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| October 18, 2007 |
| Coors Revs Up PR Engine in Bid to Crush 'Girlie Image' |
| By Kevin McCauley |
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Molson Coors Brewing Co., the Canadian/Coloradan beer colossus, doesn't want its flagship Coors Light product to be associated with just ladies and "girlie men" any more.
 That's why it is taking over sponsorship duties for NASCAR from Budweiser in a five-year deal that allows Coors Light to plaster National Assn. of Stock Car Racing logos all over its packaging and promotional material. Good luck with that.
Budweiser, "the King of Beers," is leaving the NASCAR race track scene after a successful 25-year relationship that earned Anheuser-Busch market share in the south. The St. Louis-based brewery believes it can find richer promotional opportunities to mine in the local scene and online. It is upgrading its communications effort.
What about Coors? The brewer hopes to duplicate Bud's success by adding some of Nascar's macho luster to its light beer. It's just not going to happen.
It's been a while (okay, never) since I heard a bunch of guys watching Sunday football in a bar ordering a round of Coors Lights for the boys. Can't imagine race car watchers bellying up to the bar with some Coors Lights.
Andy England, the marketing pro at MCBC, admitted that Coors Light could use some toughness. He said the the Nascar connection was made because the audience of America's most-viewed sport "skews male." So does wrestling. Does that mean the wrestling crowd is going to down Coors Lights?
 Coors Screwed it up
Coors Light faces its gender ?problem? because its one-time parent company in Golden, Colorado, totally botched the "mystique" that was associated with its brand. Coors Light became the default brand.
The original Coors, during the '60s and '70s, was a cultural icon, something special from the Rockies.
Hank "The K" Kissinger used to squirrel cases of Coors in State Dept. aircraft after visits to Colorado. This blogger traveled from New York City with two buddies in the mid-'70s across the U.S. in a '68 Skylark. We couldn't wait until we hit the Midwest, where we could first scoop up some Coors. We also paid "homage" to the brewery.
That excitement is long gone. Coors has also been brewing its beer in Virginia since 1987. The move, it said at that time, was to reduce packaging and shipping cost to the east.
So while Coors' ads usually feature its CEO surrounded by the majestic Rockies, the Coors Light swilled by the ladies and girlie men here is made in the "Old Dominion."
I wish Molson Coors good Luck with the Nascar effort. It will need it. |
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