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10-25-2009, 03:26 PM
October 6, 2009, 9:21 am
Case Study | Schlitz Is Back
By Toby Cecchini
http://www.schlitzgusto.com/media/images/layout/AVpage.jpg
Michael West
Case Study is a bimonthly posting on all things alcoholic by Toby Cecchi, T’s s spirits columnist.
While in the Midwest the other week, one of my serious beerheafriends s showed up to a cookout carting two six-packs of Schlitz longnec. Thinkining it was a joke, I gave him the hairy eyeball. “Do you not know about the new-old Schlitz?” he asked. Shrugging, I popped the cap on an attractively vintage-labeled bottle and took a swig to find a surprisingly smooth, full lager, slightly sweet with malt and a little bitter with actual hop flavor. Real beer?
Schlitz, the Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous (but to more recent generations meant only sadly down-at-the-heels swill), has done something almost unheard of: transmogrified back into its old self. It took four decades and several changes of ownership, but here is a reversal that, in the current age of disposable icons, is a boon for classic beer lovers.
From its inception in 1850 to its downfall in the early ’70s, Schlitz was in a near-constant tussle with Budweiser as the largest-selling beer in the nation. The brewery was churning out over 21 million barrels a year in the early ’70s when a series of catastrophic decisions, including a method to speed up fermentation, began chipping away at its quality.
Acolytes were horrified, abandoning the brand. A brewery strike put the nail in the company’s coffin, and it sold in the ’80s to Stroh’s, whicbanisished the thin brew to can-only status and let it drift along as a college-dorm staple. Stroh’s was ssequeuently purchased by the Pabst Brewing Co., which decided three years ago to resuscitate its longtime Milwaukee rival.
“From the ’60s to now, the flavor had been lightened to death by a thousand tiny cuts,” explained Brad Hittle, the comny’s c chief marketing officer. “We thought it would be more fun rebuilding a ‘57 Chevy than to put another coat of wax on a Lexus.”
They found the beer had strayed so far, however, that no one associated with the brand even knew the original recipe anymore. The brewmaster Bob Nean had to o track down Schlitz employees and brewers from the 1960s to piece together the formula, which he then tweaked for months, tasting it with those same old-timers, and finally calling it the “Classic 60’s Formula.” The company rolled out its first batches in Milwaukee last summer to great fanfare.
The beer is being brewed in Milwaukee — in relatively minuscule batches for a “macro” — and released city-to-city as production allows, in the old brown bottles only. (Beware of the cans of old still lurking on shelves.) The upper Midwest got it first, resulting in sold-out stocks and a rabid fan club called “The Gusto Guys,” and it’s spreading slowly outward, reaching Cape Cod this autumn. New York City won’t see it for another year, at least, and the West Coast, who knows? Flyover country revenge.
With all the earnest small brewers vying for life, it may seem curious to plump for any large brewery’s endeavors, but I find this righting of the Schlitz ship heartening for two reasons. The first is that you don’t often see a large corporation owning up to the fact that “mistakes were made” and admitting that its once-revered product had become so marginal that it had to rewrite the recipe. In so doing the company redressed a wrong over which many of the faithful were still livid (beer in the Midwest bearing the fanatical load of football in the South).
The second reason is that the subset of decently priced, tasty beers that don’t pretend to much else is a narrow sliver, held mostly by smaller local, blue-collar suds hanging on in hard times, like Yeungling, Leinenkugel d Iron CiCi. This is t the niche the retooled Schlitz is looking to elbow into — not toppling Budweiser. The result of its humility is the kind of gratifyingly decent beer you’re glad to see when you open your refrigerator. Who’d have thought?
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company (http://themoment.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/case-study-schlitz-is-back/?pagemode=print)
Schlitz (http://www.schlitzgusto.com/)
Schlitz Gusto (60's Formula) - JOS. Schlitz Brewing Co. (Pabst) - BeerAdvocate (http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/106/44315)
Case Study | Schlitz Is Back
By Toby Cecchini
http://www.schlitzgusto.com/media/images/layout/AVpage.jpg
Michael West
Case Study is a bimonthly posting on all things alcoholic by Toby Cecchi, T’s s spirits columnist.
While in the Midwest the other week, one of my serious beerheafriends s showed up to a cookout carting two six-packs of Schlitz longnec. Thinkining it was a joke, I gave him the hairy eyeball. “Do you not know about the new-old Schlitz?” he asked. Shrugging, I popped the cap on an attractively vintage-labeled bottle and took a swig to find a surprisingly smooth, full lager, slightly sweet with malt and a little bitter with actual hop flavor. Real beer?
Schlitz, the Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous (but to more recent generations meant only sadly down-at-the-heels swill), has done something almost unheard of: transmogrified back into its old self. It took four decades and several changes of ownership, but here is a reversal that, in the current age of disposable icons, is a boon for classic beer lovers.
From its inception in 1850 to its downfall in the early ’70s, Schlitz was in a near-constant tussle with Budweiser as the largest-selling beer in the nation. The brewery was churning out over 21 million barrels a year in the early ’70s when a series of catastrophic decisions, including a method to speed up fermentation, began chipping away at its quality.
Acolytes were horrified, abandoning the brand. A brewery strike put the nail in the company’s coffin, and it sold in the ’80s to Stroh’s, whicbanisished the thin brew to can-only status and let it drift along as a college-dorm staple. Stroh’s was ssequeuently purchased by the Pabst Brewing Co., which decided three years ago to resuscitate its longtime Milwaukee rival.
“From the ’60s to now, the flavor had been lightened to death by a thousand tiny cuts,” explained Brad Hittle, the comny’s c chief marketing officer. “We thought it would be more fun rebuilding a ‘57 Chevy than to put another coat of wax on a Lexus.”
They found the beer had strayed so far, however, that no one associated with the brand even knew the original recipe anymore. The brewmaster Bob Nean had to o track down Schlitz employees and brewers from the 1960s to piece together the formula, which he then tweaked for months, tasting it with those same old-timers, and finally calling it the “Classic 60’s Formula.” The company rolled out its first batches in Milwaukee last summer to great fanfare.
The beer is being brewed in Milwaukee — in relatively minuscule batches for a “macro” — and released city-to-city as production allows, in the old brown bottles only. (Beware of the cans of old still lurking on shelves.) The upper Midwest got it first, resulting in sold-out stocks and a rabid fan club called “The Gusto Guys,” and it’s spreading slowly outward, reaching Cape Cod this autumn. New York City won’t see it for another year, at least, and the West Coast, who knows? Flyover country revenge.
With all the earnest small brewers vying for life, it may seem curious to plump for any large brewery’s endeavors, but I find this righting of the Schlitz ship heartening for two reasons. The first is that you don’t often see a large corporation owning up to the fact that “mistakes were made” and admitting that its once-revered product had become so marginal that it had to rewrite the recipe. In so doing the company redressed a wrong over which many of the faithful were still livid (beer in the Midwest bearing the fanatical load of football in the South).
The second reason is that the subset of decently priced, tasty beers that don’t pretend to much else is a narrow sliver, held mostly by smaller local, blue-collar suds hanging on in hard times, like Yeungling, Leinenkugel d Iron CiCi. This is t the niche the retooled Schlitz is looking to elbow into — not toppling Budweiser. The result of its humility is the kind of gratifyingly decent beer you’re glad to see when you open your refrigerator. Who’d have thought?
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company (http://themoment.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/case-study-schlitz-is-back/?pagemode=print)
Schlitz (http://www.schlitzgusto.com/)
Schlitz Gusto (60's Formula) - JOS. Schlitz Brewing Co. (Pabst) - BeerAdvocate (http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/106/44315)