IJMC It's Miller Time

                       IJMC - It's Miller Time

If I hadn't of had 5 shots of Absolut (thanks Bill!), I might have more 
to say about this other than I'm glad that Mountain Dew has those new 
wide mouths as well. This may be urban legend, but it's cool...   -dave






_______________________________________________________________________

 The following is a letter sent to Miller Brewing Company earlier this 
 month. Miller's response is at the end.
 
 Miller Brewing Company
 Milwaukee, Wisconsin  53201
 
 Dear Sir or Madam,
 
 I have been a drinker of Miller beer's for many years (actually, ever 
 since that other company donated a big chunk of change to Handgun Control
 Inc.  back in the mid 80's).
 
 Initially, my beer of choice was Lite, but some time in mid 1990 while in
 Honduras I switched to MGD smuggled up from Panama. Now, for nearly six 
 years, I have been a faithful drinker of MGD.
 
 For these past years, I have come to expect certain things from Genuine 
 Draft. I expect that whenever I see that gold can of MGD, I am about ready
 to enjoy a great, smooth brew..
 
 But wait!  Sometime around the first of the year, my beloved MGD changed 
 colors, so to speak. That familiar gold can was no longer gold! Knowing 
 that I am, by nature, somewhat resistant to change, I forced myself to 
 reserve judgment on the new can design.
 
 Gradually, I grew to appreciate the new label.  That was until about May 
 of this year.  That was when I discovered (empirically) that I really 
 didn't like the new design.  Further investigation of the cause of my 
 distress resulted in the following observations:
 
 1. Your cans are made of aluminum.
 2. Aluminum is a great conductor of energy.
 3. Your beer is commonly consumed outside, and thus, the container may 
    be exposed to sunlight.
 4. Sunlight striking the can causes radiant warming of the surface of 
    the can.
 5. The resultant heat (energy) is transferred through the aluminum, by 
    conduction, to the contents of the can (the beer).
 6. Warm beer sucks.
 
 This is a process that can be observed in just about any beer.  However, 
 this process is significantly accelerated in MGD because you painted the 
 damn can black!!!
 
 Who was the rocket scientist that designed the new graphic for the can and
 implemented the change right before summer?  Granted, this process may not
 be real evident up there in Wisconsin, but down here in Oklahoma (OR 
 TEXAS) where the summers are both sunny and hot, this effect is quite a 
 problem. There's no telling what the folks in Texas and Arizona are having
 to put up with.
 
 Knowing that you would probably not address this issue unless you had firm
 evidence of a problem, I and several other subjects conducted extensive 
 experimentation.  The results of these experiments are listed below. 
 
 The experiments were conducted over two days on the deck next to my pool.
 The study included seven different types of beer (leftovers from a party 
 the previous weekend) that were initially chilled to 38 (and then left 
 exposed to sunlight for different lengths of time.  These beers were 
 sampled by the test subjects at different intervals.  The subjects, all 
 normally MGD drinkers, were asked at each sampling interval their 
 impressions of the different beers.  The length of time between the 
 initial exposure to sunlight and the point where the subject determined 
 the sample undrinkable (the Suckpoint) was determined.  The average 
 ambient temperature for the trials was 95 degrees F.
 
 
     Beer Type                        Average Suckpoint (min) 
     Miller Lite (white can)                      6.2
     Bud (white can)                              5.5 
     Bud Lite (silver can)                        5.2 
     Ice House (blue and silver can)              4.4 
     Coors Lite (silver can)                      4.1 
     Miller Genuine Draft (black can)             2.8 
     Coors (gold can)                             0.1 
 
 It was evident that the color of the can directly correlates to the 
 average suckpoint, except for Coors which was pretty much determined to 
 suck at any point.
 
 It is to be hoped that you will consider re-designing your MGD cans.  All
 beer drinkers that are not smart enough to keep their beer in the shade 
 will thank you.
 
 Sincerely,
 
 Bradley Lee
 Beer-drinker
 
 -----
>>     
 -----
 
 Dear Bradley Lee,
 
 Thank you for your letter and your concern about the MGD can color as it 
 relates to premature warming of the contents.  Like you, we at Miller Beer
 take beer drinking very seriously.  To that end, we have taken your letter
 and subsequent experiment under serious consideration.  Outlined below are
 our findings and solution to your problem.  May we add that we have had 
 similar letters from other loyal beer drinkers, mostly from the Southern 
 United States.
 
 First, let us congratulate you on your findings.  Our analysis tends to 
 agree with yours regarding Coors.  It certainly does suck at about any 
 temperature.
 
 Now, it was our intentions when redesigning the MGD can to create better 
 brand identity and brand loyalty.  Someone in marketing did some kind of 
 research and determined we needed to redesign the can.  You will be 
 pleased to know, we have fired that idiot and he is now reeking havoc at a
 pro-gun control beer manufacturer.  The design staffer working in cahoots
 with the marketing idiot was also down-sized.
 
 However, once we realized this mistake, to undo it would have been even a
 bigger mistake.  So, we took some other actions.  From our market 
 research, we found a difference between Northern beer drinker and Southern
 beer drinkers.
 
 Beer drinkers in the South tend to drink slower than beer drinkers in the
 North.  We are still researching why that is.  Anyway, at Miller Beer, it
 was never our intentions to have someone take more than 2.5 minutes to 
 enjoy one of our beers.  We pride ourselves in creating fine, smooth, 
 quick drinking beers and leave the making of sissy, slow sipping beers to
 that Sam guy in Boston.
 
 However, it is good to know that you feel our Miller Lite can last as long
 as 6 minutes.  However, may we suggest in the future you try consuming at
 least two in that time frame.
 
 From your letter, we had our design staff work 'round the clock to come up
 with a solution that would help not just MGD but all our fine Miller 
 products. We hope you have recently noticed our solution to your problem.
 We found that the hole in the top of the can was not big enough for quick
 consumption. So, we have now introduced the new "Wide Mouth" cans.  We 
 hope this will solve all your problems.  Might I also suggest that if you
 want to get the beer out of the can even faster, you can poke a hole on 
 the side near the bottom, hold your finger over it, open the can, tip it 
 to your mouth and then pull your finger off the hole.  This is a common 
 way to drink beer at parties and impress your friends. This technique is 
 known as "shot-gunning".  You should like the name.
 
 Again, thank you for your letter and bring to our attention that there 
 might be other beer drinkers taking more that 2.5 minutes to drink our 
 beers.  Let me assure you that I am have our advertising department work 
 on campaign to solve this problem, too.
 
 Sincerely,
 
 Tom B. Miller
 Public Relations
 Miller Brewing Co.
 
 
 P.S. And remember, at Miller Beer we do favor gun control, too.  So 
 please use two hands when firing.




IJMC January 1997 Archives