1. “Smooth drinkability”
2. “Pairs with foods of all sorts”
3. “Fresh, crisp flavor”
4. “Uniquely refreshing”
5. “Cold”
Sh*t Beer Marketers Do (But Shouldn’t)
Filed under beer advertising, beer industry, beer terminology
Subscribe
Recent Comments
1. “Smooth drinkability”
2. “Pairs with foods of all sorts”
3. “Fresh, crisp flavor”
4. “Uniquely refreshing”
5. “Cold”
Filed under beer advertising, beer industry, beer terminology
Blogging at World of Beer 
I’d add “Gourmet” to that list…
I saw “cold brewed” the other day. I’m all for having the guy who came up with that one shot.
Really, why “cold brew” when you can “ice brew”?
You forgot, “Made with only the finest ingredients.” You know, to distinguish their products from the brewers who use only the crappiest ingredients.
I had no idea corn grits were that fine.
“Carefully selected ingredients” That’s one you see often, which will usually lead you to think they were very careful in selecting the worst crap they could find.
My all-time (un)favorite is from Coors, who combined #3 and #5 to come up with ‘cold’ as a flavor. Teh stoopit! Eeeeet burrrrrns!
calling something a pilsner that clearly isn’t.
“Premium.”
This reminds me of the following quote from a recent interview with Michael Micovcin, president of Great Western Brewing, where he’s talking about their Original 16 Pale Ale:
“This is a premium product so for us it is an entry into that segment, which allows us to compete against other premiums. It’s a Canadian pale ale. We did something unique with the recipe; we double-aged the product so it’s smoother and doesn’t have an aftertaste.”
My favourite part about it is the fact that he managed to avoid using the word “beer” entirely, and calls it a “product” several times instead.
Although to be fair, he did call it a pale ale…albeit one without an aftertaste! And “double-aged,” how does that work exactly?
I can only assume that it’s aged twice as long as the period of time that every other beer in the world is aged. Sound “premium” to me!
And beer without aftertaste? What’s the point?
It’s most likely aged once while fermenting and then a second time in the bottle on the way to the beer stores!
I hate also “Well balanced” and “Premium”
“… doesn’t have an aftertaste.”
Or a foretaste, either, probably.
Actually, by far the worst sh*t beer marketers do is insist the beer goes in clear bottles. THAT will give it an aftertaste.
The next worst is printing their product information on the label in 4pt caps, dark red on a purple background.
Amen, Martyn, and that doesn’t just apply to beer. I nearly went blind this week trying to figure out what a certain vodka was made from.
You’re sure that wasn’t a result of the vodka itself?
I was at a beer release last night from the Widmer Brothers–their latest rotator IPA. They put it through two periods of dry-hopping, one with an infusion of chai tea. One of the writers leaned over and whispered to me, “does that mean it’s triple hopped?” We both snorted. So I add “triple hop brewed” to the hall of marketing shame.
I have no idea how this didn’t make the list, let alone the #1 spot.
microcarbonated
refermented
100+ IBUs
damn good beer!
Not quite beer, but sorta related:
I Cheetah All the Time!
How about one that craft beers (and would-be craft beers) use all the time:
“Hand-crafted.”
Keep your hands out of my beer! (Ick). There really isn’t any step in the brewing process that really deserves that description.
– “Beechwood Aged”
– “Frost Brewed”
To be fair, Bud is truly conditioned on staves made of beech. I’ve seen them with my own eyes (albeit pre-InBev). And you’ve actually seem “frost brewed”? That’s a new one to me!
Oh of course, I’m well aware of the Beechwood Aging process AB uses, but years ago they seemed to convey that it actually made a difference in the flavor of the beer.
“Chai tea”. I realise this now means “tea with spices” in Modern English, but etymologically it’s a tautology: “chai” is the Cantonese pronunciation of the word in Mandarin that gave us “tea”. (And keep me away from “chai latte” – if you mean “milky tea”, say “milky tea”.)
Fair enough, Martyn, although I seem to recall that the “tea” part was added after the western introduction of “chai” to coffee shops, likely because people had no idea what chai was. And wouldn’t that belong under a different heading, like “Sh*t Beverage Marketers Do”?
True, but “chai tea” appeared in the “triple-hopped” comment from Jeff A, which set me off. In the UK, “char” (pronounced non-rhotically, ie like “chah”) is slang for “tea”, via British soldiers who served in India, who picked up the word from Hindustani, which picked it up from the Chinese … altho’ I doubt many Britons realise “chai” and “char” are the same word.
Although it’s not new (but still around): “the champagne of beers”.
Wouldn’t that be like calling another product: “the mayonaise of ketchups”?