That Mythic Beer Guy
By
We are sure to see lots of him during the Super Bowl. Call him the beer guy. He is happy, loud, playful, and a bit of a dunce. He could be a fraternity brother. He could be a sports fan. But most of all he’s a myth.
The Beer Guy is mostly a figment of the marketing imagination. He was invented to sell things to men. And men, many of them, like Beer Guy well enough. Most of these guys can do a convincing performance of Beer Guy. And there are moments when this is precisely the person they wish to be.
But it’s also true that even for these guys, Beer Guy is a stereotype and an embarrassment. As the standard device for selling beer, it is tired, stupid and done.
Certainly, if you put guys in a focus group room, they will tell you how much they like beer guy. After all, this is the idiom men use for certain social occasions. But if we spend a little more time talking to men, we discover that there are depths and subtleties to masculinity and most males that the Beer Guy modality does not capture and cannot represent. Indeed, there are many people in the average portfolio of selves than marketer’s seem to know about it. It’s as if marketing has latched on to Beer Guy and now clings to him for dear life.
Does Beer Guy sell beer? I think there’s a certain amount of wear-out here. It’s enough already. Guys are not going to foment a revolution of the kind that women brought against marketers. No, they will just grow ever more tepid in their brand enthusiasm. Anyone who insists on using Beer Guy to sell beer is trading in tedium. And is there any thing more tedious than a typical beer ad. Really, in the world of culture and creativity, the typical beer ad comes across of the idiot cousin.
Somewhere someone right now is working on an ad for the SuperBowl. Let’s ask them to do at least this: work in secret signals that let us know that you know that this is not all there is to the American male. These guys you insist on portraying as big happy dopes? They actually have higher intellectual faculties. How about engaging them.
9 Comments
December 28th, 2009 at 9:58 pm
As long as they don’t revert to the old Lowenbrau-yuppie campaign from the 1980s. I can still remember their crappy jingle “Here’s to good friends, tonight is kind of special…” and the vaguely creepy pod people the commercials depicted.
BTW, Dos Equis has already gone for a different masculine stereotype with The Most Interesting Man in the World, who brings a unique aspect of dignity to the imagined customer base. Stay thirsty, my friend.
December 29th, 2009 at 1:15 am
The one that annoys me most is the Uverse commercial billed more as football than beer; where the wife asks the husband to watch football in the basement, while he refuses to budge from his lucky couch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hvfcmomC18
I can’t wait that commercial to wither and die under the consumer apathy you describe.
December 29th, 2009 at 9:37 am
How about the Dos Equis “most interesting man in the world” campaign? An ironic slap at Beer Guy with just enough Beer Guy markers to be recognizable?
December 29th, 2009 at 9:52 am
Steve and Tom, yes, I thought Dos Equis was a daring departure from the rules. Using an old guy? The nerve! And it’s a little like the Old Spice spot with Bruce Campbell from Burn Notice. Sending up that “Mr. Large and In Charge” notion. Except because this guy is fully mature there is a small glint of authenticity. He lived to tell about it.
Rebecca, wow, I hadn’t seen the Uverse spot. Knuckle head city. Thanks.
The great thing about this form is that it is so fully formed, it should now be possible for the ad world to dismantle it convention by convention.
Thanks.
December 29th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Great multi-dimensional food-for-thought piece. Thank you
. I agree that the beer guy is an edulcorated/reduced “persona” appealing to people’s “desirable state” for some, not sure to what else of others. But that doesn’t make it a myth, in my opinion: an ideal-type, a la Weber maybe. Is there really no connection with anybody’s flesh-n-blood person attribute, attitude or behavior (etc.)? Mmh. Well, i’ve actually had some mirages of the myth beer-guy. He materializes in front of my very eyes occasionally along my 12 years of life in U.S. But that does not matter.
The saddest circumstance is that when the epitomes of such beer guy make their appearance as flesh-and-blood tourists in Europe, *I* inevitably find myself engaging in elaborate discussions with my friends in Germany, Italy, France in the (often illusory) effort of building my (year after year) argument that U.S.A. is not *only* that beer-guy. And Pamela Anderson, which is a good companion to the beer guy
. Unfortunately the first-hand experience/vision of the few beer guys in the local restaurant or coffee shop weights way more in credibility in my friends’ head than my wordy attempts to re-dimension him and deconstruct his representativeness of U.S. The storyteller’s decreased power against first-hand experience. So, I typically end up making a tiny dent in their idea of U.S. for a few hours, which will be definitively forgotten as the imagery keeping on reaching Europe from U.S., with “myth” beer guys, kicks in again on the media. Another interesting discussion would be what “regulates” the imagery flow across cultures and continents. Money would be a boring, anachronistic/too simplistic answer, of course. But that’s a different (certainly interesting) conversation 
December 29th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
grant
i have always enjoyed attending to your eye when it comes to notions of masculinity. i’ve heard you sound both very disappointed in the lack of progress along these lines, as well as really (obviously) astute in identifying what appear to be rather rigid definitions of masculinity in the commercial sphere. it’s a conundrum for sure.
i will take offense to the focus group room comment as well – no matter what room you’re in if you ask the wrong questions, you’ll get useless answers. i’ve spoken to men both at home and in groups and i am constantly amazed at the lack of appetite the marketing community has for a fully realized and multi-dimensional idea of masculinity. i have no answers, and simply praise you for pointing it out. thanks.
December 30th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
Beer guy is a cultural archetype by now. Th Most Interesting Man in the World? Beer guy’s missing father figure. A void he fills with beer.
December 31st, 2009 at 5:45 pm
My business partner’s father was head of R&D for one of the large US beer Co’s (retired). For a short period they ran what we thought was the worst ad campaign ever (Bud was kicking there butt)- when we brought it to his attention his only comment was “we are not the target market”. He then went on to explain how the target market is defined as 18-25 year old males. Is beer guy still alive and well in this demographic? My guess is most of us grow out of this, but that it is still alive and kicking among 18-25 year old male and we therefor may be stuck with this stereotype for a long time.
February 9th, 2010 at 1:14 am
I love the Dos Equis spots. I also enjoy the “Real Men of Genius” ads the Budweiser runs, almost entirely on radio. I suppose that Bud’s ad team had to move to irony and satire when unable to show cleavage. They did a fine job, though…