One of my favorite books about the craft brewing industry is The Audacity of Hops: The History of America’s Craft Beer Revolution by Tom Acitelli. I highly recommend it to anyone wanting a very readable account of the emergence and evolution of craft brewing in the United States. In the book you will learn of the key events and key people that were at the heart of the craft beer revolution. One of the most enjoyable and informative parts of Acitelli’s book is learning about the part played by particular individuals. These include Michael Jackson (British beer writer), Fritz Maytag (owner of Anchor Brewing Company), Jack McAuliffe (owner of New Albion Brewing Co.), and others.

Earlier this month I had the opportunity to meet and chat with one of the craft beer pioneers featured in Acitelli’s book. I was invited to be the opening keynote speaker at the 4th Annual Beer Marketing and Tourism Conference in St. Petersburg, FL. In attendance at the meeting was Pete Slosberg, the co-founder of Pete’s Brewing Company. During the early 1990s Pete’s Brewing Company was the country’s second largest craft brewing company, after Boston Beer Company. Like many of the early craft brewing entrepreneurs, Slosberg was a home brewer. In 1986, with Mark Bronder, he founded Pete’s Brewing Company. The brewery’s signature product was an American Brown Ale, called Pete’s Wicked Ale. While inspired be English Brown Ales, Slosberg’s creation was distinctively American – it sat somewhere between an English Brown Ale and a Porter, and was more bitter than both. As a result, Slosberg is credited with creating American Brown Ale as a separate style.

At the conference Slosberg made a presentation titled “Modern Guerrilla Marketing”. Guerrilla Marketing is an advertising strategy that utilizes “low-cost unconventional marketing tactics that yield maximum results”. As the owner of a start-up craft brewery, guerrilla marketing was critical to the early success of Pete’s Brewing Company.

In designing the original packaging for Pete’s Wicked Ale, Slosberg wanted to make sure that his beer stood out on the shelf. He therefore chose purple as its dominant color, and included a mugshot of his dog Millie. Against the rather mundane packaging of mass produced beers of the late-1980s, there was no doubt that Pete’s Wicked Ale was a standout. As Slosberg told conference attendees, “weird things draw your attention. Little things can be memorable. Make people do a double-take”. In another marketing “stunt” to promote his beer, Slosberg found himself naked in a bathtub of Pete’s Wicked Ale. It was another one of those weird double-take moments.

Some of the advertising for Pete’s Wicked Ale was not cheap, but it still fell into the “weird” category and turned heads. A prime example was his 1994 television commercial which ran during shows such as Seinfeld, Melrose Place and Northern Exposure in major markets such as Boston, Minneapolis, and San Francisco. For the commercial Slosberg sat at a red-draped table on the sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. On the table were some bottles of Pete’s Wicked Ale. As pedestrians walked by, Slosberg called out to them, asking them if they would like his autograph. The commercial (which can be viewed here) shows most pedestrians shunning Slosberg’s invitation. One who did stop is seen, shortly afterwards, scrunching up Slosberg’s autographed picture and tossing it into the nearest trash can. Named by The New York Times as one of the ten best advertising campaigns of 1994, the newspaper noted that “the campaign deftly plays up his image as the quintessential little guy taking on the beer behemoths.”

During his presentation to conference attendees, Slosberg talked about his entrepreneurial philosophy. To Slosberg, initial discussions about starting a company should focus on the goals/core values of the company, and not on the product. In discussions with his business partner, Mark Bronder, Slosberg identified three goals/core values for Pete’s Brewing Company:

• Make a world class product
• Get in on ground floor of a new industry or segment of an industry
• Treat the product with reverence and everything else with irreverence (the fun factor)

The success of Pete’s Brewing Company was achieved without Slosberg and Bronder owning a brewery. All of Pete’s beers were brewed under contract. Over the years they contracted with a number of breweries to brew their beer. These included Palo Alto Brewing Co. (Palo Alto, CA) and August Schell Brewing (New Ulm, MN).

At its peak, Pete’s Brewing Company had 85 employees and annual sales of $71 million. Its beer was available in 47 states and, within the craft beer segment of the industry, only Boston Beer Company sold more beer. And the beer was good. In 1987, Pete’s Wicked Ale was voted the top ale, and was ranked one of America’s top five beers. While Pete’s Wicked Ale was its flagship beer, the company did produce five other products- Pete’s Wicked Lager, Pete’s Wicked Red, Pete’s Wicked Honey Wheat, Pete’s Wicked Winter Brew, and Pete’s Summer Brew.

In 1996, twelve years after its founding, Pete’s Brewing Company was acquired by The Gambrinus Company of San Antonio, TX. The cost of the acquisition was an impressive $69 million. In 2011, Gambrinus announced that they would be discontinuing the beers they produced under the Pete’s brand. Following its acquisition by Gambrinus, Pete’s Wicked Ale struggled in the market place. Perhaps that was because Gambrinus changed the recipe to make the beer lighter. Or perhaps it was because the beer no longer had its charismatic spokesperson to promote it in the marketplace.

I feel both honored and humbled to have met Pete Slosberg, and to have engaged in a couple of one-on-one conversations during the two-and-a-half day’s of the conference. He had an unassuming personality, was easy to chat with, and, within a few seconds of meeting him, he put you completely at ease. As someone who is interested in the history of craft brewing in the United States, it was a huge privilege to meet and spend some time with one of the industry’s early trailblazers. As a craft beer drinker, the debt of gratitude that I Pete Slosberg, and others like him, is both huge and significant.