Authenticity vs novelty: modern brands standing out
Craft beer spent decades chasing novelty, until the market simply got exhausted. In this clip from You’re Not the Audience, Parliament Creative Director Calvin Ross Carl explains why regional and heritage beers like Rainier Beer quietly won by becoming more themselves, and why brands that defend their niche are building walls around their business. He also looks at Athletic Brewing’s quick dominance in non-alcoholic beer, the drop in on-premise sales, and the difference between the beer you explore when you go out and the standby in your fridge. It’s from the You’re Not the Audience episode on beer brands, The Death of Boring Beer Brands.
Watch the full episode
Outline
Summary
Calvin Ross Carl shares his overarching thoughts on the beer category. Craft beer generated real excitement by chasing novelty after decades when only lagers existed, but constantly changing flavors and trends eventually exhausted everyone except the most diehard fans.
Meanwhile, regional beers, domestics, and some craft brands spent those years becoming more authentic and more focused on their niche. Rainier Beer and brands like it weren’t trying to become more relevant; they were trying to become more themselves. That focus also helps drinkers become more themselves, turning a simple American lager into an aspirational brand they can live into.
Calvin warns that these cycles repeat, especially with renewed consolidation, but says doubling down on who you are is never a bad idea. He closes with Athletic Brewing’s grip on the NA category and how falling on-premise sales are pushing people back to their at-home standards.
Highlights
Decades of chasing novelty exhausted the craft beer market.
Regional beers like Rainier won by becoming more themselves.
Going broad watered down craft brands that started with a niche.
Athletic has become the Q-tip of non-alcoholic beer.
Falling on-premise sales push people toward their old standards.
Key insights
Novelty has a shelf life
Constant change can create excitement, but eventually customers can’t find the thing they liked last time and tune out.
Focus builds walls around a business
Brands that narrow down and create a world worth exploring do better than those spreading SKUs across categories.
Innovation should be rooted in identity
New products are fine when they come from who you are. A beer company making canned margaritas will lose to someone who is truly focused on margaritas.
Exploring and staying home are different decisions
Going out invites novelty, while the beer in your fridge is a standby. Right now the zeitgeist favors staying home with old standards.
Detailed analysis
The clip reframes authenticity as consistency over time. Rainier and other heritage brands didn’t chase relevance; they compounded who they already were until their brands became places drinkers wanted to belong.
Calvin’s observation about Athletic shows how fast a focused brand can lock up a category, to the point where its name becomes the generic term people ask for at the bar.
Conclusion
Heritage and authenticity are crushing novelty right now, and while the cycle may turn again, Calvin argues it’s never a bad idea to double down on who you are.
Transcript
So here’s just some overarching thoughts about all of this. For the last few decades—let me think of how I want to put this. For the last few decades, craft—oh boy, I’m going to get it out. Okay. Craft beer has spent decades trying to become more novel and chasing novelty, which really worked for some time, because, you know, there were decades before that where it was just the same type of beer, and only lagers existed. And so craft beer really did generate a lot of excitement in the beer category, and it really blew up.
The problem was, after decades of chasing new novel beers, chasing trends, trying to create different flavor trends, the crowd became exhausted. Unless you’re a truly diehard fan, it becomes really exhausting to chase a category that is constantly changing like that, where every time you go into your favorite brewery, they’ve got different beers that you’ve never had. Where’s the one that you liked last time? There’s all this kind of stuff that happens. And so that really created a problem where the whole market just got exhausted.
And then what happened quietly during that time was all these regional beers and domestics, and a lot of craft ones too, that saw where the future was going. They spent all those decades just becoming more themselves, more authentic to what they actually cared about, and even more focused on their niche. I think that was the thing that a lot of craft brands especially really lost sight of: it was them focusing on their niche that made them successful initially, and once they tried to go broad, it just watered their brand down, and everyone lost sight of what they were doing.
So Rainier Beer and many others like it weren’t trying to become more relevant. They were just trying to become more themselves. And I think that’s one of the biggest things to learn from what’s happened in the whole beer industry, and the spirits industry in general. The places that are sticking to their guns, defending their niche, narrowing down, creating a world that’s worth exploring, as opposed to just spreading wide and creating more SKUs across different categories—they really just nail down the one that they’re good in. Those are the places that seem to be building walls around their business and doing well.
And the important thing about that is, when you’re a drinker and you like drinking Rainier or something like that, when that brand is becoming more and more itself and it’s becoming more steeped in this world that you enjoy, that brand is helping you become more of yourself as well. It helps you imbue yourself with that world more, and it becomes an aspirational brand then, even though it’s simple. This is an American lager, and there are other American lagers like it, technically, but this one is yours, and it is an aspirational brand that you can live into.
So I think that’s kind of it right now. Heritage, authenticity—whatever authenticity means, but that’s maybe a whole other discussion. Heritage and authenticity are just crushing novelty and that premium craft messaging right now. And it probably won’t be like that forever. I think these kinds of categories go in cycles. There’s been some greater consolidation in the beer category again, where AB InBev and brands like that have bought up a lot of small craft breweries. So I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole cycle happens again. That’s probably something for these brands that are smaller and more focused to be mindful of. But right now, I don’t think it’s ever a bad idea to just double down on who you are.
So, all right. That’s some thoughts on beer and where it’s going. I think that kind of hits a lot of the notes I wanted to make sure—let me look through my notes really fast. See if there’s anything exciting I wanted to make sure we hit on. Oh, I think that’s it. I mean, I could talk about beer and whatnot forever. I’ll just say some of the brands that we’ve worked with are working on things that I am very excited about, that I think help them become more themselves. And I think that’s really good. I don’t think it’s bad to have some kind of innovation in your product line. I think it just really needs to be rooted in who you are and not chasing, like, “Oh, we’re a beer company. Let’s make canned margaritas.” There’s no way you win at that game, because someone who’s really focused on that will end up beating you.
Actually, I mean, I’m drinking an Athletic right now. I think Athletic became so quickly dominant that the NA industry is actually going to be really difficult to break into, because at least from my perspective, it seems like the word Athletic has almost become kind of like the Q-tip of the NA industry. You can go to a bar and ask for an Athletic, and if they don’t have Athletic, the person’s like, “Well, we’ve got this one.” And I’ve seen that happen on-premise, you know, at bars, a lot.
And so that’s actually one thing I didn’t talk about: I think another challenging factor in this is that on-premise sales have dropped a lot. That’s sales that actually happen at bars. People aren’t going out as much. So when people aren’t going out as much as they used to, they’re just going to the store and buying things and returning to their old standards.
You know, I always talk about how there’s a couple types of drinking, or food, or anything like this. There’s the exploratory one, where you’re like, “I’ve never had this. I’m going to go out and try this. I’m excited.” I’m chasing the novelty. But what’s the one that’s at home in your fridge? What’s the one that’s just there for you all the time? Those are two very different decisions from a consumer perspective. And I think for years we had the “we’re going out, let’s chase novelty.” And now the zeitgeist is currently, let’s be at home, let’s stick by our old standards. And so that’s where I think a lot of that regional focus and everything really nails it. But all right.