Has everyone drunk the 2024 Koolaid or did I wake up in some alternate universe where #MeToo never happened? While the proof is sadly definitive that this will be remembered as the year Americans stated definitively that they consider the price of eggs to be more important than women’s rights over our own eggs, a swift glance through this morning’s beer news had my eyes widening in disbelief, and as I skipped from link to bewildering link, I began to wonder if I had indeed entered the Twilight Zone.
Doug Veliky’s Beer Crunchers newsletter is a great resource for industry tidbits and, while we don’t always see eye to eye, I enjoy his hot takes and news bites I might not otherwise have come across. Back in October, I was somewhat dismayed to read Veliky’s defense of new brand Hurray’s Girl Beer – the project of entrepreneur Ray Biebuyck, whom, as far as the internet is willing to yield information, has no background in beer or brewing, but seems intent on feeding the beast that is sexism in beer by creating a brand aimed at women – specifically younger women – on the basis of competing with the hard seltzer market by offering fashionably flavored, low calorie beers that submit to all the most disappointing stereotypes of ‘beer for women’.
Posting about this on social media, I received primarily supportive responses from what is, rightly or wrongly, the online silo in which many DEI advocates and activists are now forced to inhabit to avoid the plague of trolls who persist in their efforts to undermine and discredit us. One or two commentators suggested that I give the beer, and the brand, a chance to prove itself, contact Biebuyck and get her side of the story. Having scrolled through Girl Beer’s depressingly predictable Instagram feed of young, good-looking women and men, mostly dressed as if they’d escaped from an early 90s GAP advert, sipping, chugging, and in one instance being held upside down and drinking Girl Beer through a straw – to demonstrate athleticism it would seem – I neglected to do this, in what has proven a vain hope that that brand would quietly disappear.
Imagine my horror this morning while browsing Veliky’s latest missive to discover that said brand is the 2024 winner of Brewbound’s Pitch Slam competition at this year’s Brewbound Live conference. The panel of four praised Girl Beer as “intentionally subversive, rebellious”, a description I find completely flummoxing in the light of their self-confessed target demographic – young women who like fruit-flavored beverages and are on low calorie diets. What exactly is subversive or rebellious about telling young women to drink fruity low-cal drinks? This has been the primary goal of drinks marketers for decades.
DEI activists have worked hard to fight against this stereotype of women drinkers, which is demeaning in its shunning of body positivity, its assumptions about women’s flavour preferences, and its ageist looks-based inferences. Now, a company whose values clearly uphold all of these prejudices has been given a prestigious award complete with a hefty prize package and publicity via Brewbound and the buzz the award will attract. How can this be perceived as anything other than the industry going backwards?
More troubling still is the context in which this award was granted. Brewbound opened this year’s event with a panel titled Making Beer Accessible to Underrepresented Groups, purportedly to promote diversity in the industry but which surely must have been challenging for participants to take seriously having just seen Girl Beer achieve recognition for their regressive and formulaic approach to bringing women into the industry.
Even more disappointing was to discover that none other than Whole Foods will be stocking Girl Beer in California. Known as a positive force in the food and drinks industry who keep their eye on the ball in terms of supporting businesses with strong ethics as well as sustainability practices, this let-down hit hard. Is nowhere safe from the pressure to laugh along at a joke that’s funny at the expense of a key Whole Foods demographic – one who care about sustainability? How exactly Whole Foods have rationalized the inclusion of Girl Beer to their ethos is unknown at present (Veliky cites Dan Barrera, from Whole Foods’ Adult Beverage Category Merchandising, as being “impressed” with Biebuyck’s presentation), but it certainly feels like a significant misstep for a company who prides itself on being ahead of the progressive curve.
Of course, there appears to be no doubt that the Biebuyck’s imperative is all dollars and cents. In her quote to BevNet, she states that “If beer were able to capture a net new female consumer that is opting for hard seltzer, hard kombucha and better-for-you beverages, it could represent over a $14 billion opportunity. So we’re aiming to solve just that.” With no background in the industry and clearly no understanding of the long fight women have gone through to prove we are so much more to beer than an outlet for fruity low-calorie drinks, Biebuyck’s statement reads as cynical and unaware, reminiscent of when a billionaire decides to try their hand at a business or industry they have no experience in just because they can. And, of course, why shouldn’t she? This is, after all, a free country. The problem is that Biebuyck’s messaging is entrenching that it remains more free for some than others. But with so many industry supporters apparently happy to jump on the bandwagon of pushing DEI under the proverbial bus in the hope of making a buck or two, she most likely feels she’s on solid ground.
Response from the public appears, thankfully more muted. Veliky sites the brand’s success as being in part due to an effective TikTok campaign using comedians to emphasize the supposedly humorous tongue-in-cheek, and aimed at an audience who, apparently, are far too hip and savvy to get stressed by a small thing like gender bias. Not being on TikTok myself, I can’t comment on the quality of this messaging, but based on their Instagram feed, their concept of humor comes across as juvenile at best, tacky at worst. I can’t speak for Gen Z young women, but if I were them I’d consider this attempt to connect as patronizing and somewhat demeaning. Their mere 427 TikTok followers and 3,825 Instagram followers thankfully appear to back this up, adding credence to the lack of market awareness Girl Beer demonstrates.
Letting that market speak will, hopefully, put a reality check on this unfortunate experiment. Recent research from Good Beer Hunting’s Sightlines emphasizes the power and priorities of educated Gen Z women, who prefer genderless branding with a focus on product. Quite how Girl Beer believes itself to reach out to these intelligent, clued-in young drinkers is something of a mystery. Interestingly, in his original post Veliky cites Sightlines’ Kate Bernot’s research on the trend of positing drinking as a ‘how and when experience’ (delivered to the Montana Brewers Association) as indicative of Girl Beer’s appeal. Personally, I found the comparison between Girl Beer and Off Color’s Beer For… series somewhat jarring as Off Color’s series is aimed at all drinkers, and embraces experiences all drinkers partake in, (pizza, tacos, etc) as its cornerstone. While this is undeniably an important industry trend, as is drinkers’ increasing focus on flavor rather than style, neither presents an adequate justification for the commodification of sexism that Girl Beer presents. Veliky later cites brand examples Mom Water, Skinny Girl Margarita, Real American Beer, Dad Strength as comparators, which make much more sense. These are also all brands with problematic gender-biased ethos, presentation and marketing.
I don’t care how many comedians, memes or taglines you throw at this – gender bias is not subversive, clever, funny or cool, and attempting to make it humorous belittles those negatively affected by it while simultaneously entrenching offensive and demeaning stereotypes, and just because it’s not pink, it doesn’t mean it isn’t sexist. Heading into 2025, Girl Beer feels like a worrying indicator of the beer industry’s future and the likelihood of DEI being all but abandoned in the cause of profit, making me seriously consider how committed the industry ever was to it in the first place and how happy many segments of the beer community will be to see it dwindle and disappear and re-introduce beer-bro culture, complete with prejudiced ‘banter’.
Go ahead, tell me I can’t take a joke. But remember it’s the normalization of jokes like this that got the 47th president into the White House.
Craft Beer Amethyst 