My heart goes out to multi-billion-dollar brewing giants MillerCoors (which recently completed its merger) and Anheuser-Busch (which is about to be taken over by Belgium’s InBev). No, really, it’s hard to look small when you are that big.
Not that it has kept the beer companies from trying. The Coors half of MillerCoors recently promised that its signature (though lesser-selling) banquet beer would continue to be brewed entirely in Colorado with Rocky Mountain Spring Water, even as production of Coors Light and other beers is spread around the country.
It also announced the long-awaited release of its first microbrew under Coors’ newly-created microbrew division, AC Golden Brewing: Herman Joseph’s Private Reserve.
Herman Joseph’s! That’s the best they could come up with?
Well, we are living in a green world, so I guess recycling names is just as good as recycling bottles, and Herman Joseph’s is as recycled as it gets, having been used for one of Coors’ older lines back in the 1980s or '90s.
Then there’s Anheuser-Busch, which has a brewery in Fort Collins and took out full page ads today in the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News to let its “friends and neighbors” know that it will “continue to brew Budweiser and all our great beer with a commitment to quality you’ve come to expect.” As if foreign ownership would make Bud taste any different.
On the other hand, the company thoughtfully sent Westword some of its new Budweiser American Ale (to differentiate it from them fureners over in Belgium, I guess). Bold.
Surprisingly, though, American Ale wasn’t bad. Smoother, sweeter and seemingly less carbonated than Bud, this “amber ale” actually had a little flavor and was easy to drink, although I’m not sure it “defines the American-style ale,” as the company says. -- Jonathan Shikes
