Big Beer Brands, Craft Beers, and Consumer Behavior

Craft beers are trendy and popular, as well as locally-known--which is why beer giants like Anheuser-Busch InBev are swallowing up many smaller brands. Above, logo of A-B InBev's Blue Point Brewing Co, founded in 1998 and serving the Long Island, NY area.

Fortune magazine has a map and video showing the extent of the "drink local, buy global" trend, including the news that A-B InBev recently purchased its 10th craft brand (Wicked Weed Brewing, based in North Carolina).

A-B InBev seeks two ingredients in craft beer acquisitions: (1) variety, so the parent's product portfolio isn't too heavily weighted toward one type or another; and (2) owners who are interested in working with a deep-pocketed, marketing-savvy parent for growth.

Craft beers aren't the huge growth niche they were a few years ago, but they're still growing. As the extent of involvement by beer giants becomes more widely known, will craft beer lovers be put off or will they be able to judge each brand and brew on its own merits? Marketers will be watching for clues to consumer behavior, attitudes, and actions as competition becomes even more intense between beer brands.

For Your Marketing Plan: Check Demographic, Social, and Cultural Trends

Research projects at http://www.pewresearch.org

Researching demographic, social, and cultural trends for your marketing plan? Be sure to check out the research at the Pew Research Center site.

As shown above, Pew researches a number of topics that can help marketers understand the perceptions, attitudes, beliefs, and behavior of consumers.

For instance, the Internet & American Life Project covers Internet usage, mobile usage, and social media. One analysis looks at how political campaigns in 2014 made use of mobile marketing and social media. Another examines Twitter topic networks. Others look ahead to the Internet of things and other future developments--important background for preparing long-term marketing plans.

Don't miss the Social and Demographic Trends research on such topics as family formation (marriage and remarriage and gay marriage), household composition (multigenerational HHs are on the rise, thanks to boomerang Millennials), college attendance and debt, economic distribution, and much more.

The Hispanic Trends Project follows issues in North and South America such as demographic shifts, political impact, immigration, religion, and cultural identity. Again, for marketers in the Americas, such information can be extremely helpful.

What's the Role of Stamp Marketing?

The U.S. Postal Service is working hard to come up to marketing speed. It needs revenue, and it provides direct-to-door delivery at a competitive price. In fact, given the price of postage around the world, U.S. first-class stamps are a relative bargain.

Now the USPS is being criticized for, well, marketing. Specifically, for issuing stamps with particular commercial value, rather than mere commemorative value. In part, the point is to encourage purchasing and in part, to encourage a revival in stamp collecting among a new generation.

In the bottom row left, the Batman stamp that has been a lightning rod for criticism because it represents an ongoing partnership with Warner Bros. and DC Entertainment. In limited edition, it was released at New York Comic Con. Commercial? Definitely, as was a Harry Potter stamp series and other pop-culture stamps.

In the top row right, the Rudolph stamp for 2014. Issued 50 years after the animated Rudolph special hit TV screens, the stamp evokes nostalgia with a commercial angle--and has provoked comments like this one from a former Postmaster General, quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek: "They have really ruined the stamp program. They have prostituted it in an effort to make money."

What is the role of stamp marketing? One former member of the committee that sifts stamp ideas and recommends subjects says the USPS should avoid issuing stamps "with the same profit motives as Big Macs, Slurpees, jeans or neighborhood tattoo parlors."

Given the financial situation of the USPS, stamp marketing must take profitability into account. Yet tradition has a definite place: Last year, the USPS issued a new version of the "Inverted Jenny," a stamp famous for the airplane (the Jenny) being mistakenly printed upside down. The originals are rare and celebrated.

Issuing a new version was more than a way to stimulate purchasing: It also put a smile on the faces of ordinary buyers and collectors alike, because of the back story and the decades of history involved in the Jenny mistake. Reinforcing a positive attitude is certainly a valuable role for stamp marketing.