Updated to include more detail on pledges.
Craft brewing’s lobbying association announced today that it’s launching a crowd-funding campaign to buy Budweiser’s Belgian parent company,
The Brewers Association (BA), the Colorado-based trade organization that represents craft breweries, calls its campaign “Take Craft Back,” and so far it includes a new website, hashtags and videos of brewers and others talking about why craft matters. It’s ostensibly the largest crowdfunding campaign in history, seeking to raise money totaling the value of a company that has just completed the biggest corporate merger in history. But the BA doesn’t seem too concerned with that deal, which brought together the world’s two largest beer producers.
Rather, the messaging focuses on the fact that AB InBev has wholly purchased 10 American craft breweries over the past six years and doesn’t identify these brands accordingly. Many in the craft community consider this obfuscation disingenuous, leading the BA to name products made by the former craft breweries as “crafty.”
The BA website explains: "Take Craft Back is intended as a humorous rallying cry to bring attention to a serious issue: AB InBev’s intention to permanently alter the craft landscape by presenting acquired brands as if they were truly, authentically independent — ultimately narrowing real choice in the marketplace for the beer lover."
Given the extraordinary dollar amount, the tongue-in-cheek language and the unlikelihood that AB InBev would actually sell to the BA, it's pretty obvious the organization is using the announcement as a publicity move/stunt to get people talking (and people like me writing). However, if one simply reads the headlines or watches the light-hearted online commercial that stars a suit-wearing spokesperson named "Andy," it would be easy to mistake the campaign for a serious one ... even though Andy comes off as somewhat of a spoof and jokes about the enormity of the monetary goal.
“Sure, it sounds like a lot because (long pause) holy crap, it is," says the actor who plays Andy.
"We can take a joke!" Anheuser-Busch vice president of communications Gemma Hart writes in an email. "While the fake money for this campaign 'piles' up, we will keep focusing our donations on giving back to communities across our country.”
The BA is giving away prizes to pledgers but won't collect any money unless ... or until ... it meets its entire money-making goal. When would-be givers click on a button to donate, they have to provide an email address and check a box that reads, "I agree that we'll be in touch if somehow, miraculously, against every odd, the $213 billion crowdfunding goal is reached. (We don't expect to be in touch.) No credit card needed. We trust you're 21 or over."
In response to a request for clarification, the BA's craft beer program director, Julia Herz, emailed, "We are collecting pledges of support and not credit cards or actual dollars."
In reality, the campaign seems to be designed to highlight the BA’s recently released “Certified Independent Craft” seal and explain – in its own voice and others’ – why the group takes such a hard line in defining what is and isn’t craft.
In an online video, Herz calls Take Craft Back the "gutsiest move ever made on behalf of U.S. independent craft brewers" and implores brewers and craft beer drinkers to share the cause on social media with provided images and .gifs, submit a meet-the-brewer profile and contact reporters with pre-written talking points about why craft makes a difference.
But you never know. The BA could end up laughing all the way to the bank. Five hours after the announcement, 2,301 backers had pledged $691,270.
