For one who has spent much of his life in quasi-relationships with what have come to be termed “adult beverages,” the evolution of marketing within the “firewater” industry has always cracked me up. It’s about style versus substance, of course.
This isn’t to say that, historically, the various techniques utilized by Madison Avenue ad agencies, no matter how condescending their approach toward the consumer, didn’t have their desired effect upon my purchasing tendencies. I ate it up! Or drank it down, as it were.
Now, as far as beer was concerned, I really don’t recall any particular brand as holding any cachet over the rest. It wasn’t like the somewhat-fledgling national “suds” trade fought over the panhandle of Idaho. A target demographic it was not!
If memory serves, regional brews like Olympia and Lucky Lager were prevalent. Coors existed solely as a rumor, spoken in hushed tones across clandestine poker tables and known only to those worldly individuals who had actually traveled beyond western Montana.
As far as hard liquor, more than likely black-market availability played a large role in bringing Jim Beam into play. But, after relocating to California, that specific Kentucky bourbon was supplanted on my depth chart by Jack Daniel’s, a Tennessee “sour mash.”
Now this, quite possibly, is the initial example of my caving in to marketing. It could have been that iconic label or maybe just some alluring billboard display that appeared peripherally while I was cruising down a Southern California boulevard. But, whatever, I remained sold on the inherent “manly” image associated with Jack in the short term, anyway.
They say Scotch is an acquired taste. Well, if that be true, in my case it proved to be a most effortless acquisition. The marketing probably began years earlier, subliminally at least, when the Kingston Trio released their ambiance-rich croon-along classic, “Scotch and Soda.”
But it would be another musical genre, jazz, that would seal the deal. Sinatra, particularly, went down quite nicely to the accompaniment of ice cubes tinkling against glass once “Scotch on the rocks” joined the ensemble. It would provide similar embellishments, of course, when Miles and Bird and Monk improvised on any number of standards from the American Songbook.
Cutty Sark, a range of blended Scotch whisky and sherry, really had no competing suitors when it came to being my recreational Scotch of choice during those early years from my stint in the Army to my arrival in Utah. No doubt we’re once again seeing the clever ploys of marketing at work here, what with many of the “blended” Scotches of that time not really tasting all that different from one another.
Named after the fastest and greatest of the old Tea Clipper ships and featuring an illustration on its label that recalled the “bygone, glorious days of sail,” Cutty Sark held forth on the top shelf of my liquor cabinet until it got unceremoniously knocked off by a post-Super Bowl III Joe Namath ad for Johnny Walker Red Label.
Hey, I was a fan! He had led the radical Jets in an upset over the traditional Colts and in the ads there were sophisticated chicks draped all over the dude. What was a guy to do? Plus, I found the nuances involved with its taste actually appealing. To this day, many years later, it remains my blended Scotch of choice.
More recently, however, with the advent of so-called “100% agave premium tequilas,” my Scotch appetite has become somewhat diluted. It began as a shift in warm-weather repasts with snifters of frozen anejos (aged tequilas) replacing Scotch as my first option. Marketers for the Patron brand set their hooks early on.
These days, much of the marketing of premium tequilas is centered around the clear, unaged spirits known as “blanco” or “silver.” These “vodka substitutes” most notably differ from their aged counterparts in color and smoothness. Of late, however, some tequilas are actually super anejos in blanco’s clothing.
What they do is blend combinations of blancos, reposados, anejos, and “extra anejos” and then filter the color out. Casa Dragones gets $275 per bottle for its singular concoction. Although, to me, it’s not as clear as their end product, marketing to the vodka crowd is obviously the current target demographic of choice. No doubt, at some point, I’ll buy in. I usually do.
Jay Meehan is a culture junkie and an observer, participant, and chronicler of the Park City and Wasatch County social scenes for the past 40 years.