Monday, July 9, 2007

Can you pick out your brew?

This is so obvious that it requires no comment on my part.




Put samples of half a dozen or so mass-market American beers before a panel of drinkers in a blind taste test, and even the most confirmed quaffers would be lucky to match two to the right brand.



But put half a dozen or so mass-market American beer advertising slogans or jingles before a panel of testers, and even teetotalers with some exposure to media would come close to a perfect score.



Try it yourself:




  • It's the water

  • From the land of sky-blue waters

  • The beer that made Milwaukee famous

  • The one beer to have when you're having more than one

  • The king of beers

  • The champagne of beers





That even non-imbibers would score well on such a quiz (some of you are not just humming the melody of the jingle but finishing out the verse) is testimony not only to the pervasive nature of mass-market advertising channels when combined with a memorable message. It's also evidence of the power of advertising to create brand identity — and customer loyalty — out of what is basically a commodity product, in which one brand is largely indistinguishable from another.


Read the entire article at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

1 comment:

Brewer said...

I've done this experiment on friends with great success, though they still go back to drinking their "favorite". Bud Light usually ranks the lowest among the bunch with Miller High Life usually getting top marks.

Try it on your friends today!

el