Apparently the beers, named Eve and Animee are lighter, less carbonated and wait for it....bloat resistent! Bloat resistent!!! hahahahahaha......what a pile of steaming dung! At this point that's all I'm going to say about the beers because they won't be worth writing about.
The Blogospheres(and Molson Coors) own Kristy McCready told the Fail on Sunday 'The Perception is that beer is a laddish drink, Animee will be more sophisticated and playful'. Sorry Kristie but that's just bullshit. Gigantic piles of it at that.
So you're telling me that a ordering a glass of Pliny the Elder when I went to Russian River last year wasn't sophisticated? It was laddish? You're telling me that my wife joining me in having a glass of RR Supplication wasn't sophisticated enough?
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| Pic taken from BeerDudeUk.Com |
MC have got their marketing so far wide of the mark that they will alienate everyone if they're not careful. After all you're already patronising the women and then start calling the blokes that drink the fizzy piss that pays the bills 'laddish', well, that's just plain rude.
This all sounds a bit personal and it really isn't but this sort of bollocks really winds me up, who do you think they're going to sell this to? Supermarkets? Massive pub chains? Certainly not to any women I know, they all have much better palates.
Bit of Barfly advice here peeps, stop trying so hard to conquer the world, you just end up looking ridiculous.
15 comments:
I get what you're saying about birds and beer Glyn.
I find a bird with a pint in her hand hugely erotic, even if they often tend to bat for the other side as I've found to my embarrassment in the past.
But MC are wasting their time with this one - most birds stick to girlie lager if they want a beer.
I know what they mean about bloating though.
After 10 pints of Murphys I can clear a room with one of my bloats
Wahaay !
Wot's this? A fruit-based beer for the laydees?
I wonder how things like peer pressure in a pub or bar would impact on this concept? Strikes me that you'd only go for it if you drank beer already. I assume MC have data that suggests wine drinkers would be prepared to try it, but aren't taste & try alcohol promotions banned now?
As for the concept, I tend to agree with you. The RRBC example is an interesting one.
PPT, Sid - thanks for the support, and for sharing that PPT! ;-D Wahaay!
Hmmm, reminds me of this...
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/BU0206/S00188.htm
After 6 months or so, the stuff couldn't be given away. I wish them luck, but I've (personally) seen it fail before when working it said brewery above.
Kelly
I'm surprised (well, maybe not!!) that you would be so vehement about any brewer working to get more people into the beer category and get the category we all love so much back into growth.
I think that your wife joining you in a glass of RR Supplication is very sophisticated indeed, the sad thing is that she's very much a minority and 79% of women never or rarely drink beer.
My love of beer is no secret so working on BitterSweet for the last 2 years, where we have spoken to well over 30k women, has been one of the toughest jobs I've ever done. Coming to work every day to hear women denigrate beer has been tough, I've heard women say things like "the thought of drinking beer makes me want to vomit" but it's the harsh reality we have to face as an industry.
The amount of beer drunk by women in the UK is just about the lowest in the world - undoubtedly there are women that do drink it but it would be madness to ignore the fact that vast numbers just don't.
Is Animee the solution? For some women absolutely yes. We have swathes of data Sid that says women will favour this over wine. That gets more women into the category and that's good for all of us.
But it's not the only solution, we believe in offering choice and we need to look at the whole beer drinking experience if we're going to get women drinking beer in big numbers and that's what we're doing - looking at glassware, packaging, the beer aisle, the pub serve and tasting nights just like you've been organising. All of those things need to be addressed for women too.
Animee is not for you Glen but that doesn't mean it's crap (especially since you've not tried it!). As I said at the start, with a category that's seen 4 decades of decline we should be championing all attempts to reverse that.
Had we rushed to market 2 years ago with a beer based on assumptions then you could have called us unprofessional but we haven't. Animee has been developed with women and we've researched every stage of the process to get it just right and launch something that women tell us they want - that feels very professional to me.
Let me know if you want me to send you some!!
P.S Sorry - for the long reply, I got a bit carried away ;o)
I dunno Kristy, I suppose why it makes me uncomfortable is that it puts women drinkers in some kind of ghetto in relation to beer by admitting defeat on beer in general. "It's too bitter", "don't like the taste" blabla and so there has to be a Beer For Women.
I don't imagine there'd be any suggestion that this stuff would be a 'gateway beer'? MCs ambition would be to get wine drinkers to change, and then keep them drinking this stuff. Not so?
Sid - just about every other category out there produce different products for different genders, everything from soft drinks to skin care to chocolate and we accept that as being absolutely right and normal - why should beer be any different?
For some it might be a gateway beer - of course we want to get wine drinkers into the category. For some it might be that they only ever drink Animee, meaning occasionally they choose less of other categories - both of those things are good news.
Admitting defeat would be doing nothing - all the things you mention are true for women (not all women) so we have to do something very different to change perceptions, I believe that's Animee.
I read an interesting article about Starbucks recently. It’s most interesting point was saying how Starbucks are actually more of a dairy retailer than they are a coffee house. They sell various warm milkshakes flavoured with an array of syrups, or with a small amount of perfectly fine if unexciting coffee. However, the piece (which quoted the excellent Laynes Espresso independent coffee house in Leeds) also talked about how Starbucks are still vital for the success of independent coffee houses; because without the big chains the majority of people wouldn’t start drinking proper coffee at all. Sure, a tall vanilla latte wouldn't be a true coffee lover's choice, but they wouldn’t be a coffee lover without having started somewhere.
If these new Animee beers from Molson Coors get more women who never drink beer into beer, then this is A GOOD THING. We all started somewhere on our beer loving quest, and you can bet your bottom dollar that it wasn’t on what you would now consider ‘a good beer’.
I'm not saying these beers are going to be good, I'm almost certain I would hate them, but the fact is some women may try these beers and like them, then move onto more flavourful 'proper' beer in the future. Putting a 7% dry hopped Black IPA in their hand and saying 'that’s good beer' is going to convert about as many women to beer as a triple shot of Italian espresso would to coffee.
Neil - I think I love you!! Great comment and you are absolutely right, Animee is about providing choice for women that currently reject beer - not for people that already enjoy it.
Kristy, thanks for the very considered and thorough comment, still not buying it though. MC can throw as much research money into this as they like, it still boils down to patronising people. As one person put it, we don't need new beer, we need new attitudes to it.
This trick has been tried before and it failed. I cannot see how this is ever going to work. I've had comments from female customers and Brewsters that I know agreeing with what I've said.
As far as being opposed to any brewer trying to get new customers I'm not, I just happen to think that you don't have to patronise these people to get them to drink good beer.
Eductating people that think beer is bad would be a whole lot better (and cheaper probably) than launching a new product which I've already said, looks like an alcopop.
After all, how much does a marketing campaign cost compared to making a new beer, new packaging and then marketing that too?
If MC were really serious about getting real women to drink proper beer they should utilise breweries they own, like Worthington and Sharps where good beer is actually being brewed.
I suspect if you had 'rushed this to market' two years ago, my response would have been very similar, there's just no getting past treating your customers like children.
Oh and it's Glyn NOT Glen.
Cheers.
Kristy - you managed to avoid the thorny subject of bloating ?
If you can guarantee Animee does away with it I'm gonna put my missus on it pronto.
I'm not saying she's bad with the trouser trumpets but the kids have taken to flinging themselves off tall buildings when they know she's been on the cider.
I wish you luck but the name is crap and the bottle just looks like an alcopop.
On that score I'm in agreement with Glen !
PPT - Getting a rise out of me that way (fail). ;-) wahaaay!
Oh no - sorry I got your name wrong, I HATE it when that happens!!
To assume that Animee is the only way to get women in to beer would indeed be patronising but that's categorically not what we're doing, it's about offering choice to the huge numbers of women currently rejecting beer completely.
What we recognise is that to get women choosing beer we need new beers like Animee as well as all the things that you mention - education, trial and marketing - there is no one solution to the problem, to suggest there is is what's patronising and stereotypes all women as being the same.
The definition of good beer is incredibly subjective and for lots of women Animee is good beer. Not for the women you know perhaps but that doesn't mean it won't appeal to others. Beer after all is the most inclusive drink of all - surely there should be something we can all enjoy?
Krusty
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