“Can we all agree to temporarily raise the bar for what’s considered an ‘alcoholic?’” Conan O’Brien tweeted to his 28.6 million followers on April 11.
Most jokes contain a bitter truth, and in this case, the truth is that social distancing measures and stay-at-home orders mean more adults are drinking alone at home, and disruptions to normal routines have upended standard conventions around alcohol use.
This is the age of the noon-time “quarantini.”
The changes are so serious the World Health Organization issued a statement April 14 reminding the public that alcohol increases health vulnerability, risk-taking behaviors, and violence, noting that “people at risk or who have an alcohol-use disorder are particularly vulnerable, especially when in self-isolation.” These drinkers may also pose a danger to others in situations of domestic violence and child abuse.
As COVID-19 has made at-home consumption more appealing than at any other time in recent memory, and as those with means stock up and drink more, it raises moral questions of how producers should behave when public health is front of mind. A fridge packed with beer hasn’t felt this fraught since the last recession.
Feelings of uncertainty, fear, and stress have increased while more people are isolated from support systems of family, friends, and community groups. The guardrails that might curtail their drinking, like reporting to work or having to drive, are less sturdy. Loosening alcohol regulations that allow home delivery are saving some small companies even as they make buying booze easier than ever—and there’s no bartender screening whether you’re overserved.
Americans also have more alcohol on hand: data from market research company IRI shows servings of beer (which includes flavored malt beverages) purchased during COVID-19 are up 17.8% at grocery stores and other retailers as shoppers stock up on larger packages. The growth is even larger for wine and spirits tracked by IRI.
Even accounting for a decrease in stockpiling behaviors this month, alcohol sales are up 27% year-over-year for the week ending April 7, according to IRI. Owen Schrull of Ashebrooke Liquor Outlet in Morgantown, West Virginia says half-gallons of liquor are flying off his shelves. The average order during the COVID-19 period, he estimates, totals about $200.
As the psychological burdens of this pandemic mount and backstops to alcohol consumption recede, how should breweries adjust their messaging? They have a product to sell—and they’re more desperate for revenue than ever—but their customers are potentially in a vulnerable mental space. The smartest companies will find a way to thread the needle.
Last month, Tom Harvey published a blog post on his company’s website titled “Marketing Advice for Drinks Retailers, Off-licences, and Bottle Shops During (and After) Coronavirus.” Harvey is the co-founder of YesMore Agency, a London- and California-based drinks marketing agency, and he’s concerned by the pandemic’s potential to exacerbate unhealthy drinking habits.
“It flags a wider problem for the industry as a whole,” Harvey says in the video. A global crisis means alcohol producers should “go a bit beyond your usual [approach of] slap a logo up on your ad that says ‘drink responsibly’ … and actually think about the reasons why people might be drinking now.”
Harvey goes on to caution alcohol producers against promoting memes like “gin and bear it” or “keep calm and drink on.” Those may seem like harmless fun in stressful times, but Harvey says they normalize problematic drinking and don’t fit into most companies’ overall messaging or strategy. There’s real danger, legally and in terms of public perception, in aligning a brand with alcohol abuse, even in the short-term.
“These are not good things to associate with your brand, and can be damaging long after you’ve spent millions on perception-change campaigns,” Harvey tells Good Beer Hunting. “Ask any Brit of a certain age what the beer Stella Artois is also known as, and they’ll say ‘The Wife Beater.’ This nickname took the brand decades to shake and still haunts them today.”
Responsible messaging isn’t just morally correct, he argues, but is to the industry’s benefit. Before the coronavirus outbreak, regulators in the U.K. had been closely watching the alcohol industry to catch producers flouting rules regarding sales and advertising. A government health agency even pushed to add warning labels to alcohol similar to those on cigarettes. Every time an alcohol producer markets its products irresponsibly, Harvey argues, the case for tighter regulations grows stronger.
In the U.S., loosened alcohol laws such as those allowing home delivery in the wake of COVID-19 have been a necessary lifeline for producers who can logistically offer such services. The natural business goal would be, of course, to sell as much alcohol as possible. But if producers want regulators to keep current laws in place long-term, it behooves them to promote responsible consumption. Otherwise, lawmakers might see looser regulations as adding to a public health crisis.
Breweries’ messaging not only has present-day health ramifications, but will be associated with their respective brands as the pandemic continues—and even after it’s receded.
So, what does a responsible tone around alcohol consumption look like during a global crisis? The marketing department at Portland, Maine’s Allagash Brewing Company sketched out an answer to that question last month.
The department, led by marketing director Jeff Pillet-Shore, quickly decided the pandemic meant that nothing—within and outside of the company—would continue as usual. The brewery needed to review all events, marketing, and social media through the new lens of the crisis.
Other breweries are belatedly coming to the same conclusion. The Veil Brewing Co. in Richmond, Virginia last week announced it would suspend sales from its two taprooms after critics said its beer releases were drawing crowds that violated social-distancing protocols. The Veil built its reputation on long lines for coveted beer releases; in an Instagram post announcing the release of Sector 5 Quadruple IPA on April 14, the brewery imposed a one-case-per-person limit and encouraged customers to “act fast because this one is going to go quick.”
In a subsequent Instagram post announcing a stop to beer sales from its taproom, The Veil wrote: “These changes are not easy and are a complete 180 from what our business model once was, but we are truly focused on continuing to keep our staff and customers safe through this all.”
To avoid such backtracking, breweries may find it simpler to pause all previously scheduled marketing, events, and social media posts to give themselves time to reevaluate. Pillet-Shore says Allagash did so in order to focus on what communications should look like at a time when customers and retail partners like bottle shops, bars, and restaurants are fighting to survive. Now, the brewery is deliberately posting more content featuring those partners and charitable efforts to help them.
Many Americans are struggling physically, emotionally, and financially as a result of the pandemic. Allagash evaluates all of its messaging now with that in mind, applying “an extra filter” in evaluating every photo or sentence it publishes. Sometimes that involves circulating a piece of potential content to more staff members to get their feedback; other times, it means drafting a post and then waiting a day, coming back to it with fresh eyes, and asking whether it still feels on-message.
Photos of people drinking Allagash at events or in large groups are out. Ditto any images or words that could make people feel isolated or lonely, like photos of empty streets or venues. The brewery has instead posted more photos of its beer alongside food, showing drinking in the context of meals rather than as an activity in and of itself.
Allagash has also been posting photos of “Maine moments” to social media each morning. They’re images of beaches, sunsets, and lighthouses captioned “from Maine with love” or “Sincerely, your friends at Allagash.” Pillet-Shore says it’s a way of acknowledging people’s unease while “allowing our beers to be a positive space.” That tone is starkly different from the “gin and bear it” approach some alcohol brands have taken, even as both respond to the same anxieties.
Allagash successfully reevaluated its playbook and made small decisions to tailor its message in real time. Brands who don’t risk looking tone deaf.
“One thing to ask yourself if you are a [content] creator: How is this going to make my audience feel, what emotions will it bring out in them?” Mae Karwowski, chief executive of influencer agency Obviously told The New York Times. “We want to make sure brands aren’t attached to those really negative things that are happening while still acknowledging that we’re all communally going through this.”
With more time than ever to scroll through social media and read companies’ newsletters, customers are guaranteed to notice the good, the bad, and the painfully out-of-touch. Alcohol brands promoting their products as a response to desperation and anxiety—even softened with humor—could be stuck with those negative connotations longer than they intend.
In a fast and forceful way, COVID-19 is revealing inequalities and challenges that have long remained hidden in plain sight or culturally ignored. One of those: alcohol is, by definition, a poison. It’s vulnerable to abuse by anyone, but especially by those whom this crisis has most devastated—the lonely, the marginal, the struggling.
What our present situation has also laid bare is that ignoring such truths comes at great cost. Alcohol producers who disregard their role in this ecosystem can unintentionally do harm to others and their own reputations.
“No brand in their right mind would want to be known as the drink for alleviating
anxiety, loneliness or depression,” YesMore’s Tom Harvey says. “So why tap into meme culture that trivializes drinking for such reasons in the short term simply for a quick buck?”
The temptation to crack a joke or sell beer to drinkers as a coping mechanism is fleeting. But successful brands will recognize their customers’ range of emotions and promote healthy responses to them. With projections indicating this virus will wreak havoc for some time, beer can’t market itself as a tool to numb people through a crisis period. The crisis is going to be our new normal, and we’ll need to do more than gin and bear it.
Words by Kate Bernot