When Todd Ahsmann became president of Goose Island Beer Co. in November, the brewery was in the midst of picking a new creative agency to help turn around struggling sales.
Ahsmann, who is 52 but can pass for 10 years younger in his jeans and flannel shirt, sat through presentations from four agencies. He rejected them all.
“None felt like Goose Island to me,” he said.
Ahsmann has a unique perspective on Goose Island’s “feel.”
He has known Goose Island founder John Hall almost as long as he’s been alive; he became friends with John’s son, Greg, in the first grade. When John Hall launched Goose Island as a brewpub in 1988, Ahsmann was one of its first bartenders, endlessly explaining the difference between ales and lagers for customers befuddled by the burgeoning craft beer movement. He later spent 10 years in Goose Island’s marketing department, which was where he worked when John Hall stunned the world in 2011 by selling the brewery to the world’s largest beer company, Anheuser-Busch InBev.
Though he was new to the role as Goose Island’s president, Ahsmann’s roots were deep enough to confidently decline all four pitches.
“They felt like generic ads you see on TV for any consumer packaged goods,” he said.
Instead, he wanted “disruptive and urban.”
THINKING BIG ABOUT BEER
Ahsmann wound up picking Colorado-based Crispin Porter + Bogusky for the job and, more important, for a new campaign debuting Sunday: "Think Big About Beer." It is a campaign, he said, that embraces Goose Island's vast scope, from its 30-year-old Chicago roots to its international footprint
In the first spot, Greg Hall and Goose Island brewmaster Jared Jankoski take turns listing the things the brewery could have been (“We could have just made beer for beer people”), before Hall concludes, from a wide shot of Goose Island’s sprawling barrel-aging warehouse, “But I guess that just felt a little too small.” (It should be noted that the Anheuser-Busch connection is nowhere to be found in the ad.)
“We’ve always had big ideas,” Ahsmann said. “It’s the scale of those big ideas that have changed.”
"Think Big About Beer" will be joined in 2018 by new beers, new packaging and maybe even a Super Bowl commercial
Virtually every major Goose Island brand was down nationally last year in grocery, convenience, big box and drug stores, according to Chicago-based market research firm IRI: 312 Urban Wheat Ale fell 19 percent; Green Line Pale Ale and Four Star Pils were each down 35 percent; Honker’s Ale fell 49 percent; even sales of Goose Island variety packs were down 33 percent.
Goose Island IPA saw the only significant growth, up 29 percent because it’s priced aggressively and it’s a companywide priority, on par with Budweiser, Bud Light and Stella Artois. But even that success came with an asterisk: Goose Island IPA was surpassed in sales rank by Founders Brewing’s All Day IPA, which dropped Goose Island IPA from the nation’s third-biggest-selling IPA to fourth.
(Draft beer sales are not figured in IRI data, and Ahsmann said he’s confident that Goose Island has the most IPA tap handles in the nation; he declined to share figures.)
Even more of a concern was the damage in Goose Island’s own backyard: 312 Urban Wheat Ale, Green Line, Four Star Pils and Honker’s Ale were all down double digits in Chicago. Goose Island’s overall Chicago sales were down 7 percent, while one of its biggest local competitors, Revolution Brewing, was up 34 percent.
Austin Harvey, manager at Lakeview beer shop and bar Beermiscuous, said interest in Goose Island’s specialty releases remains solid, but the broader portfolio is largely an afterthought for his customers.
“People want to try new things constantly, and barring that, they want beer that’s made in their area, or even ZIP code,” Harvey said. “As a national brand, Goose doesn’t have the indie cred of newer, smaller breweries in town.”
So Ahsmann has some work to do.
‘WHERE’S THE GRITTY VIBE?’
First up: “Think Big About Beer,” a campaign that supplants Goose Island’s previous marketing push, “To What’s Next,” which was launched in 2014. Also receding — though not disappearing completely — will be advertising based on Anheuser-Busch’s hop farm in northern Idaho, which became a central optic during the national push behind Goose Island IPA.
Recently, Ahsmann said, he began wondering about Goose Island’s messaging: “Where’s the city? Where’s the gritty vibe?”
“I feel like we were maybe getting a little bit off track,” he said. “It’s time to correct course in how we speak to the consumer.”
Goose Island’s story is therefore returning to Chicago — an effort to tie the brewery not just to its hometown, but to cities in general: urban and bustling, with a dose of cosmopolitan and hip.
“It’s something that can be owned and is differentiating for Goose Island,” Ahsmann said. “Think about it: Can you think of any other nationally distributed craft brewer based out of a city?”
There are others, of course — Brooklyn Brewery, Boston Beer Co. and Anchor Brewing in San Francisco — but none that owns the idea of city in the way that Corona is beach or Coors is mountains. Ahsmann wants Goose Island to be that beer. He wants “Think Big About Beer” to tell that story.
Goose Island is also tweaking its beer and its packages.
Within two weeks of returning to Goose Island, Ahsmann bought a canning line. It’s a fairly small one, filling just four cans at a time — no bigger than you’d see at far smaller breweries. But that was the idea. Goose Island plans to churn out a wave of new and experimental beers in 16-ounce cans to connect with its home audience.
The first, 312 Dry-Hopped, was released in early March. It emerged in a stark and handsome black can with simple, blocky gold lettering. An image of the can became the brewery’s most-liked Instagram post ever. 312 Dry-Hopped sold so briskly that the brewery is releasing more — a batch more than double the size of the first — in early April.
Lu-Wow will be next, a tropical IPA boasting notes of coconut and pineapple — “perfect for summer,” Ahsmann said. That will be followed by Soleil, a bright saison with kombucha and ginger, and Hombre Secreto, a saison with mango aged in tequila barrels.
As important as the beers are their 16-ounce cans — the chosen vessel of the industry’s hippest breweries.
“It doesn’t take a genius to walk around bars and liquor stores and see what’s going on,” Ahsmann said. “People are putting out innovation in 16-ounce cans.”
The money for Goose Island’s new canning line just so happened to be available in the marketing budget — which seems appropriate, considering that a canning line for Goose Island is less a necessity and more a means to redefine itself for the local audience.
“I do think it’s marketing — it keeps you relevant,” Ahsmann said. “It helps affirm we are a craft brewery in Chicago.”
STAYING NIMBLE
Ahsmann is undertaking an approach similar to his two-year stint as president of Blue Point Brewing on Long Island. Blue Point was the second brewery bought by Anheuser-Busch in what wound up being a 10-brewery coast-to-coast shopping spree between 2011 and 2017. Ahsmann was plucked from Goose Island for the job in 2015.
Under Ahsmann, Blue Point scored hits with Prop Stopper (an IPA made with seaweed), Hazy Bastard (a hazy IPA), Beach Plum Gose (beach plum is a fruit native to Long Island) and Citrus Plunge (a citrus-forward IPA). All were packaged in 16-ounce cans pasted with stickers — just as the smallest and hippest breweries do.
“They definitely changed their standing,” said Chris O’Leary, who writes about New York City beer for the Brew York website. “It started with the marketing they rolled out — which is brilliantly polished, like Anheuser-Busch work, but still plays an authentic local angle.”
Blue Point’s stream of innovation and intense focus on local identity came off as “more nimble than I think a lot of people thought an Anheuser-Busch brewery would be,” O’Leary said.
In fact, that’s the exact word Ahsmann uses to describe his plans at Goose Island. “I’m telling everybody to be ready to be nimble,” he said.
In addition to 16-ounce cans, Ahsmann plans to tweak the approach to Goose Island’s high-end portfolio, for its family of heralded whiskey barrel-aged Bourbon County beers and beyond. He declined to specify changes for Bourbon County other than to say he sees “lots and lots of runway” for growth.
The plan is clearer for Matilda, one of the first beers made with Brettanomyces yeast, and Sofie, a saison aged in wine barrels with orange peel. Anheuser-Busch has touted both beers as potential high-end breakthroughs to compete with the growing wine and spirits categories; yet both declined in national sales in 2017, according to IRI. Matilda was also down heavily in Chicago, while Sofie grew only marginally.
Ahsmann said a redesign of Matilda’s label and bottle last year — to a darker, squattier look — was a failure that needs to be addressed. Both it and Sofie could end up with refreshed labels and in sleek 500-milliliter bottles; the brewery is adding equipment to accommodate such bottles. (At the moment, Goose Island can fill certain 500-milliliter bottles — the stocky ones used for the Bourbon County beers.)
As for the struggling main portfolio, Ahsmann said he remains confident: “You surround it with innovation and tell a good story, and that’s how breweries grow. All the elements are there for us. We just have to put the puzzle pieces together.”
The flagship will continue to be Goose Island IPA, though the company is a bit less bullish on its prospects. Ahsmann’s boss, Felipe Szpigel, president of Anheuser-Busch’s craft beer unit, called The High End, has publicly stated a goal of making Goose IPA the nation’s top-selling IPA by 2020. The brewery is waving the white flag on that front, Ahsmann said; catching up to leader Lagunitas is such a steep climb that Goose Island is instead trying to develop “the No. 1 hoppy portfolio” in the nation.
This month it launched the national release of Midway IPA — presumably to do battle with Founders All Day IPA — and in the fall will release Old Man Grumpy Pale Ale, introduced two years ago as a Chicago-and-draft-only beer, that will be going national in 12-ounce cans.
Like most of Goose Island's national brands, the beers will not be brewed in Chicago; they'll be made by the Craft Brew Alliance in Portsmouth, N.H.
BIG CRAFT BEER STRUGGLES
The portfolio’s struggles, Ahsmann said, are nothing unique to Goose Island; it’s the same phenomenon other large craft breweries are facing: San Diego’s Green Flash Brewing recently ended distribution in 32 states (including Illinois) and put its East Coast brewery up for sale. Trade journal Beer Marketer’s Insights reported in January that many of the nation’s largest craft breweries were down in 2017, including Boston Beer, Sierra Nevada, New Belgium, Deschutes, the Craft Brew Alliance (maker of Kona, Redhook and Widmer), Oskar Blues and Boulevard — in addition to Goose Island.
Goose Island’s challenges exist at multiple levels, said David Steinman, senior editor of Beer Marketer’s Insights’ Craft Brew News. Among them is that the company has pushed its IPA at the expense of other brands. It is also competing for resources and attention within Anheuser-Busch’s craft beer division.
As an example, he cited Space Dust IPA, from Seattle’s Elysian Brewing — a brewery Anheuser-Busch bought in 2015 — which got a national launch last year and has surged past Goose Island IPA sales in 2018.
“That will prove to be a tricky balance for Anheuser-Busch for all of their partners, but especially Goose Island because it’s the largest one,” Steinman said.
In the era when small and local beer brands are often most attractive to consumers, being big can be an obstacle. The large breweries are at once trying to simplify portfolios but also trying to tantalize customers with new brands.
“Being a national craft brewery can work, but it’s harder to do than it ever has been,” Steinman said.
Ahsmann said national craft brands such as Goose Island are simply at a down point in a natural oscillation.
“There’s a ceiling for how many national craft beer companies there can be, but there’s room for national craft beer companies,” he said. “I take a long-term view of everything.”
But do people want craft beer and innovation from a brewery owned by Anheuser-Busch, whose IPA comes from the same tanks as Bud Light? He bristled at the question.
“I don’t believe people think Goose Island is not cool. I really don’t,” he said. He mentioned the brewery’s 312 Day party March 12, where rappers Danny Brown and Joey Purp performed for a capacity crowd of 1,200.
He picked up a photo of Purp playing at last year’s 312 Urban Block Party. The image was taken from the stage, behind Purp, as he entertained a crowd jammed across Fulton Street, in front of the brewery as the sun set.
“Who doesn’t think we’re cool when we’re throwing parties like this?” Ahsmann said. “If people don’t think we’re cool, it’s because they’re not paying attention.”
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