I am not a blonde nor am I a brunette. I am not a female beer drinker, I am a beer drinker. With one swift, collaborative effort to celebrate and “poke fun at the misconception that women want gendered or ‘girly’ beer”, Danish based beer brewing company Mikkeller and locally based publication for female inspiration, Girls Are Awesome, have created a very questionable beer, called “Female”. Which essentially objectifies women into two basic (hair-based) classifications. Let’s spend time dissecting this case study.
Focus on how you are creating impact
I am not an activist, nor have I ever identified myself as feminist (though, after this experience, I am going to do something about that). What I do spend most of my days working on, is as a marketer who knows how to help businesses build their brand. I am therefore someone who wholeheartedly appreciates the effort of organizations that take on creating something bigger than the businesses themselves. At the end of the day, all you want is to create impact. You want to create an impact that gives your current customers a positive emotional impact to the brand and you want to reach new customers, that share the same values as you do. As far as collaborations go, I get it. Let’s get more women to drink beer (though, where is the data that warranted the collab in the first place? That’s another story).
I love Mikkeller, I love what they have done with the brand, they’ve pioneered local craft beer in Denmark and differentiated themselves as a brand people can get behind. I applaud Girls Are Awesome, there’s a lot of effort behind highlighting women to inspire other women. The intention of the collaboration is admirable, it takes time, effort and planning to put everything that they’ve done together.
Spend (lots) of time on the messaging, make sure there is follow through
Unfortunately, this new beer collab called ‘Female’ completely misses the mark. The product and the message simply to do not align. And by product, I mean the label design, name and copy are all sources of confusion and frustration, especially amongst the targeted audience. With a cause to “celebrate and put focus on female representation”, it in fact does quite the opposite and belittles the female gender as beer drinkers in the first place.
If you are creating bold statements in your press release such as “seeking to erase the conception that beer is just for men.” How are you creating impact with this product? What and how do you expect that releasing this beer will erase this conception? Are you highlighting other female led breweries, are you highlighting your female head brewer, are you making it interesting for non-beer drinkers in the first place to drink more beer (other than just a new label?).
Test your messaging with your target audience
This is the key. Who are you trying to target? Is this going to resonate with them? Put it in front of them to garner their reaction. Main point is, if you have to explain the ‘real’ intention behind the label (I get it, no need to mansplain) over and over again, you’re throwing marketing dollars away. As in, ‘Fem’ is five in Danish, and hands have five fingers, and that its Fem-Ale and the blonde and brunette references the type of ales (wit and brown) and that it’s a high five to the inclusiveness of the brands behind the collab, and so on etc etc. The message is then lost. As brands, you have a split second in today’s day and age to win over a customer. You’ve completely and utterly lost me at face value — I’ve already lost it. I see “Female” and I see “Blonde” or “Brunette”. Sexist. Period.
How to get behind equality
If your main mission is to increase female representation in the beer drinking world. Here is some advice from Lena August Rutkowski and some other awesome women who commented on the event page on how to do just that:
- Make sure you pay your women employees the same as men employees
- Make sure you promote women craft beer-producers in a male-dominated environment
- Ensure that your women bartenders have a safe, sexism-free space to work in
- Don’t invoke a centuries-old trope of a woman as a sexual object by literally creating an object that you call “female” — “blonde” and “brunette” at that — and call it stereotype smashing
- Read more here.
Already in a shit storm?
Simple. Do something about it. Do not simply respond with blanket statements copy and pasted from the press release. These kinds of situations are healthy. They are good, it creates awareness and understanding with the exact target market you are looking to capture. Understand them, read the comments and be proactive. Ie: “We screwed up” is also a pretty cool thing for companies to admit to saying. If you really want to show you care, pull the product in question. Just don’t wait too long, brand value dissipates fast and negative emotions travel fast.
Conclusion: Basically, don’t do gender-based marketing
Just do great fu*king marketing. Period. Now go do something you’re proud of.
