Abstract
The geography of beer and breweries, like many industries, has historically been linked to natural resources and the location of critical inputs, notably rivers. While beer and other perishable foodstuffs were historically produced for local consumer markets, new technologies, distribution networks, and multi-national corporations have changed the market considerably and the result has been the dominance of a few large macro breweries serving global consumer demands. Yet, the emergence of new niche markets and the success of micro-brews has resulted in an explosion of regional and local craft production facilities and a renewed emphasis on local water-streams, springs, and lakes. In this paper, we examine the iconography and observed “hydro-geography” of selected local, regional, and even national products to understand the intersection between place and industry, and the geopsychology of competitive marketing strategies and stratagems.
The author order is alphabetical and as such the work represents a shared and truly collaborative contribution.
If I wanted water, I would have asked for water. Slogan for Labatt’s Blue
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Notes
- 1.
Today, Budweiser is a brand of the global ABInBev which is now headquartered in Europe.
- 2.
The globalization of the beer industry will be address in other chapters in depth.
- 3.
This tallied number excludes brewpubs which are not associated with distribution beyond a single site or chain of firm-owned sites.
- 4.
The Reinheitsgebot was being enforced in Germany long before Pasteur discovered the role of yeast in the process of fermentation. Subsequently yeast was recognized as an essential fourth ingredient circumscribing the legal definition of what constitutes beer in Germany. The legal definition of beer in the United States of America is, not surprisingly, much less stringent. Theoretically anything goes into an American brew and some microbrew labels even tout their impurities to attract marginal demographics.
- 5.
While under-utilized, the concept of “geo-psychology” is useful as it is inherently embedded within the everyday global economy and inherently explores the relationship between the environment and economics—and the derived socio-spatial perceptions associated with observed economic processes (or, as Keirsey (1997) argues, political processes, too) in place (see Gregor (1967).
- 6.
In many respects, the historical settlement of German immigrants and the dominance of the “lager” style of beer in North America reinforced the perceived relationship between water, purity, and quality. While brewed locally by small firms, the visual clarity of the German lager style was consistent across the region. More recently though, regional craft markets have departed from the lager style associated with macro-breweries. The result has been to emphasize “difference”, not “sameness” (i.e., market differentiation), vis-à-vis recipes and a shift away from a purer (and perceptually more water quality dependent) lager to more opaque pale ales, cloudy Belgians, as well as more exotic recipes.
- 7.
Great Lakes Brewing Company sponsors the annual Burning River Festival and underwrites numerous sustainability initiatives with an emphasis on water quality issues.
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Acknowledgments
Historical beer label images were obtained online at multiple sources and used in a fashion consistent with “fair use.” When and where specific labels (excluding photographs by the authors) are presented in the text as individual images, permissions were obtained. As such, the label of Burning River Pale Ale is used with the permission of the Great Lakes Brewing Company. The Brownfield Brewing Company logo was downloaded from a Facebook wall associated with the firm and multiple documented efforts were made to contact the non-existent company, its now defunct website, and/or members of the former management team. The un-registered and un-marked logo is used within the context of fair use. Finally, the authors acknowledge the assistance of ISU Multimedia services and the Bellarmine University Public Affairs & Communications division with various images, notably Fig. 9.2.
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Gatrell, J., Nemeth, D., Yeager, C. (2014). Sweetwater, Mountain Springs, and Great Lakes: A Hydro-Geography of Beer Brands. In: Patterson, M., Hoalst-Pullen, N. (eds) The Geography of Beer. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7787-3_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7787-3_9
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