Light Beer Was a Flop Until Advertising Saved It

“Everything you always wanted in a beer. And less.”

Gablinger’s invented light beer in 1967 with a scientifically superior formula. It flopped. The problem was marketing it as a diet product, which repelled the core beer demographic. Miller bought the formula and hired McCann Erickson in 1975. They put retired NFL quarterbacks in ads talking about taste and “less filling” instead of calories. Suddenly light beer was for regular guys, not dieters. The product didn’t change. The story did. That’s the whole game.