Pabst Blue Ribbon is just regular American beer. So why are sales up 25%? Because it’s hip; college kids drink it. And I’m not surprised. The news, via Ad Age:
The answer, wholesalers and beer-marketing experts said, is likely found in marketing activity that occurred long before the current recession. Back in 2004, Pabst executed a highly effective word-of-mouth campaign that made the long-declining brand an “ironic downscale chic” choice for bike messengers and other younger drinkers who viewed the beer as a statement of non-mainstream taste. PBR sales surged by nearly 17% that year, and have climbed at single-digit rates since, until this year, when the recession sent its sales soaring as more drinkers were pushed into the subpremium category.
Think of it as conspicuous downscale consumption, or something like it.
“There’s still a bit of hipness to it,” said Benj Steinman, editor of Beer Marketer’s Insights. “Of all the subpremiums, it’s got a little more cache.”
“It’s an anti-establishment badge,” added a major market wholesaler. “It seems to play to the retro, nonconformist crowd pretty well.”
I’ve seen it myself: people in their 20’s like this beer. Might be rubbing off on others now. In fact, I might try it myself this weekend. $25 for a case of Heineken at the local Costco is a bit much. Time to reset my beer budget.
When I first noticed PBR was hip, I thought it might — MIGHT — have been sparked by its being featured in David Lynch’s 1986 film “Blue Velvet.” That’s good product placement…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snhiofL2Rh4]
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One of the more dynamic performers of our age is David Bowie, who consistently presented a new persona with practically every new album. We should change how we approach our work from time to time — especially if you’re in marketing. Keep reinventing yourself.
Most rock n rollers admired what Bowie’s done, and regular people of a certain age would recognize him or his name. A German spider expert is betting on it: he’s named a newly discovered species in Malaysia heteropoda davidbowie to get more attention for his cause:
The Heteropoda davidbowie is distinguished by its large size and yellow hair, and is only found in parts of Malaysia.
Bowie was apparently selected for the honour because of his musical contribution to arachnid world – the 1972 concept album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.
Peter Jäger, the German spider expert who discovered the Heteropoda davidbowie, said that naming spiders after celebrities helped draw attention to the marginal status of many species as human activity destroys their habitats.
Environmental authorities have traditionally proved reluctant to include spiders on lists of endangered animals, but campaigners like Mr Jäger argue that their decline undermines nature’s genetic diversity.
“It is working against time,” he told The Observer. “We are also quickly losing genetic resources that have evolved over more than 300 million years.”
For those who need to be reminded of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, here’s a clip from 1973…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gj4C1zYEPw]
And the spiders reference, in case you missed it…
So where were the spiders while the fly tried to break our balls
Just the beer light to guide us,
So we bitched about his fans and should we crush his sweet hands?
What’s next? A new bat species named after Meat Loaf?
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