brand. Apparently, it saw a lot of Bay Area folks through college and their lean years, as an affordable beer brand. And now, they’re bringing it back, albeit without the iconic label and a reimagined modern take on the packaging. I feel like appealing to the nostalgia for the brand — something Pabst knows a thing or two about — would have been a better idea, although only time will tell. On the plus side, it’s being brewed under contract by the 21st Amendment Brewery in San Leandro. When I spoke to co-owner Shaun O’Sullivan, he told me it was under arrangement with Pabst to brew and can the beer for them. At 4.2% it could be a good session lager, something that could definitely be useful. I’m actually looking forward to tasting it, and part of that has to do with 21st Amendment’s involvement.

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Here’s the press release from Pabst:

The Gold Rush and Tech Boom are iconic examples of the good fortune emanating from the Bay Area. San Francisco attracts visionaries and entrepreneurs willing to put in the sweat equity to make their dreams a reality. For most of the last century, Lucky Lager was the Bay Area’s beer of choice after a long day. Now, this Bay Area classic has been reimagined as a premium lager to inspire a new generation working tirelessly to turn dreams into reality.

Founded on the heels of prohibition, Lucky Lager became synonymous with the city of San Francisco and a favorite of the diverse cultures that call it home. In an effort to revive Lucky and restore its local roots, Pabst tapped San Leandro-based 21 st Amendment for help with brewing and canning, and San Francisco-based design agency Hatch to helm the redesign. “San Francisco is a town where anyone with a persevering mindset and dedicated spirit can get ‘lucky’ and strike it big,” said Matt Bruhn, General Manger at Pabst. “We want Lucky Lager to be your reward for a hard day’s work.”

San Francisco-based design agency Hatch created the new Lucky Lager can, a modern interpretation of the iconic original. Six packs present “Lucky” in one of five local languages heard every day on the streets of San Francisco, including English, Chinese, Spanish, Korean and Vietnamese. This new design concept is an initial nod to the area’s rich cultural diversity and a subtle reminder that luck is a universal phenomenon. “Lucky represents sketch dreams and napkin schemes; it’s a beer meant to celebrate both the wins and failures that pave the road to success,” said Nicole Flores, Creative Director at Hatch.

“Born in San Francisco, Lucky Lager is infused with the same drive, where “X” marks the spot for determination, imagination and desire that make the Bay Area so alluring. Such qualities are inherent to the beer and to those in the Bay who drink it.”

A unique, unfiltered lager that pours with a pale straw color and a clean white head, Lucky Lager introduces itself with the aroma of sweet corn, toasted bread and light notes of citrus fruits from delicate hops. At 4.2% ABV, Lucky welcomes you with notes of light malt, floral earthy hops, and slight honey, with a creamy and satisfying carbonation. It finishes crisp with a pleasant linger, proving that being Lucky is refreshing.

Lucky Lager is exclusively available throughout the Bay Area and Northern California. For more information on distribution and our story, please visit luckylagersf.com.

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The five different Lucky cans being prodiced.

Beer Hints From Heloise

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Today is the birthday of Ponce Kiah Marchelle Heloise Cruse Evans, better known by her pen name Heloise. She is “an American writer, author, and speaker specializing in lifestyle hints, including consumer issues, pets, travel, food, home improvement, and health.” Heloise has written over a dozen books of “household hints,” although it appears many of them have been recycled and repackaged. This is her book, “Kitchen Hints From Heloise: More Than 1,527 Time-Saving, Money-Saving, and Work-Saving Hints for Cooking, Cleaning, Shopping, and Storing,” published in 2005.

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I suspect she’s written a number of hints that had something to do with beer, but there were a few in this specific book, which are below.

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At least she’s acknowledging that there are different types of beer, and even mentions local ones. Since it’s meant for a very general reader, it’s very general advice, and I certainly can’t agree with having a light beer available (those beers are pure evil, in my opinion), but at least she’s suggesting some variety, and that’s a positive step, even fourteen years ago.

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Her advice on clean glasses is mostly okay, but I absolutely hate that she’s saying “some beer drinkers prefer icy mugs.” I tend to think if you like your beer out of a frosted glass, then you’re not really beer drinker, you’re just drinking some ice cold liquid you don’t want to taste so you can get drunk. And what German beers does she think have a lemon slice “floating in the brew?” I know she means a Hefeweizen, but it’s not just tossed in the glass, Her advice her is pretty bad, actually, to my way of thinking. She ends with “it’s a matter of taste,” but that seems like a terrible thing to say in a book offering hints. She should be telling people what is the optimal way to enjoy their beer, instead she seems to throw up her hands and say just do whatever you want, which doesn’t strike me as great advice.

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I guess she’s right that most beer is pasteurized if she’s referring to mainstream beers and imports, which she most likely is, but it still seems like the wrong thing to say, and should be explained better. But the funniest thing is her assertion that “most people … have no problem with beer that has gone flat.” Who did she ask for that advice?

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Sure, but I’ve never once thought of even putting wine in my stew.

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So overall, I find it odd that a woman who’s spent a lifetime supposedly giving people great advice and household hints, would so obviously do so little research in doling out advice on beer. It sounds more like she just regurgitated what she’s heard rather than asked any beer experts, or people who might actually know what they’re talking about. That’s my advice to her.

George Carlin Tasting Beer

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Today is the birthday of American stand-up comedian, actor, author and social critic George Carlin. He was easily one of the best stand-up comedians in my lifetime and now my son is discovering him through YouTube, which has been fun for me. Anyway, Carlin enjoyed beer, and because of that twenty years ago New York Magazine asked him to participate in a tasting of “microbrews” for an article written by Tony Hendra for the May 12, 1997 issue.

If you don’t know Tony Hendra, he used to be the editor of National Lampoon, and “co-created, co-wrote, and co-produced the British television satirical show Spitting Image.” He “is an English satirist, actor and writer who has worked mostly in the United States. Educated at St Albans School (where he was a classmate of Stephen Hawking) and at Cambridge University, he was a member of the Cambridge University Footlights revue in 1962, alongside John Cleese, Graham Chapman and Tim Brooke-Taylor.”

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It’s interesting to look back two decades and see how people viewed craft beer in 1997. The first thing you’ll notice is that the term “craft beer” is nowhere to be found. They were drinking “microbrews.” But that’s just the beginning. The article was called “Brewhaha.”

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In addition to Carlin and author Hendra, the other beer tasters were Bernard McGuirk, who “is the executive producer of the Imus in the Morning radio program” and Laura Ingraham, who “is an American radio talk show host, author, and conservative political commentator.” It’s an odd group, though the unifying factor seems to be that they’ve all worked in radio.

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It’s funny to hear them complaining about all the fruit in beer those days, instead of the “reliably toothsome beers” that Pete’s and Samuel Adams, among others, had been making before then.

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They don’t say how many or which other beers they sampled, but their list of their Top 10 is certainly a trip down memory lane. It’s strange to say, but I can honest;y say I’ve had every one of them.

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And their list of the ones they most disliked is equally interesting. And again, it’s weird, but I’ve tried every one of those beers, too. They have some pretty interesting remarks about each of them, but their notes of Rogue’s barley wine betrays their deep ignorance about what they’re drinking.

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Another hint that they’re not exactly aficionados is the reference to spittoons. Twenty years ago it was pretty common to see articles like this, blissfully unaware that tasting beer and wine was different. And then they’d just proudly blurt out their spitting, giving away their ignorance without even realizing what they were doing.

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But anyway, happy birthday George Carlin.

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Nielsen Beer Numbers Show Where Growth Is Happening

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Earlier today, Bart Watson, the BA’s economist, tweeted a chart from Nielsen entitled “Craft Beer is a Staple Out West and Growing Across the Country.” The chart is from a new report released yesterday, called Tapped In: Craft and Local Are Powerful Trends in the Beer Aisle. It shows three columns of data, including dollar share, percentage change of dollar volume versus last year and changes in dollar share versus last year. This is for “craft beer,” which Nieslen defines slightly differently than the BA, if memory serves.

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The top five markets for share of craft beer are on the west coast, three of them in California: San Diego, San Francisco and Sacramento. The bottom five are all midwest and east coast, though only Washington DC is a particularly large market, with the other four being somewhat smaller. The top five each represents market in which craft enjoys roughly one-third of all beer sales, which is amazing to me given where we were just ten or twenty years ago.

In terms of change, Birmingham, Alabama is the surprise winner with an astonishing 63.1% growth in volume over last year. Although equally surprising is San Diego who despite being the third largest market for craft, also grew 22.5% more on a large base, and was the fourth highest in volume growth.

Of the categories Nielsen tracks, cider is the one most on fire, with volume up 43.2%. Next is craft beer with 10.2%, tied with Mexican beer, although craft has the edge in percentage change in value, though I’m not entirely sure how that’s calculated. Super Premium, Premium, and Sub Premium are all trending down, with negative numbers, though not by much. Sub Premium is losing the most ground, down 3.5% by volume.

In addition, Nieksen surveyed beer drinkers about how much they care about their beer being local.

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If you’re unfamiliar with Nielsen, they track sales data in primarily larger, chain outlets like groceries, convenience stores, liquor and drug chains, etc. as opposed to beer stores and more independent or unique sales avenues. But because they’ve been collecting consistent data for a number of years, their information is usually pretty reliable and a decent snapshot of what’s going on across the country. Here’s some more of their analysis regarding where people are buying beer.

At the end of June 2015, craft beer accounted for 11.9% of the total dollar volume of the beer category in the U.S. It’s worth noting, however, that craft’s market share varies significantly by channel. For example, it has a much larger share in the grocery channel (20.1%) than the convenience (4.6%) and drug (8.7%) store channels, largely because grocery stores have significantly more floor space available, which allows for greater assortment and options for consumers. That said, however, the convenience channel holds the title for being the leader for overall beer sales, and craft is making a strong run there, growing at a faster pace in the convenience channel (+21.4%) than in grocery stores (+13.7%) for the 52 weeks ending June 20, 2015.

Beer Giants Still Giant

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The Wall Street Journal had a piece on the beer business entitled Beer Giants Cultivate Their Crafty Side which I can’t read in its entirety because I don’t have a subscription, but it did include a chart showing the current state of affairs in the beer industry.

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Shifting Suds. “Independent brewers are selling more beer,” but given this comes from the Wall Street Journal (which is all about BIG business) they can’t help but add “but their shipments remain small compared with the big beer brands.”

What the Wall Street Journal forgets to mention is that Anheuser-Busch was founded in 1852 and didn’t hit 1 million annual barrels until 1901, when they were 49 years old. Sierra Nevada took only 35 years (or less) to reach 1 million, and Boston Beer needed even less time, reaching their first million barrels 1996, meaning it took Samuel Adams 12 years.

A Link-Bait Manifesto

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This morning I got a press release from the P.R. Firm for a well-known men’s magazine that was so obviously link-bait, that I almost didn’t even want to read it. I won’t say who or what, mostly because I’m tired of playing into their hands, but most of you will no doubt be able to figure it out.

It’s something I’ve been guilty of time and time again. When I see something that annoys me, or strikes me as being wrong on some level, I often feel compelled to intercede. I’m seeking help.

A few years ago, I definitely would have penned an angry response, pointing out the flawed reasoning, or what have you. But I think I’m done, at least I hope so. I was bcc’d (thankfully) so I have no way of knowing just how many people the P.R. firm was trying to bait with their e-mail, but I suspect it was a lot of people. The e-mail itself used the most incendiary quotes from the piece, obviously designed to raise the hackles of the beer community and rally support against the piece, all in an effort to get thousands of people to visit the website and get their hit count going through the roof.

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Essentially, this has become a strategy on the internet. Say something incendiary, and reap the rewards. Maybe some of the people actually believe what they’re writing, but I get the sense that even if that’s the case, they do it in such a way as to maximize the outrage, and thus insure a greater number of responses. Often, I think, the extreme position taken is done precisely to get a rise out of people. I think it’s become a variation of the old saw about there being no such thing as bad publicity, in this case more along the lines of as long as people are clicking on the link, it doesn’t matter what they say or whether it’s even true or not. All that matters is the hit count. Oscar Wilde was saying something similar in the 19th century. “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”

Sadly, there are all sorts of helpful websites explaining just how to accomplish this. See, for example, the SEO Guide to Creating Viral Linkbait, The Marketer’s Ultimate Guide to Link Bait, or SEO Advice: linkbait and linkbaiting. There’s even a helpful infographic and a link bait title generator. While most of them insist that not all link bait is bad, in our little part of the interwebs, that hasn’t been my experience.

I think I’ve just grown weary of hearing why the bubble is about to burst, or why you hate hops or beer with flavor, or that you drink your beer out of a plastic cup as god intended. Please, stop. Okay, I’m certain that won’t work. No plea for sanity every has. So instead I’d like to propose that we all agree to ignore them. That’s really the only way to make them stop. If we all ignore the link bait, and they don’t get the expected backlash they’re hoping for, then they’ll have no choice but to stop trying.

Having a different opinion or wanting to spark a meaningful discussion about it will remain an excellent reason to pen a thoughtful blog post or article. But taking an opinion that’s designed to provoke outrage with inflammatory language, fringe positions, or by insulting entire swaths of people has no place in the marketplace of ideas that the beer blogosphere should aspire to. Just say know.

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Don’t take the bait

For The Next Session, Write About Writing

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For our 86th Session, our host is Heather Vandenengel, the Beer Hobo. For her topic, she’s chosen Beer Journalism, in other words using your words to write about writing … beer writing, that is. She writes. “It’s time for a session of navel-gazing: I’d like to turn a critical eye on how the media cover the beer industry. And, for a broad definition, I’ll define media as newspapers, magazines, websites, blogs, TV, books and radio.” Here’s what she’s looking for:

What role do beer writers play in the culture and growth of craft beer? Are we advocates, critics, or storytellers? What stories are not getting told and what ones would you like to never hear about again? What’s your beer media diet? i.e. what publications/blogs/sites do you read to learn about industry? Are all beer journalists subhumans? Is beer journalism a tepid affair and/or a moribund endeavor? And if so, what can be done about it?

In the spirit of tipping the hat when someone gets it right, please also share a piece of beer writing or media you love–it doesn’t have to be recent, and it could be an article, podcast, video, book or ebook–and explain a bit about what makes it great. I’ll include links to those articles as well in my roundup for easy access reading.

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Here’s her instructions for participating:

  1. Write a blog and post it on or by Friday, April 4.
  2. Leave a comment [t]here with a link to your post.
  3. Check back on Monday, April 7 for a roundup of all the blog posts.

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Some of the earliest writing about beer, c. 3000-3100 BCE.

Contains No Bourbon

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After much speculation, I got a press release this morning from MillerCoors clarifying what we all thought to be the case regarding their newest creation, Miller Fortune. Here’s what they had to say:

Earlier this week, Bloomberg News Service wrote a story (“MillerCoors Seeks Spirits Fans With Bourbon-Like Lager”) about a new beer from MillerCoors called Miller Fortune, that we are launching the week of February 10.

Since that story ran, there have been several follow-up stories that inaccurately portray Miller Fortune as being a bourbon-flavored beer. That is simply not true and we’d like to set the record straight for anyone interested in writing a story in the future.

WHAT IS MILLER FORTUNE?
Miller Fortune is an exciting new beer with a 6.9% ABV. It features a rich golden color, brewed with caramel malt and cascade hops to achieve layers of flavor and a distinctly smooth finish. Our beer was brewed to deliver the complexity and depth that appeals to spirit drinkers. Spirit inspired…yes. Spirit infused…no. As many of you know, the beer industry as a whole has lost seven share points to spirits (five) and wine (two) in the last 10 years. Miller Fortune was created to fight against these losses and take back legal-drinking age spirits drinkers/occasions. So, you can say it has been inspired by the success of spirits competition and it is a darker beer that may look more bourbon-like in a glass.

WHAT MILLER FORTUNE IS NOT?
Miller Fortune is not bourbon-like or a bourbon-flavored beer.

I almost feel sorry for MillerCoors. That they would have to send out this release says a lot about the state of mainstream journalism, because that’s who got the story so wrong. What I think this reveals is that the mainstream and business press is not capable of covering the beer industry any longer. For so many years, they talked about numbers, about market share, about marketing; almost everything to do with the business, except for the beer itself, its flavor. But now that beer with flavor is kind of a big deal, they no longer know what to do. The business press booted it all over the place on this one, though Time magazine’s assigning it to a health reporter was even worse.

If I may be so bold as to suggest, the mainstream press needs to hire people who know something about beer to cover it effectively and accurately. Not business writers, not wine writers, not health writers: beer writers. I know of at least 130 members of the North American Guild of Beer Writers who would be pleased to accept a paid assignment from Bloomberg, Business Insider, Time or any number of news outlets who for years have been, for the most part, not covering beer very well, assigning beer stories to reporters who did not, and apparently still do not, really understand it. With over 2,700 American breweries, and even more internationally, there’s plenty to keep us busy. Just call one of us next time. We know the difference between a bourbon beer and one inspired by it.

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Miller Fortune: Bourbon & Cascades

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Okay, this is my third post today about Miller Fortune, the new “bourbon-like lager” from MillerCoors meant to address their loss of market share to distilled spirits. I’ll reserve judgment on the beer itself until my sample arrives and also until after it’s had a chance in the marketplace. Besides, it’s already been well-covered by Beverage Daily, Bloomberg, Business Insider and Time Magazine.

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But there’s certainly some oddities in the way they’re presenting it, whether by the mainstream press or by MillerCoors. As usual, it seems like they’re focusing a lot on the packaging — ooh, it’s black — and other marketing and not as much on the beer itself. One account describes the packaging as “jet-black, angular bottles meant to ‘evoke a guy in a tapered, athletic-cut suit.'” Uh-huh, that’s just what I was thinking of when I looked at it. The beer is 6.9% a.b.v., closer to an IPA than the usual light lager, though humorously Business Insider claims Coors Light is 5.9% instead of its actual 4.2%.

Then there’s trying to get bars and restaurants to serve it in a whiskey glass. Apparently, “[t]he rocks glass is intended to set Miller Fortune apart the same way the orange slice has made Blue Moon one of the company’s fastest-growing brews and its answer to the craft-beer juggernaut.” The idea is, of course, to make it seem more spirits-like, but it just seems gimmicky to me. It’s one thing to design a special glass to enhance the flavors but quite another to just pick a glass meant for something else in the hopes that people will make the association between the two.

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I don’t quite get the bourbon association, either. It wasn’t aged in a bourbon barrel, like many beers being brewed these days by smaller breweries, yet it’s referred to as a “bourbon-like lager.” The Bloomberg article says it has a “complex flavor hinting at bourbon” while Business Insider calls it a “bourbon-flavored beer.” The beer labels says it’s a “Spirited Golden Lager” while RateBeer categorizes it as an Amber/Vienna Lager while Beer Advocate has it listed as an American Amber/Red Lager. But apart from MillerCoors trying to draw an association to bourbon and spirits drinkers, and claiming bourbon makers as their inspiration, I don’t know where any bourbon flavors would be coming from.

Bloomberg brings up that they used some Cascade hops, saying it’s “a golden lager brewed in part with Cascade hops to give it a citrusy bite and caramel malt to impart an amber hue” and that “the flavor is moderately bitter with hints of sweetness, resting somewhere between a craft beer and a light lager.” So nothing about bourbon or being bourbon-flavored or bourbon-like, as far as I can tell. And the few people who’ve reviewed it on Beer Advocate and RateBeer likewise make no mention of any bourbon character. But perhaps the most hilarious statement was made by Time magazine, who states that “Miller Fortune is brewed with Cascade hops to give it its bourbon-like flavor.” That must be why Anchor Liberty and Sierra Nevada Pale Ale have all that spirited bourbon character. I can’t wait to see how this one plays out.

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