Episode 12: Old Milwaukee with Eli Wentz

I. Introduction

This is State Fair beer. 

First brewed in 1849 by the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company, today’s beer, remained with Schlitz until 1982 when it was acquired by Stroh Brewing of Detroit, who in turn managed it until 2000 when it was acquired by that little giant of breweries, Pabst.  Today representing itself with World War II-style pin-up girls on their cans, this beer is perhaps best known for being shilled by the fiction, but hormone-provoking, Swedish bikini team.  This is a beer that Will Ferrell loves so much he filmed free, unscripted ads for them focused on the Quad-Cities region of Iowa and Illinois (Davenport, Betterdorf, Rock Island, Moline, and East Moline - don’t worry, we had to look it up too – and why are there five cities?).  This is the beer that Consumer Reports described as the best mass-marketed beer based on the evaluation by 17 beer scholars (including several with PhDs in fermentation science) from a slate of 69 beers.

Today, on Pickled Eggs & Cold Beer, we’re talkingabout the only beer I regularly buy in a drug store. Today, folks, we’retalking about Old Milwaukee.

Today's theme is Memphis Slim's 1961 "I Just Landed in Your Town."

II. Our Guest, The Old Man in Glade Spring, Cap'n Eli Wentz

Eli Hemmingwentz.

III. Rubric

BeerAdvocate: 2.35 of 5

RateBeer: 1.39 of 5

Untappd: 2.35 of 5

ABV: 4.6%

Ingredients: Six-row malted barley, a specially-formulated corn syrup (not high fructose corn syrup), two complementary types of hops, filtered water, and cultured yeast.

Cost: $ - - - if we could type half a dollar sign we would - costs us only about $7.50 for a 12-pack at the local drug store.

IV. Our Reviews and Talking Points

Appearance: Gold, translucent, transparent. Well-carbonated (soda-esque levels). Head rapidly recedes.

Aroma: Very light, described by Dr. Wentz as the smell of a fraternity house floor the morning after a party.

Flavor: Simple lager, unassuming and nothing offensive, "not a hard-hitter," - Clayman.

Mouthfeel: Nothing of note.

Authenticity, Marketing, and Other Factors: Will Ferrell ads are on point, the retro-style pin-ups are not over-whelming, sort of nostalgic.  The Swedish Bikini Team appealed to us as hormone-driven teens, and the Monty Python-esque stuff is decent for a chuckle, but it is still pretty sex-sells heavy. 

Overall: Eli gave Old Milwaukee a rating of 3 of 5, Clayman a rating of 2.8 of 5, and Eric a 2.75 of 5 - our average score? 2.85 of 5. 

V. Sponsors

This episode was sponsored by two wonderful local businesses:

Leben Farms of Abingdon, Virginia

Leben Farms is a community supported-agriculture (CSA) program that offers locally grown fresh vegetables in weekly boxes to its members in Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee.  Using organic and regenerative practices to grown nutrient dense food, community-supported agriculture is a food production and distribution system that directly connects farmers and consumers. In short: people buy "shares" of a farm's harvest in advance and then receive a portion of the crops as they're harvested.

Check them out on Facebook or Instagram.

Glade Pharmacy in Glade Spring, Virginia

33472 Lee Hwy, Glade Spring, VA 24340

Locally owned and managed, Glade Pharmacy provides the highest quality pharmaceutical service in the Emory/Glade Spring area.

VI. Plugs

Aplastic Anemia and MDS International Foundation

Be the Match Foundation

The Martha Washington Inn

Abingdon, Virginia

Mehl's Bakery at the Abingdon Farmer's Market

Abingdon, Virginia 

Morgan's 

Abingdon, Virginia

Prince

Spam

Wolf Hills Brewing 

Abingdon, Virginia

VII. Selected Reading and Viewing

Rusty Blazenhoff.  January 20, 2012. "Will Ferrell Creates Unscripted Old Milwaukee Beer Ads for Free in Various Midwest Cities." Laughing Squid

Marc Fisher.  May 25, 1996.  "Ale Freezes Over: Old Milwaukee Leads the Pack in Taste Test." The Washington Post. 

Dave Infante.  August 12, 2014.  "Remembering the Swedish Bikini Team: Beer Advertising's Forgotten First Ladies." Thrillist. 

Tim Nudd. March 20, 2012.  "Will Ferrell or Old Milwaukee: I Just Love a Good, Crappy Beer."  Adweek. 

Chris Schonberger.  July 4, 2013.  "America's Best Cheap Beers, Ranked."  First We Feast.

Ronald Theriot.  February 12, 2011. "Old Milwaukee."  Louisiana Beer Reviews.  On YouTube.

VIII. Selected Advertisements

c. 1975

c.1976

c. 1980

c. 1980

c. 1987

c. 1991 The Swedish Bikini Team

[For some reason we're having trouble embedding these, so we're doing simple links: 1 and 2]

c. 2012

c. 2012

c. 2012

c. 2012

c. 2012

c. 2013

Episode 2: Bud Light with Brendan Roche

Clayman doesn't like Bud Light.

I. Introduction

It is the best-selling beer in the United States, the third best-selling on Earth, a yellow beverage that is so ubiquitous that the only thing as large as its presence on supermarket and convenience store shelves is its advertising presence.  The great cold war between multinational beer corporations rages on, in its fourth decade at least, as alliances and corporations grow ever larger, consolidating resources, developing intensive and extensive logistics systems, data analysis mechanisms, but the leading weapons are not intercontinental weapons or aircraft carriers, but inexpensive adjunct lagers that promise palatable low caloric costs with sufficiently high alcoholic content, packaged in an inoffensive form.   What is amazing is the scale and consistent quality of this undertaking – today’s beer alone generates around half a billion US dollars a year, in no small part because it is nearly always of the same essential quality no matter where or when one buys it – a miracle of technology and planning whose history mirrors that of modernization itself.  

Today on Pickled Eggs & Cold Beer we raise our glasses and consider the imperial behest of arguably the greatest of corporate mascots of the 1980s, the late, the great, Spuds McKenzie.  

Today, we’re talking about Bud Light.

Today's theme - Clara Smith's "Deep Sea Blues," recorded in 1924 with saxophone and piano accompaniment  

II. Our Treasured Guest, Brendan Roche, Esq. 

Dr. Smith, Mr. Clayman, Squire Roche, Champ Flair

III. Rubric

BeerAdvocate: 1.86 of 5 

RateBeer: 1.23 of 5

Untappd: 2.26 of 5 

ABV: 4.2% 

Origin: Breweries around the world, including thirteen breweries in the United States in St. Louis, Missouri; Newark, New Jersey; Van Nuys, California; Tampa, Florida; Houston, Texas; Columbus, Ohio; Jacksonville, Florida; Merrimack, New Hampshire; Williamsburg, Virginia; Fairfield, California; Baldwinsville, New York; Fort Collins, Colorado; and Cartersville, Georgia 

Ingredients: beer is made from water, barley malt, rice, yeast and hops

Cost: $;between $10 and $13 for a 12-pack

IV. Our Reviews and Talking Points

Appearance: Pale yellow, bubbly, full white head that recedes fairly quickly

Aroma: very little

Flavor: Inoffensive, watery, beer with all dramatic notes shaven off

Mouthfeel: Watery, bubbly

Authenticity, Marketing, and Other Factors: So ubiquitous it seems to lack a real sense of self; great marketing but so much that it is overwhelming.  

Overall: Mr. Roche gave it 2-Stars; Mr. Clayman gave it 1-Star; and Dr. Smith gave it 2-Stars.  Overall? 1.67 Stars

V. Plugs

As always, please support local breweries, eateries, artists and music - also, please check out :

The Ric Flair Shop

The Virginia Creeper Fly Shop

Abingdon, Virginia

Sugar Hill Brewing

St. Paul, Virginia

Wolf Hills Brewing

Abingdon, Virginia

Mac's Chicharonnes (Pork Rinds) 

Chicago, Illinois

Old South Pickled Eggs

Alma, Arkansas

VI. Recommended Reading and Viewing

Tom Acitelli. March 30, 2017. "Bud Light and the Light Beer Arms Race: A-B's Bestseller Turns 35."  All About Beer Magazine.

Overton v. Anheuser-Busch (1994) 205 Mich. App. 259

Ronald Theriot. "Bud Light." Louisiana Beer Reviews. 

G. B. Wilcox. 2001. "Beer brand advertising and market share in the United States: 1977 to 1998

GB Wilcox."  International Journal of Advertising.

VII. Selected Advertisements

c. 1982

c. 1983

c. 1985

c. 1985

c. 1987

c. 1987

c. 1989

c. 1992

c. 1995 to 2001

c. 1999

Episode 2 Teaser: Bud Light with Squire Brendan Roche

Dr. Smith, Mr. Clayman, and Squire Roche

Friday the 13th is renowned as a day of bad luck, a day that it is dangerous to engage with ladders, black cats, mirrors of the breakable ilk, and so forth.  But as we are neither Donald Duck, Popeye, nor Tom the Cat (prestigious animated characters though they may be) we are nonetheless issuing our second big ep on that very day!  Will it be great?  Possibly.  Will it feature a lawyer talking about Bud Light?  Definitely.   See you then, cats and kittens.

Available on iTunes, Stitcher, and Castos!