There was a clear winner and clear loser during this week’s Beer:30 Tasting. Plus, we had a few special guests this week.
First, a special thank you to our guests – Emily Wachter (Bensur alumni), Bill Catania (Bensur alumni) and David Hugar (Connoisseur Media). Our team enjoys having an occasional visitor and fresh set of taste buds.
This week’s winner was Wells Banana Beer. A few tasters were very doubtful at first about this… “Banana beer, come one!” But when the bottle was opened, all doubts went away. The Wells Banana Beer had a very pleasant, fruity smell. After just a few sips you will fall in love with this beer. You cannot deny the beer’s banana flavor. For a fruit beer it is not too sweet. It is a subtle beer with virtually no alcohol taste. Wells Banana Bread Beer received an overall score of 8.5. We highly recommend you give it a try! You can purchase Wells Banana Bread Beer at Six Pack House of Beer, 847 Pittsburgh Avenue.
And now the loser. This beer received a total score of 3.5. One of the lowest ever rated. The loser is Bahia Lager Brewed by Cerveceria Centro Americana, a Pale Lager brewed in Guatemala City, Guatemala. According to their web site: “CCA has earned over 10 Gold Medals from Monde Selectionne in Brussels, Belgium. Because of the 10 consecutive wins it has been awarded the “Prestige Award of Brewing”, One of only three such distinguished awards in all of the western hemisphere.” I don’t think any of out tasters would believe that statement for a minute. I think Old German could beat it any day of the week.
It has been awhile since the last Beer:30 blog. We apologize. We know how you look forward to it every week.
Summer is the theme this week. The beers we taste tested were: Sierra Nevada Summer Fest, Leinenkugel’s Summer Shandy Ale, Breckenridge Summer Bright Ale, Brooklyn Summer Ale, Misery Bay IPA, and Dundee Summer Wheat.
The beer that stood tall this week was Shandy Summer Ale. This beer was rated at a whopping 9.8. That is a new record for Beer:30. Breaking the previous record held by San Miguel Dark Lager in the Week 9 tasting. Shandy Summer Ale is a wheat beer with a taste of lemon. This beer is the definition of summer.
Our Account Executive Jason said of the Brooklyn Summer Ale “It tastes like man musk.” Personally I don’t know what “man musk” tastes like but it cannot be good.
We all want to thank Eric our Senior Art Director for picking out the summer themed beers for this week. Hopefully the next Beer:30 will break the record again for the best tasting beer. If you have an idea for a themed beer tasting or want to let us know what you think of these beers post a comment on our Facebook Fan Page. So, go out and get a taste of summer!
U.S. Brig Niagara is featured today on Cleveland.com the website for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Local students from the Cleveland area were on board the ship as part of the Cleveland YESS Project.
The U.S. Brig Niagara is traveling to Cleveland for the Tall Ships Festival on July 7-11. Visitors will be able to come aboard and tour all of the Tall Ships.
You know the old saying “you get what you pay for.” Well in this instance you are saving a nice chunk of change for high quality store brand BBQ sauce. The price of KC Masterpiece 18 oz. bottle compared to Walmart’s store brand BBQ sauce, Great Value, is $2.49. An 18 oz bottle of Great Value is $1.23. So if you live in an area where there is not a Walmart nearby (if that is even possible since they are everywhere), you may end up paying a substantial premium for national brand BBQ sauce.
Depending on the area of the country you live in you will be able to find store brand BBQ sauce at your own grocery store. Dominick’s grocery store offers a store brand BBQ sauce for $2.19. Trader Joe’s offers their store brand BBQ sauce for $2.49.
These store brand products are proven commodity items in a supermarket. Not only is the price better than the national brands but the nutrition from the store brands is often better as well. Two tablespoons of KC Masterpiece equals to 60 calories and 15 grams of total carbohydrates. Store brand such as Dominick’s BBQ sauce nutritional facts is 50 calories and 13 grams of carbohydrates. Great Value store brand is 50 calories and 12 grams of carbohydrates.
In a recent food industry blog, Great Value was rated better than the national brand leader when judged on taste and price. This is just one example that store brands are a better overall quality product for you to buy.
In this week’s sampling a new record had been set! San Miguel Dark Lager received a rating of 9.16. The beer that received a 4.6 the lowest rating this week was the He’brew Messiah Bold.
This week Bill our Creative Director here at Bensur gave Lancaster Milk Stout a rating of 10+. Bill also said that Akadia Ales London Porter reminded him of smoky nuts. Now I’m not exactly sure why it reminds him of smoky nuts, we’ll allow your imagination to decide.
This past Friday our Account Executive Jason got a little carried away. He decided to rip up his paper with the beer ratings on it after we were done sampling the beers. He was having a rough day since his car battery died. Luckily he had drawn his ratings on a solar system scale he designed as well. It is a very creative design, if I do say so myself.
I think all of us here at Bensur can agree that this past week’s Beer:30 was the best yet. We can thank Cyndi our Senior Art Director for that, since she was the one that picked out these delicious treats. Hopefully the next Beer:30 will be just as good as this past one.
Go out and sample some of these beers you won’t be disappointed. Stayed tuned until the next Beer:30.
Allow me to introduce myself… My name is Ryan Nguyen, and I am interning this summer at Bensur Creative Marketing Group. In my first week on the job, I got to participate in Beer:30! I cannot think of a better way to begin my internship than attending a beer tasting.
The beer selection for week eight included a wide variety of brews from around the world. The beer we tasted was: Ayinger, Negra Modelo, Kirin Ichiban, Svyturys Baltas, Hoegaarden, and Baltika. The task is pretty simple: We sample every beer, and then give each a rating from 0 to 10.
The highest ranking beer from the Bensur team this week was Ayinger, a German brew. It received an average score of 8.16. Although, some of us came to the conclusion that after tasting all the beers, we may have ranked Ayainger a bit too high. Clearly we were in the mood for beer last Friday, so whichever beer was the first tasted would have been at an advantage. Nonetheless, the German offering was still good enough to be the week eight winner.
The two that followed Ayinger were Kirin Ichiban, a Japanese rice beer, and Hoegaarden a Belgium brew. The worst of the day was Svyturys Baltas, with a rating of only 4.0.
That’s all for now. Stay tuned for the next Beer:30!
Images speak louder than words. Enjoy this week’s Beer:30, video style.
Bensur Beer:30 on Vimeo
As said in the last Beer:30 entry, this past Friday was all about fruity beers. The selection was most appropriate with the beautiful Spring weather daunting us from the outside. Therefore, to bask in the glorious weather, the Bensur crew sampled some fruit-themed brews.
Our five selections included: Moosehead Light Lime, Ithaca Apricot Wheat, Pete’s Wicked Strawberry Blonde, Bar Harbor Blueberry Ale, and Michelob Ultra Pomegranate Raspberry.
With the highest average score of any beer sampled over the past 6 weeks, Pete’s Wicked Strawberry Blonde came in on top with a rating of 8.25. On the other hand, due to Kevin’s request of also including the lowest scoring beer, this week also had another Beer:30 record breaker – the lowest score of any beer sampled. The lowest scoring beer was the Michelob Ultra Pomegranate Raspberry with an average of 0.667.
Check back for something new, exciting & innovative with this Friday’s Beer:30 event! Let’s just say – it’s go big or go home Friday with some Samuel Adams brews.
As reported in an article titled “What Difference – A Closer Look” from PL Buyer, in a recent survey done by IpsosMarketing, the results displayed a continued trend towards consumer favoritism of private label brands. These numbers escalated well above national brands and for many reasons. While all of this will sound rather familiar, what makes this study even more interesting is that it’s not just focused on the U.S., but rather on a global spectrum.
The survey included respondents from 23 countries, including China, Germany, Mexico, India and Australia. In other words, every continent is included in this study, with the exception of Antarctica. The consensus of the study among the various nations was a rather unified one. A total of 81% of the global consumer respondents claimed that private label products offer the same, satisfying taste as do national brands. The days of consumers associating private label with “trade-off” products or “lower-priced” products are gone. Roughly 80% agreed that store brands are the same, if not better, than national brands in the sense of convenience, meeting the needs of the consumer and being environmentally-friendly. The chart below displays key findings of the survey.
While the popularity of store brands continues to dominate, a few key areas were also highlighted in the survey pertaining to areas in which store brands could improve in the consumer’s mind. A few of these areas were to offer products that are of higher quality, unique and innovative. All in all, the content factor of today’s store brands seems to be here for the long-run. So, look out!
The article by PL Buyer can be found here. Also, the IpsosMarketing study itself can downloaded here.
P.S. According to the article, countries such as Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Japan ranked store brands higher than the United States. However, the U.S. wasn’t too far behind after ranking 5th.
And… we’re back! After a brief hiatus, the crew returned to the Bensur Creative Conference Room for a long-awaited Beer:30 reunion. This time around, we even introduced a few new faces (and you know who you are!).
This past Friday, we had “Extreme Friday” and by extreme, we are referring to “beers with extremely high alcohol content!” We would like to thank Mr. Brian Scott, a local beer expert, for providing the beer selections this week. All of us here at Bensur definitely got schooled by Mr. Scott and his selection of rare and international brews. Each beer had different story attached to it.
“Brian Scott is a regional asset. He is a Beer Icon. He is a man every man can look up to and say, ‘that is a good man, he appreciates a good beer,’” said Kevin Seeker, Bensur’s Account Director. The beers showcased were: Dogfish Head, Trafalgar Korruptor, Sierra Nevada Bigfoot Ale, Samichlaus Bier, Dogfish Head Palo Santo, and Dogfish World Wide Stout. After an exotic and intriguing beer-tasting, we declared a winner. With an average score of 7.6, Dogfish Head Palo Santo came in on top.
In honor or our winner, we double “doggy” dare you to host your own Beer:30 event with your fellow co-workers, take a picture and post it to our Fan Page. We want to see who else has what it takes to win the title of “Ultimate Wannabe Beer Connoisseurs.” The winner gets a rare and valuable collection of left over trade show trinkets with an estimated value of… well the value is not really relevant.
With that said, we look forward to next Friday’s Beer:30 event with a sampling of Fruity Beers (not that there’s anything wrong with being “fruity”).
NOTE: There will be no Beer:30 this Friday because somebody has to go on a business trip to Canada.
So, until then, send in those pictures!
Store brands, also known as private label products, are surging in sales in the European grocery and household markets. According to research by Europanel, several European retailers reported over 40% of existing sales being credited to private label brands. Can the US markets also experience such enormous growth? Predictions of increasing market share look very promising.
The introduction of store brands began in the 1980s capturing a small percentage of the market. These products did not start out with the best of results. Product quality was inconsistent, packaging was lackluster, and overall appeal was uninspiring.
Fast forward twenty years later to a market of expanding growth potential here and abroad. Retailers and customers alike are enjoying the benefits of store brand products. Retailers have raised the bar in product quality and packaging development, making their products very marketable in the current retail landscape. For 2009, The Neilsen Co. reported 21.8% of unit volume sales being attributed to store brand products while only comprising 10% of items in store. Opportunity for growth in the private label market is wide-open. Wise advice for retailers desiring future market share…ready, set go!
Featured in the first quarter issue of Exclusive Brands is none other than M-Dot Network. The 35th issue of the publication displayed a three-page cover story of the Erie-based company in the article titled “A Private Label Solution for Digital and Mobile Coupons.” The article itself provides a general overview of the digital couponing trend while highlighting M-Dot’s strategic approach to capitalizing on this rather new and tantalizing opportunity.
Don’t you hate it when you’re at the store buying the very item your sought after and then realized upon checking out that you left your coupon at home? Well, no more fear then because those days are now over. Companies like M-Dot Network have developed a next-level software platform that allows those valuable coupons to be sent straight to your mobile phone, PC, and even your iPod. Shoppers are even free to choose what coupons they like by finding and selecting the coupons online or on their mobile phone.
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Welcome back to Round 4 all [who are living vicariously through our weekly beer-tasting event]!
The 4th week of Beer:30 brought us to sample a variety selections, including a few featured beers from PA breweries. The beers sampled were: Dundee India Pale Ale, Sierra Nevada Glissade, Hook and Ladder Back Draft, Snow Goose Winter Ale, Yards IPA, Elliot Ness, and The Poet Oatmeal Stout.
Most of these beers were either hits or misses for the Bensur team. All in all though, the top two were the Sierra Nevada Glissade and the Elliot Ness. However, with an average of 7.7, the Sierra Nevada Glissade prevailed.
In case you were wondering what is going on at Bensur lately, I am here to tell you - A LOT! Today I’m going share with you one of my recent projects with the Flagship Niagara and their upcoming Tall Ships Erie Festival.
With the unfortunate State funding cut from $850,000 to $350,000, many feared a hiatus for the Flagship Niagara. Therefore, in honor of one of Erie’s most valuable historical possessions, Bensur jumped on board to help save the ship. Bensur has been working hard to assist the Flagship Niagara League with marketing for the upcoming Tall Ships Erie Festival.
Officially scheduled for September 9 - 12, 2010 is the Tall Ships Erie Festival, in which seven tall ships (including the Flagship Niagara) will fill Dobbins Landing for a weekend of ship tours and demonstrations, music, food and craft vendors, and so much more. For more information, visit the website developed by Bensur for the event at http://www.tallshipserie.com.
This festival will ultimately:
1) Serve as a welcome home party for the Flagship Niagara as she returns home to Erie after sailing all summer long throughout the Great Lakes
2) Proceeds from the event will help keep the ship afloat and operating.
This year, the Flagship Niagara will spend much of the sailing season away from Erie, visiting many ports in the Great Lakes including Chicago, Duluth
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Saving money with coupons is once again in vogue. It is now easier than ever to save at the checkout thanks to M-Dot Network, a company that has revolutionized the couponing redemption process. While some shoppers are still spending time clipping paper coupons from the Sunday supplements, others are catching on to the new and much easier way to save with digital couponing.
Bensur Creative Marketing Group has been instrumental with the implementation of M-Dot’s new advertising and public relations campaign. Our work has included web site development, demonstrational and instructional videos, and trade show management.
M-Dot Network has launched a new software platform to service retailers in a gradual shift towards electronic-based couponing. This platform enables retailers to redeem coupons from multiple digital coupon issuers in real-time. Here is how it works.
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In honor of the Gannon University’s women’s basketball team, today will be dedicated to this special time of the year, better known as March Madness. For those of you out there who don’t follow basketball at all (and I was once one of you), the GU women’s basketball team recently became the Atlantic Region Champions and are officially in the state of Missouri prepping for their NCAA championship games. Oh and not to brag or anything, but they also happen to be the #1 D2 team in the entire nation! The first NCAA game will be broadcast Tuesday, March 23rd via WERG 90.5 and ncaa.com at 7:00pm Eastern. More information regarding the GU women’s team and their placement in the NCAA Elite Eight can be found here
In other news, I found an article on PR Newswire that coincidentally relates to the theme of today’s blog. The article was titled
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So, we promised last week that we’d bring you a review of more Pennsylvania Beers. Well, not so much. This would probably be better explained in a story format. So, here it is. Our newest Account Manager, Jason, was sent out this week to retrieve the beer for our little weekly competition/Bensur bonding session. We ended up sending him to the wrong distributor and so instead, we had an “East to West” beer-tasting. Even better? Perhaps.
The beers represented were: Belfast Bay Lobster Ale, Yuengling, Bock Beer, Dream Weaver, Strawberry Wheat, and Cranberry Lambic.
The results of the beer-tasting were rather unanimous; it was mainly down to two: the Belfast Bay Lobster Ale and the Strawberry Wheat. The winner,
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So, it’s official as of a few days ago - Facebook has surpassed Google on total number of visits during the week of March 7 - 13th. According to an article on WebProNews, from this time last year, Facebook had an overall growth of 185% while Google had a growth of 9%. Does this mean the end of Google? Absolutely not! It’ll just make for a great fight at the top. Check out the article here.
In other news, today is all about Skype. I recently came across a link from creativity-online.com titled “Skype Outside,” in which 5 artists from around the world would be given a specific Skype message that they would transform into some type of artistic expression. For example, the artist from Antayla, Turkey, Paul Sivell, would use his artistry as a notable tree carver to convert the messages into art. Other artists represented were from the United States, Spain, Japan and Australia. So, what’s the big catch? Skype’s newest feature - Skype Mobile.
People would be able to visit the site, sign up for Skype Mobile and type messages utilizing the new feature. Then, the artists would receive the messages and
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As most of you may already know, any specific color always has a meaning connected to it. For example, the color yellow is associated with freshness and joy. Well, this same psychology has its relationship with the direct mail industry. According to an article recently found by one of Bensur’s own, “Points of Hue” from Deliver Magazine highlights the importance for a company to select the best color for their direct mail campaign that can convey, or rather influence, a certain message to its receivers. The article then goes on to point out the good, the bad [and the ugly] of some key colors.
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