you might know that i’m always sort of on the look out for new products
that make absolutely no sense to me.
(‘nuts and gum-together at last’ as featured on the simpsons, for example).
years ago i found a flavored bottled water for pets. oh, that was a good one.
they had ‘crispy beef flavored water’ for dogs.
and ‘tangy fish flavored water’ for cats.
i’m not making this up. really. i even bought some just so people would believe
me that such things existed.
well, today someone sent me a link to ‘chelada’.
http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/29/37389
‘what is chelada?’ i hear you asking?
and ‘is it disgusting?’ i hear as your potential follow-up question.
well, here are the answers:
a-chelada is a new product from the anheuser-busch corporation. it combines
buweiser beer with clam juice and tomato juice. in a can. for convenience and portability.
b-is it disgusting? well, i haven’t tried it, but really, how could beer and clam juice and tomato
juice in a can not be disgusting? i mean, how could it not be ipecac-like in it’s ability
to immediately cause the consumer to start vomiting uncontrollably?
maybe i’m mistaken. maybe people love it and swear by it and find it to be refreshing
and tasty.
here’s the scene: it’s august 10th and it’s very hot outside. you’ve just come back
from a long and healthy bike ride and you’re hot and sweaty and boy do you want
something refreshing to slake your thirst.
‘honey! i’m back from my bike ride and boy am i thirsty!’
‘welcome back honey, would you like a room temperature can of beer mixed
with clam juice?’
‘boy would i!!’
i personally see the target market for chelada(clam flavored tomato beer)as being
senior citizens who smoke those dark brown ‘more’ cigarettes and are on their 3rd bypass operation and need oxygen tanks to walk to their car and who’ve given up and life and want to ingest things that will fill them with a feeling of self-loathing and despair. but i could be wrong.
maybe the clam flavored tomato beer market is younger and more vibrant, sort of like
the people who watch the bam margera show and drink mountain dew and listen
to rape rock and punch waiters?
here’s the ad campaign:
4 guys in a contemporary suv, nu-metal music playing. the 4 guys are drinking chelada clam flavored tomato beer and high-fiving while throwing their empty cans at homeless people and baby deer and bunnies.
voice over: ‘extreme! when all you wanna do is party, go with chelada!’
commercial ends as the 4 chelada drinking guys chase a nun down a dark alley, high-fiving all the way.
maybe they’re going for the youth market? a jaded youth market, tired of being catered
to in unimaginably varied ways, hungry for something new. and what’s newer than
clam flavored tomato beer(in a ‘lite’ version for our fitness conscious consumers)?
it makes me wonder what’s up next in the anheuser-busch new-product pipeline.
how about:
‘partita’: mexican rose wine in a can, flavored with real ‘south of the border’ lizard blood.
‘G-filte’: sweet passover wine, flavored with whitefish and guarana, for a 100% kosher-kick.
‘coro’: deep fried beer, filtered through grade-b beef, with 2 tablespoons
of lard in every can.
it’s a fantastic time to be alive.
-moby