Even MORE “craft-style” macros…

Last week I wrote about Coors’ new style of Blue Moon to arrive soon. 

I have held off to-date on writing about Miller’s three new “Craft-style light beers” because I feel like this topic has been done to death in the blogging community.

But, it was inevitable that if Coors and Miller were getting in on the craftbrew action that Anheuser-Busch would eventually too.  They are taking a path halfway between the Coors and Miller approach.  Coors created a new label that few realize is affiliated with a brewing behemoth (Coors’ Blue Moon), to try to minimize associations with their macro brand that might damage sales of the craft-style beer.  Miller has put their new beers out under the name of their landmark label (Miller Light), hoping that the positive associations with craft-brew will rub off on the whole brand. 

Anheuser-Busch is taking the one of their current labels (Michelob), but not their landmark label (Budweiser), and re-branding it as a craft beer.  They already have the slogan down, “crafting a better beer”, and now they will introduce four new Michelob styles: Michelob Brown Ale, Michelob Red Ale, Michelob Dunkel Weiss, and Michelob Bohemian Pilsner. 

As E.S. at the Relentless Thirst blog noted, the dunkel weiss does sound the most interesting.  I say this because I have an inherent suspicion of brown and red ales to begin with.  I think they tend to be watery and bland even when made by great brewers.  So, you can see why I wouldn’t be totally enthused by A-B versions of these styles.  And I just can’t see a Pilsner, no matter how Bohemian, as a real innovation coming from an American macro-brewer, it’s just a tiny variation on their current theme.  But a dunkel weiss?  That’s a whole new grain and a whole new color of beer, so it will be interesting to see if they can convert their base to drinking it.  I’ll certainly give it a try.