Hot on the heels of the pummeling of Bud Light over choosing a transgender spokesminstrel, this ad campaign claiming the history of beer for feminism, has surfaced:
Corporate virtue-signaling? Sure.
But that’s not the part that annoys me the most.
The worst part is what this says about women in America today.
Money Where Their Mouth Is: Advertisers are, in normal times, perhaps the ultimate practitioners of the free market. They, their campaigns, and their agencies and departments rise and fall on how successfully they gauge the sentiments of their audiences.
For example, the ad agency that conceived of a “Clydesdale” campaign for a certain brand of beer managed to do a superlative job of gauging the effect that ad would have on the ad-viewing audience – not only selling lots of beer, but creating perhaps America’s foremost celebrity draft horse team.
Likewise, the ad agency that thought a group of cute frogs croaking the name of the beer into the dark would sell beer – and they were right.
Good ad agencies, execs and campaigns “read” society correctly.
So – what are they reading?
Impressions: It’s not a big stretch – ads are aimed at the people who buy products.
And within families, households and communities, that varies by what’s being sold.
So think about products where the primary buy/don’t buy decision is men. Classic example – firearms. Ads for firearms portray men as sober, decisive, serious people. That’s how gun owners see themselves and their paths. An ad agency that portrayed their male customers as doughy comic relief would probably have a hard time getting their contract renewed, since the brand’s sales would probably tank. By the way – the women portrayed are also solid, serious people, as well.
Home improvement brands, like hardware stores, tend to take men fairly seriously as well
Beer? Well, the portrayal of men in beer ads is often tongue-in-cheek…:
…and the women portrayed with them tend to be – as the shrieking harpy in the Miller ad notes – somewhat idealized:
In a bikini? Sometimes. The purple middy top is close, in its own way.
But women are portrayed as idealized as a rule. Young, pretty, not stupid – it’s affectionate.
So – when the target audience is women, what then?
Complete contempt, that’s what. The males – especially fathers and boyfriends – in commercials these days wish they were portrayed with the sensitivity of a hot chick in a bikini (although the guy narrating this video gets the message all wrong):
The point being, our ads tell us something about how advertisers (who get paid to get attitudes right) see how we see each other. And from the ads – and the crushing preponderance of them by volume – we learn:
- Men, at least in the last 30-40 years, have affectionate respect for women, while celebrating attraction
- Women think men are hopeless incompetents.
And this has been going on for well over a decade.
So is it any wonder the young fellas of GenZ are forsaking the mating game for video games and pr0n?
A female HK media exec stepped into the shit on Monday. Cooler heads stepped in, and immediately extricated themselves.
https://twitter.com/HecklerAndKoch/status/1658959377632559104?cxt=HHwWgIC8ifaw54UuAAAA
I read a response (from the left) that went something like: women shouldn’t have to mud wrestle in order to sell beer. Gosh I guess I missed those.
Is that reductio ad absurdum or straw man?
If the most important issue to millions of Americans is abortion, shouldn’t the ad agencies capitalize by showing relevent commercials?
Man slouching on the couch in t-shirt and shorts, very pregnant woman walks toward the front door.
“You going out?”
“Yes, I’m going to abort our child.”
“Okay, cool. Hey, grab me some Bud Light on the way home, willya?”
Should make a mint. I wonder why they don’t try it?
Several key points to take away from Bud Light’s vice president of marketing, Alissa Heinerscheid botched attempt at “inclusion”:
1. Inclusion is a goal and not an advertising campaign.
2. Inclusion of a group that represents less than 2% of the population is not what colleges teach in business school. The trans population is too small to make a dent in sales.
3. You don’t alienate your largest buying group of Bud Light just to get a handful of incremental sales and brag to college professors that you are “woke”.
4. I have no idea of why such a poor tasting brand like Bud Light is the #1 beer sold in America.
Even Coca-Cola learned its lesson and took New Coke off the shelves after getting a backlash from Coke drinkers. Lets see what AB Beverage does after this publicity stunt backfired on the company.
Why are you throwing transgendered people under the bus?
Why do you hate them and want them to die?
Man walks in the door with a grocery bag. He pulls a whole fresh chicken out of the bag and plunks it on the kitchen counter.
Man: “I thought we could barbecue tonight. Want to chop up the chicken while I start the grill?”
Woman: “Not tonight, I spent all day chopping up aborted babies to sell their body parts. I’ll order pizza instead.” Woman picks up the phone.
Man: “Great idea, honey. Have them bring some Diet Coke, huh? I love the refreshing taste of Diet Coke with my pizza.”
Most popular topic in America – should sell like crazy, right? I wonder why they don’t do it?
Man walks in the door with a grocery bag. He pulls a whole fresh chicken out of the bag and plunks it on the kitchen counter.
Man: “I thought we could barbecue tonight. Want to chop up the chicken while I start the grill?”
Woman: “Not tonight, I spent all day chopping up aborted babies to sell their body parts. I’ll order pizza instead.” Woman picks up the phone.
Man: “Great idea, honey. Have them bring some Diet Coke, huh? I love the refreshing taste of Diet Coke with my pizza.”
Most popular topic in America – should sell like crazy, right? I wonder why they don’t do it?
Setting aside for a moment the red state reaction to this particular Bud Light controversy.
It is quite clear that the trans movement has raced way ahead of where most people are.
EMERY: “At what point in your mother’s pregnancy with you was it no longer OK to abort you?”
I’ll join the chorus…you are a moral coward…see yourself out troll.
“Women were among the very first people to brew beer”
Among which kinds of people?
I don’t drink light/lite beer. I don’t hate it or anything, I just don’t drink it. However, I think it’s worth mentioning that the spokeswoman for Miller Lite has a really nice rack. I also appreciated the short skirt.
It is quite clear that the trans movement has raced way ahead of where most people are.
Translation: The plebs aren’t ready to embrace progressive ideas such as a biological man with an Audrey Hepburn fetish used to promote the beer they drink, especially if they drink to unwind after working hard and sacrificing more and more to keep food on the table. These rubes are so backward that they don’t want to be lectured on how their morals and values are wrong.
… oh, yeah, I forgot to mention, that there’s a video of little Miss Nice Rack, as a spokeswoman hawking for Democrat candidates, exposing those delightful tatas in a higher calling than merely selling lite beer. I’m too busy to find it now, but it’s out there.
I work in branding (but not a cowboy), and I’ve said from time to time that the reason they call it a brand is because it’s a pain in the ass that never goes away. Nevertheless, if you have a brand, you have to defend it at every step – in language, imagery, usage – or surrender it. That means that the keepers of the brand in a company must be vigilant, even if they don’t especially like the brand. To make another cowboy reference, Conn Conagher said, “If I take a man’s money, I ride for the brand.”
What I see in the beer brand brouhaha is that – at least in the case of Bud Light – the brand protector was more interested in her own brand and in making a point, rather than the company brand she was supposed to protect and promote. She undoubtedly knew what was going to happen, and didn’t care because she knew she’d become a minor sensation and be hired by a more progressive company eager to score points. It certainly wasn’t meant as a way to sell more beer.
The ML commercial started out OK; why not acknowledge the role of women in brewing history, especially around Mother’s Day? Where it went off course was to turn it into, essentially, a personal attack on men and the industry. This is not a strategy meant to sell your product, unless “you” are your product.
My own field is financial services, and I have thoughts and concerns about what I’m seeing there as well, but I’ll save those for another time.
Regarding JDM’s comments, yes, it is odd for Ms. Glazer to be “on display” in a way not much different than the bikini/etc., beer commercials of yore. This is feminism?
On the light side, with that last name, maybe Glazer should endorse donuts? Just sayin’.
All in all, it strikes me that there’s got to be a way of broadening appeal of one’s product besides “ticking off the current customer base.” I don’t believe that Bug Light or Miller Lite drinkers would be offended at all at the notion that “Mom” was historically involved in the brewing of beer–you could have a lot of fun with that one.
Except for the notion that “Mom” had something to do with the making of that carbonated donkey…..
I never liked any Anheuser Busch products. I drank PBR during my military years, switching to Miller shortly after I got out for several years, but now I’m a craft brew guy. If I try one and like it, I check them out to see if they have political views. That research has saved me from buying the products of some woke brewer that doesn’t like my views.
I’ve seen people say “This is going to boost Coors’ sales. They’re a rugged, “old west” brand, they wouldn’t fall for insanity like this”.
Coors owns Miller.
As to the ongoing mystery (to some people) why Bud Light (and now Miller) would piss off the majority of its market – in the case of Bud Light, catering to an infinitesimally small portion? It’s very simple. To the acolytes, the agenda is far more important than money or profits. The ONLY thing that will stop corporations from descending into the woke abyss is when the shareholders are harmed by reduced revenues.
Case in point: At Berkshire Hathaway’s most recent stockholder meeting, they voted “overwhelmingly” against incorporating ESG principles into the business.
https://money.usnews.com/investing/news/articles/2023-05-06/berkshire-shareholders-reject-climate-diversity-proposals-keep-buffett-as-chairman
(Personally, I’ve had 1 can of Bud Light in my life, and that was more than enough. I’d rather drink an IPA than a Bud Light, and I don’t like IPAs.)
little Miss Nice Rack
AOC?
Giving the ER NuRsE a break, and stepping away from his Berkeley horse, rAT squeaked: “Inclusion of a group that represents less than 2% of the population is not what colleges teach in business school.”
How the fuck would you know, rAT? Your MBA from Trump University isn’t even valuable as ass wipe. How much did he fleece you for?
AOC?
Yes. That woman is truly gifted in that one thing.
But no, I was continuing a comment I made a few minutes before about that Miller spokeswoman having a nice rack.
I think I know why rAT is simultaneously enthusiastic and squeamish about abortion…
How many of your rat-lets has your
ER Nursedaughter flushed down Dr. Mengele’s toilet, rAT?tia!
Oh, never mind. I watched the commercial again on Twitter and it was pointed out in the comments. I’d never heard of this gal before reading the tweet comments.
Excellent response: “Lesbian chick who hates men lectures 90% of @MillerLite’s customers. Hell of an idea!”
Between coors and inbev, there are not a lot of brews left. Unless you support your local independent as we do.
As for woke culture, NOTHING will stop them. You gonna switch to Coors? They’ll buy it. You wannt switch to an independent, they’ll buy it. They have the cash. And they WILL continue to shove their woke down your throat, and by golly, you’ll love it and ask for more! Why? Cause goobernment goons will have their back.
I believe that the people in the corner offices are finally beginning to understand that maintaining their ESG score costs them more than the salaries of a few useless DEI administrators.
The likeness between the way that ESG/DEI has wormed itself into all corners of American society and the way that fascism worked its way into German and Italian society in the 1920s & 30s is remarkable.
I guarantee, you look deeply at exactly why these corporations do these bizarre, woke things you are going to find ESG and DEI protocols at the source.
If you are selling beer, and you actually say that your corporation’s most important objective is not selling beer, you have become corrupt. You are working contrary to the reason you exist.
South Carolina is among the nations leaders in providing computer science courses for high schoolers.
Minnesota is last…in the nation.
But, y’all do have the best buttsex curriculum, and you’re a magnet for genital mutilation for kids…so you got that going for you.
https://m.startribune.com/minnesotas-high-school-tech-education-is-among-the-worst-stunting-local-industrys-growth/600275879/
But do us a favor will ya? Keep your ignorant, uneducated, degenerate kids out of South Carolina, OK??
I dont drink beer, I only drink whiskey and bourbon on occasion on the weekends occasionally but this last 2 months will go down in marketing history as how to not market your product. Rumor has it that they did this for their ESG score supposedly because I think IMBev is owned by BlackRock and this marketing executive is right out of central casting for this new crap that is failing hard.
All this almost makes me wish I still drank beer so I could quit it again.