By Max Weber – for National Liquor News
The shakeup at Carlton & United Breweries continues apace, with the underperforming Carlton Cold brand being shifted from its current form to mid-strength.
Currently brewed at four per cent AVB, Cold will be downgraded to 3.5 per cent, as the brewing giant fine-tunes its offering in a beer climate that sees one in five sold in Australia now a mid-strength.
“The new Carlton Cold, along with Carlton Mid and Peroni Leggera now form the three main brews in our mid strength offering,” says CUB’s General Manager of Marketing for Carlton Brands Andrew Meldrum.
The move echoes CUB CEO Ari Mervis’ comments to TheShout last month that certain brands were due for reworking, and that the CUB beer portfolio needed more clarity in its market targets.
"What we have done is we've identified which brands need to participate in which consumer segments," Mervis said.
CUB last year restored the original 4.9 per cent AVB recipe of its flailing flagship Victoria Bitter product in a successful attempt to reinvigorate the brand, which had lost its crown as the country’s top-selling beer.
Meanwhile, the recent advertising drive that has accompanied Crown Lager’s own reboot has been given another shot in the arm, with a new series of television commercials to go to air tonight. Click here to view on YouTube.
The ad “celebrates the dedication of the people who have such a major role in producing the ingredients of Australia’s finest beer,” said Richard Oppy, Crown Lager’s general manager, and features farmers Andrew Weidemann and Allan Monshing, who provide hand-picked barley for Crown.
The new Carlton Cold will be available from this Monday (September 23rd) in a new 355mL bottle incorporating ‘thermo chromic ink technology’ that indicates through a change in colour on the label when the beer is at the optimal drinking temperature.
Both the bottle size change and ABV reduction will be reflected in a wholesale price reduction, and the new Carlton Cold will be supported with a significant marketing investment of $5M in the first 12 months.