Kirin Ichiban is apparently made (in Bedford…) with uncompromising standards, using only the single first pressing of the finest ingredients, giving us the sweetest, most flavoursome beer every time.
Is anyone else slightly confused by this label?
Archive for the ‘marketing’ Category
Extra virgin lager
Friday, July 2nd, 2010My favourite brewery
Sunday, June 27th, 2010
Never mind Fuller’s or Thornbridge — it’s Integrated Bottling Solutions all the way!
Vaguely tasteful St George’s Day brand
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
Slain from the Station House Brewery in Frodsham, Cheshire, is actually pretty nicely branded for a St George’s Day cash-in.
It was so restrained compared to the other beers on the bar (British Bulldog and Old Enoch Powell) that it took me a while to ‘get it’.
As for the beer, I think it’s the only example of what those who are into beer styles would call a ‘northern brown ale’ I’ve ever had on draught. It wasn’t fantastic, but it certainly made a change.
Yet more pub livery photos
Thursday, April 23rd, 2009All of the bits and pieces of brewery and pub marketing below were spotted in East or South London. I wonder if people in 50 years time will find remnants of Wetherspoons branding so evocative? Probably.
Table Turning in pubs
Monday, April 20th, 2009
We had a nice afternoon in one of our favourite London pubs soured on Saturday when we were more-or-less asked to leave to free up the table for a reservation. When we queried whether it had to be our table, given that there were lots of others without reservation signs on, we got a very stroppy response from the bar manager.
The practice of moving people or hurrying them along to squeeze in a second sitting is annoying even in real restaurants, however sensible it might be from a business perspective. But the questions of whether you should be able to reserve tables in pubs at all is a sensitive debate for many British people — it’s a level of formality that seems somehow to undermine the very idea of what the pub is about.
People in Germany seem to cope with it, but maybe that’s because there the reserved signs appear (often with profuse apologies) four hours in advance of the booking, so you’ve got plenty of time to finish up, or just choose another table. In the Greenwich Union, we were given an hour — hardly enough time to eat desert and have another drink.
In the couple of hours we were there, we enjoyed cask conditioned Meantime IPA (7.5%, and not as good as from a bottle) and gained a new appreciation for the fruity, sherbety draught Meantime Helles (4.1%).
So, the Union continues to be both brilliant and annoying. God knows we love the beer, but it might be a while before we go back.
Naughty adverts
Wednesday, April 15th, 2009Tandleman and Pete Brown have both written about the fact that the Advertising Standards Authority have upheld complaints against this advert for Courage bitter:
But I can’t help but be reminded of the kerfuffle around this advert, from the same parent company, three years ago:
Given how clear the rules are about linking alcohol with increased attractiveness or confidence, these can’t be mistakes. I’ve seen the Courage ad more in the news today than I have in paid for advertising slots anywhere in the last few weeks. Contrived controversy = free publicity.
Weasely Carling Ads
Saturday, January 24th, 2009
Phase one of the new Carling campaign was bad enough. But in phase two, the ad men have reached a new low. Get a load of this from the voiceover:
“Carling know it’s important to check their barley themselves.”
A few questions spring to mind:
- What is “checking” barley?
- Is “checked” barley better than any other? As in, “Yeah, I checked the barley — it’s absolutely awful, but we got it cheap.”
- They know it’s important, but does that even mean they do it? Whatever it is.
So, here’s our proposed slogan for phase three:
“Carling know that beer is supposed to taste nice.”
Pubco sets up pretend freehouses
Thursday, December 11th, 2008UK pub company Mitchells and Butlers are apparently planning to open a series of unique “concept bars”. They’ll be part of a chain but designed to look like they’re independent.
The UK pub chain company owns, among others, O’Neill’s, Scream Pubs and All Bar One, but has clearly recognised (as we’ve pointed out before) that big companies and boringly ubiquitous brands are going out of fashion. They’re not going away, though — just into hiding.
Interesting to see how this business model works out. Our bet is that one of the bars will do better than the others and then turn into a chain…
Remembrance beers at the Speaker
Thursday, November 6th, 2008The Speaker in Westminster will be offering a range of Remembrance Sunday related ales this weekend for anyone who wants a quiet pint after attending ceremonies at the Cenotaph. Slightly weird? Maybe, but what an eye for the angle!
Nice branding can make things taste better
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008
Nicely branded Sierra Nevada Anniversary Ale
We’ve always felt slightly guilty about how easily we are influenced by the packaging and presentation of our beer. This week, however, a friend tipped us off to a piece of research from 2004 which suggests we’re not being entirely irrational.
The experiment showed that people actually had a stronger pleasurable reaction to a soft drink when they were cued up to expect one brand or another, and presented with packaging.
Test subjects were given Coke and Pepsi without being told which brand was which. These drinks are chemically almost identical, as Samuel McClure points out. With no branding to refer to, the subjects showed about the same degree of “neural response” in the “ventromedial prefrontal cortex” in both cases. Then, when they were told which brand was which (when they were “brand cued”) they not only stated a preference for one over the other, but actually, measurably enjoyed it more.
So, maybe when we get all excited by the nice label on a bottle of beer, and the pretty glass it’s served in, and the quality of the head on the beer — stuff that shouldn’t really matter, but does to us — we have a similar chemical-electrical reaction?
We’re not scientists. If anyone would like to correct or elaborate on our primitive understanding of what this research means, go for it!
