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Lynn M. Walding, Administrator |
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e - NEWS |
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September 26, 2003 |
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1. Cleaners Throw Out Dictator's Vintage
Wine
2. UK: Bacardi Launches Second Diet
Breezer
3. Southern Comfort's Creator Returns to
Promote
4. Underage Performers File Lawsuit Over
Bar Ban (Oregon)
5. Americans Say 'Cheers' More Often
6. In Search of the Perfect Drink
7. Red Bull vs. Lion in Bar-Mixer Duel --
Energy Drinks Taking off the Gloves
8. DPS 'Safety and You' Report Shows Continued Increase in Alcohol Arrests
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1.
Cleaners Throw Out Dictator's Vintage Wine Ananova
September
22, 2003 |
Thousands of bottles of vintage wine that were once
part of the private cellar of Nicolae Ceausescu have been thrown out by
cleaning staff.
Cleaning staff who were looking for storage space for
their cleaning equipment decided to throw out the wine after deciding it could
not be drinkable any more.
In total, some 2,000 bottles were thrown out at the
People's Palace in the centre of Bucharest, including bottles of cognac.
One cleaner said: "We did not want to try it, we
thought it might poison us as it was so old, instead we just threw it out like
we were told."
The mistake was noticed when palace employees went to
get 621 wine bottles that were due to be sold for 45,000 euros to a private
collector - and found the wine had gone and been replaced in the cellar by
buckets and other cleaning equipment.
The President of the Romanian Wine Producers and
Exporters Association said: "Any of these bottles even if they had been
poor quality would have been worth upwards of 60 pounds just by virtue of being
once owned by Ceausescu. But these were really good wines so who knows what
value they would have reached.
2. UK:
Bacardi Launches Second Diet Breezer
Source: just-drinks.com
editorial team
September 23, 2003
Bacardi Martini has launched the second diet variant of its
Breezer RTD brand. The drink will be a low-calorie orange & vanilla
flavour.
Launching into the off-trade, the
drink will contain 96 calories per 275ml bottle, the same as Bacardi Breezer
Diet Lemon, which launched in January 2003. Both drinks have a 5% abv. Diet
Orange & Vanilla will also be available in a four-pack and a larger 70cl
bottle.
Bruce Ray, director of trade
marketing at Bacardi-Martini Ltd said: "Research suggest that 2.8m females
in the UK are 'currently dieting'. The diet category therefore offers huge
opportunities as more and more people demand a healthy lifestyle, without
compromising on taste."
He continued: "The launch of Bacardi Breezer Diet Lemon has been a huge hit, achieving 78% PCW (product class weighted) distribution in multiple grocers within the first 8 months. With the launch of Diet Orange & Vanilla, we're confident of adding further to the success of Diet Lemon."
3. Southern Comfort's Creator Returns to Promote
By Sherri Day - The New York Times
September 23, 2003
JACK DANIEL is to Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey as M. W.
Heron is to Southern Comfort liqueur.
Drawing a blank on Heron? You're in good company. Heron is
far from a household name, but executives at the Brown-Forman Corporation,
which makes both Jack Daniel's and Southern Comfort, are trying to change that.
The company has unearthed the story of M. W. Heron, a
bartender in New Orleans who created Southern Comfort in 1874. Brown-Forman is
betting that Heron will help consumers develop a greater connection with the
brand. The goal is to parlay consumer interest into an increase in sales and a
national campaign for Southern Comfort, which Brown-Forman has brought to
television for the first time.
"We've had an awful lot of success with Jack Daniel
because there is a Jack Daniel; there are pictures of Jack Daniel," said
Rick Bubenhofer, a spokesman for Brown-Forman in Louisville, Ky. "People
like authentic brands. They like Harley-Davidson, and there was a Mr. Harley
and a Mr. Davidson. People can identify with them. We think the authenticity
will help us increase the popularity."
The search for details about Heron is part of a larger
effort to reignite interest in Southern Comfort.
Although the domestic liqueur business, which recorded about
$250 million in profit in 2002, is experiencing a resurgence of sorts among
baby boomers, its volume, or the number of cases sold, has increased only 4.1
percent since 1999, according to the 2003 Annual Spirits Study from M. Shanken
Communications. Southern Comfort, which is the second-largest domestically
produced cordial, behind De Kuyper, a unit of De Kuyper Royal Distillers of the
Netherlands, has grown 9.7 percent since 1998, the study said.
To woo consumers back to their brands, liquor makers have
begun to increase their advertising on television. Last week, Brown-Forman
began running its first national television commercials for Southern Comfort on
Spike TV, USA and FX. Excluding its new television campaign, which was created
by Arnold Worldwide, part of the Arnold Worldwide Partners division of Havas,
much of the company's advertising and marketing will center on Southern
Comfort's elusive creator. The company is developing an Internet and radio
campaign around Heron.
"It's time to reacquaint people with the brand, and
that's what they're trying to do with this advertising campaign," said
Frank C. Walters, the director for research at Shanken. "Everybody knows
the brand, but sometimes you need to shake it up, bring things back to the surface."
An injection of Heron's aura, the company hopes, will help
it do just that. After finding documents bearing Heron's signature, the company
redesigned the stumpy Southern Comfort bottle and replaced it with a slimmer,
more modern version bearing Heron's raised signature on the bottle and its
security seal. It was the first significant redesign of the bottle since 1936.
About two years ago, Brown-Forman executives embarked upon a
scavenger hunt for clues about Heron's life that took them from the Louisiana
bayous to the shores of Ireland, which Heron's family is thought to have fled
during the potato famine.
According to the company, Heron, the son of a shipbuilder,
was born in 1850 in St. Louis. He became a bartender and was often asked to
improve the taste of barrels of whiskey whose quality had deteriorated during
shipment down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to New Orleans.
While doctoring one such barrel, the company says, Heron
used a blend of spices and fruits to create a drink called Cuffs and Buttons in
a New Orleans saloon. The concoction soon outsold its closest competitor, White
Tie and Tails.
After attending a celebration of Southern heritage, Heron
was inspired to change the name of his liqueur to Southern Comfort. He gave it
the tagline, "The Grand Old Drink of the South."
Sleuths at Brown-Forman traced Heron's life story to
Memphis, where he ran a bar off Beale Street, and to St. Louis, where he
operated a bar on the riverfront and died in poverty in 1920, shortly after the
beginning of Prohibition. Mr. Bubenhofer visited Heron's grave and theorizes
that Heron, who was at one time known as Martin Wilkes Heron, changed his
middle name to Walker after John Wilkes Booth assassinated Abraham Lincoln in
1865.
But despite the company's detective work, one thing about
Heron's identity eludes them. No one at Brown-Forman knows what he looks like.
And the company has offered a $10,000 reward to the person who can produce a
photograph.
"A photo is worth a thousand words," said Paul
Tuell, the Southern Comfort brand director at Brown-Forman. "There's a
little fun to the mystery of Heron. There's also a sense of closure of naming
this great entrepreneur and showing his face off that we're keenly interested
in."
In the meantime, the company is very much in the moment,
with its marketing and ads featuring the slimmed-down bottles and the perky
young adults, ages 21 to 29, who are its intended audience.
Since 40 percent of Southern Comfort's sales are made
outside of the United States, the spots are also intended to appeal to an
international audience by placing a strong emphasis on music and what the
company calls real or genuine moments shared with friends.
In one spot, "Train," which is on television now,
a group of luggage-laden friends stare up at an electronic schedule in a train
station in Europe. Their eyes frantically search the board for a train to
Prague. Upon discovering that the train in question leaves within minutes, the
group runs through the station and makes it on board just before the train
departs. As they settle into their cabin, they celebrate by toasting with
Southern Comfort. "To Prague," one says as the others raise their
glasses. But their victory celebration is soured by the conductor's
announcement that the train is going to Barcelona. Undeterred, the group toasts
to Barcelona, instead.
"Gift," a 30-second spot expected to be released
in late November, also features a group of young friends. In the ad, the friends
have just exchanged Christmas gifts. As they unwrap the gifts, they find
various undesirable presents, including an oddly shaped sculpture and a spindly
candle. All eyes shift to one young man who opens a bottle of Southern Comfort.
There is an awkward pause before the group attacks him. He squirms incessantly,
but manages to hold the bottle slightly out of reach.
4. Underage Performers File Lawsuit Over Bar Ban
(Oregon)
By: Janie Har - The Oregonian
September 23, 2003
SALEM -- A year after the Oregon Liquor Control Commission
voted to ban all minors from entertaining in adults-only bars and clubs,
underage musicians and dancers are fighting back in court.
Roughly a dozen 21-and-younger performers have signed on to
a lawsuit filed in the Oregon Court of Appeals by the American Civil Liberties
Union, which argues that the OLCC rule violates free-speech protections under
the state and federal constitutions.
"They're doing something that isn't right. It affects anyone
my age or who wants to be a musician," says Matt Seymour, a 16-year-old
junior at McMinnville High School who plays bass with The Jake Blair Band.
"I think they have too much power, the OLCC,"
Seymour says.
The case, which could affect hundreds of underage
entertainers in Oregon, is the latest legal challenge against the OLCC, and
could help reshape the state's traditionally fierce protection of speech and
expression.
More narrowly, the case pits budding artists who want to
build reputations as musicians, stand-up comics or dancers against a state
regulator whose job it is to keep minors away from alcohol. That was
particularly hard to enforce, alcohol regulators say, when strippers too young
to drink legally could dance at bars for a strictly 21-and-older clientele.
Jon Stubenvoll, an OLCC spokesman, says the liquor control
agency opted to ban all underage entertainers to stay within the boundaries of
the constitution.
"Once we start to say this type of entertainer is in,
and this type of entertainer is outside the rule, we were advised we were on
thin ice vis-a-vis the state constitution," he says.
But David Fidanque of the ACLU of Oregon, says the adopted
rule still restricts certain kinds of expression. The OLCC, for example, allows
underage servers to pop into the bar of a restaurant to fetch a drink for a
customer and it allows other underage workers such as plumbers to apply for
exemptions to go into a bar to fix a leak in the business's off-hours.
"The only minors who can't get in are those who are
entertaining. And we think that is clearly censorship based on the content of
communication," Fidanque says.
Legal experts agree this could be a turning point in the
history of free speech in Oregon, where the highest court has for two decades
struck down obscenity laws and most restrictions on adult entertainment, and
voters have three times rejected ballot measures that would have limited
expression.
The state Supreme Court is scheduled to hear in November two
appeals that present perhaps the most serious challenges to date. One involves
an ordinance that requires dancers to remain 4 feet from patrons; the other
involves prosecution of club owners who staged a live sex show between two
women.
"Is this a slam dunk? I can't say that. It's a close
call," says Garrett Epps, who teaches constitutional law at the University
of Oregon School of Law. "It's possible that 10 years ago it would have
been more of a slam dunk" for the ACLU.
Named as petitioners in the lawsuit are two former nude
dancers who are younger than 21; two underage members of an Irish dance group;
several underage musicians and their parents; and club operators. Fidanque says
they expect oral arguments to be scheduled for the spring.
In the nine months since the rule has been in effect, the
OLCC has received eight requests for exemptions. The liquor control director
rejected six and granted two, including one for a brewers festival in Newport
last month.
The agency has handed out one citation for violating the rule.
It's unclear how many entertainers and venues are affected
by the rule, but OLCC officials estimate that 10 percent of strippers in
Oregon's 70 licensed venues were underage. About 300 to 400 bands have members
that are younger than 21, estimates Bruce Fife of the Portland chapter of the
American Federation of Musicians.
The old rule in Oregon was that underage musicians could
perform at adults-only spots if they observed rules keeping them away from
drinking patrons.
Similar rules allow musicians in California to perform in
bars, although the state does not allow strippers younger than 21 to perform at
such places.
And in Utah, minors have long been banned from any
establishment that sells beer, but are allowed, if they meet certain requirements,
into private clubs that sell liquor. This year, however, the Legislature
enacted a law prohibiting any underage person from being on the premises of a
club with a "sexually oriented business license."
Some families are considering moving out of Oregon because
of the rule, says Elisa Herbison, whose 16-year-old daughter Jenna Rae sings
and writes her own music.
Rae says the rule has taken away her income.
"The law got into effect because they didn't want
underage strippers. That's totally unfair," she says. "I'm not
stripping, I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm doing what I love to do."
5.
Americans Say 'Cheers' More Often
By Andrew Herrmann - Chicago
Sun Times
September 20, 2003
If moderate drinking is good for you -- as some studies
claim -- Americans are slurping up the cure.
Among those who drink, 68 percent have had at least one
alcoholic beverage in the past week--up from 48 percent in 1992, says a Gallup
poll released Friday.
Frank Newport, editor of the Gallup poll, believes the
increase is connected to news reports about purported health pluses of a daily
drink.
Eric Burns, author of the upcoming history of alcohol in the
United States, The Spirits of America (Temple), agrees. "There has been so
much publicity about the health benefits of moderate drinking,'' he said --
benefits including lower rates of heart disease and some cancer.
While drinkers are drinking more, there aren't significantly
more people drinking, percentage-wise.
Roughly three in five Americans -- 62 percent -- drink, a
number that hasn't fluctuated that much since Prohibition, said Newport. The
high mark was in the late 1970s, when drinkers topped 71 percent, he said.
But Newport said that Americans' attitudes about alcohol are
evolving.
For example, in Gallup's most recent poll, some 31 percent
said drinking has been "a cause of trouble'' in their family, up from 24
percent in 1992.
In 1947, when the question was first asked, 15 percent cited
alcohol-related family problems.
"Back then, Uncle Johnny drank too much and it was
considered a funny thing,'' said Newport. Not any more. He noted that few today
would appreciate the slurring, drunken humor practiced by comic Foster Brooks
in the late 1970s.
Burns said boozing today pales when compared to Colonial
times. The founding fathers' generation "drank from morning until night,''
he said.
"They drank at every meal. Kids were fed rum for
breakfast,'' said Burns. Twice a day -- at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. -- they had their
"bitters,'' tossing back alcohol-based "ardent spirits.''
One colonial insurance company charged higher rates for
teetotalers, considering them "thin and watery.''
Colonists saw alcohol as preventive medicine against
mysterious ailments, healthier than filthy water and non-homogenized milk, and
an antidote for their loneliness for home and the stress of trying to build new
communities, Burns said.
The Evanston-based, anti-alcohol Woman's Christian
Temperance Union challenges the health benefits of liquor, citing research it
says suggests that lowering of heart disease risk may result from beverage
ingredients other than the alcohol.
It calls alcohol America's No. 1 drug problem with about 350
dying daily from alcohol-related problems.
"After weighing the facts, total abstinence is the wise
choice,'' the 130-year-old group says.
6. In
Search of the Perfect Drink
By
David Goetz - The Courier-Journal
September
23, 2003
BrownForman keeps mixing it up, hoping to find the right
blends for all kinds of drinkers
It sounded like a good idea. A pre-mixed, cinnamon-flavored drink
to add to the roster of Jack Daniel's Country Cocktails.
People liked the name – Barnburner – and taste tests were
positive. But there was a problem.
"You couldn't drink a whole one," said
Brown-Forman food scientist Renee Davis Wright. "That cinnamon kind of
builds up on you."
Back to the laboratory, where Wright and the development
teams practice what she calls "a weird combination of chemistry and
engineering" to find new ways to enhance and market the company's liquor
brands.
Given the centuries-long history of whiskey, it would figure
that just about all the possible combinations would have been exhausted by now.
But food companies keep coming up with newer, bolder flavorings, and
Brown-Forman keeps adding new names and tastes to its roster of brands, so
there's always something to keep the beakers busy in the company's labs.
And even the best-selling brands — Jack Daniel's and
Southern Comfort in Brown-Forman's case — can use some help attracting young
consumers reaching drinking age.
Straight-whiskey purists are still around, "but you
have a new generation of drinkers now coming up that are more interested in
blended drinks and mixes," said Theodore S. Lioutas, vice president for
research and development at Brown-Forman.
Some of the recent projects his drink thinkers have worked
on include a new hurricane cocktail mix for Southern Comfort; a brand extension
of that venerable cordial, called Southern Twist; and a frozen Jack
Daniel's-and-Coke dispenser being tested in bars.
The frozen hurricane recipe was a joint venture with Island
Oasis, which markets beverage mixes to bars, restaurants, drink shops and
liquor stores. It was a home run for the researchers.
"It really helped our sales a lot," Wright said.
"There was an account in New Orleans that typically sold a case of
Southern Comfort in a year's time. They sold 10 cases in a week doing hurricane
promotions."
The mix also opened up stadiums and concert venues to
Southern Comfort, good places to introduce the brand to younger consumers.
The Brown-Forman researchers had a specific flavor profile
to work from with the hurricane, traditionally a rum drink with citrus and
sweet, red Grenadine. But when company executives came asking for a new spirit
to take advantage of the Southern Comfort brand franchise, the teams had a lot
less to go on.
The bosses were after "the essence of Southern Comfort
but not a whiskey, and not brown, and they wanted something that appeals to
women," Wright said.
So the mostly female project team set out to find what women
are looking for in a cocktail.
"We learned something about ourselves and an
appreciation for what you guys go through trying to figure us out," Wright
said. After sifting through consumer research the team decided women
"wanted something sophisticated that they could feel good about holding a
glass of, but not a frou-frou wine cooler. They didn't like the taste of a lot
of wines, but they liked the ease of wine. You could stick it in the refrigerator
and have a glass. You didn't have to have mixers and things like that. We want
what we want, when we want it, but easy and cheap" – and no alcohol burn.
The result was a clear, 30-proof cordial with flavors of
peach and plum and a hint of orange that should be finding its way onto retail
shelves now. Brown-Forman suggests it over ice or with soda.
Flavorwise, Jack-and-Coke was a natural. Half of the 7
million cases of Jack Daniel's sold last year were mixed with a cola, and Coke
was a willing partner in developing a new outlet for its own franchise.
It was the frozen part that took some doing. For one thing,
the typical frozen slush machine has just two outlets, for flavored syrup and
water.
"It doesn't sound like it would be that hard, but
engineering a third outlet was an issue," Wright said. So the company
worked out the kinks with Louisville beverage machine maker Grindmaster Crathco
Systems Inc. "Once that was done, getting the texture exactly right was
the challenge."
The problems were in cooling capacity and its relationship
to customer traffic.
"If it's too icy, you can't drink it; if it's too
liquid people say it's too watery," Lioutas said. "At peak times,
when you're selling a lot of drinks, you have to have enough cooling capacity"
to keep them frozen. "You have to work with the consistency of the recipe
to make sure you can accommodate the peaks and valleys."
Brown-Forman set up a couple of the machines in its dining
room for employees to sample. "All in all it was very successful," he
said, though the cost of the machines may limit their popularity with
restaurants and bars.
Employees are an important resource for Brown-Forman
researchers. The company recruits volunteers from the ranks and tests their
palates before adding them to the roster of test subjects. Most days somebody's
sampling something up on the fourth floor at company headquarters in
Louisville.
No swallowing allowed but, even at that, testers are limited
in the number of samples they can try because the alcohol evaporating in their
mouths begins to affect their ability to distinguish tastes.
"A very, very challenging part of the job is how to
assess the human response without affecting the person who's giving the
response," Lioutas said. "After three drinks, they make no
sense."
There's also a Louisville-area data base of 3,500 tasters
from outside the company. Brown-Forman hires research firms to conduct taste
tests in other cities.
"It is very complicated to standardize the basic human response,"
said Lioutas, who has a doctorate in food chemistry. "That is what we're
all about."
Standardizing taste tests can get into details as fine as
the size and shape of the ice cubes used in the drinks. Sometimes the company
ships water to the testing venues to use for ice cubes to eliminate variables
in the taste of water from city to city.
While mixing flavors and colors that people like is fun,
serious science is behind it, said Lioutas, who can look at the chemical composition
of a bourbon sample and tell you the part of the country originating the oak
that made the barrel.
It's relatively easy to control the grains that go into
making a whiskey and the distillation process that turns them to alcohol, he
said. But 60 percent to 80 percent of the flavor and color develops after the
spirit enters the barrel. "There's a lot of chemistry happening
there."
During his five years at Brown-Forman (after stints with
Pepsi and Tropicana), Lioutas said, research has put "extreme
emphasis" on the wood in the barrels that age the company's premium
whiskeys and bourbons.
"Because of commercialization of the forests, we're
seeing a lot of younger trees going into our barrels — that's something we
really are concerned about," Lioutas said. "Younger trees don't give
you the same flavor. They require different processing to come to the same
quality. We can deal with them, but we have to know what we're
harvesting."
To find out what's in the wood and what comes out of it when
its soaked in whiskey, researchers grind barrel staves into powder, dissolve
them in alcohol to flush out the components and run the samples through
machines that can identify the type and proportion of chemicals.
They can tell you how hot to toast the barrels, and how
long, for example, to maximize the change of undigestible lignin in the wood to
flavor-enhancing vanillin that can leach out into the bourbon.
The mission of his department, Lioutas said, is to find out
what consumers want and "get the variability of Mother Nature out of the
equation."
So, one day, will he be able to produce the perfect bourbon
in his lab?
"I wish we were that good; we can't quite copy Mother
Nature to that extent," Lioutas said, a little wistfully.
And then there are those pesky variables.
"Perfect bourbon, how do you define that?" he
asked. "According to whose opinion?"
7. Red
Bull vs. Lion in Bar-Mixer Duel -- Energy Drinks Taking off the Gloves
By:
Ricardo Baca - Denver Post
September 24, 2003
One of the biggest changes to hit cocktail culture in the
last decade came when 'Red Bull-vodka' became as commonplace an order as 'rum
and Coke.'
Using Red Bull as a mixer, something the company doesn't encourage,
was ingenious. The energy drink was already uber-trendy, and high-profile
marketing in clubs and bars would only up the hip factor.
Its taste - described by some imbibers as a medicinal
Mountain Dew - was like no other. Spiked with caffeine and taurine, an amino
acid that dials up the heart rate, Red Bull was viewed by club kids as a
desirable mixer with alcohol.
So it's no surprise that its success in bars has been
targeted by everyone from Coke to Pepsi, from small Colorado start-ups such as
Go Fast to the former Red Bull employees who founded Roaring Lion.
The battle of the bars is underway, and the scuffle for
market share has turned rough and tumble.
Red Bull's success in North America created a frenzy in the
beverage industry. Established heavyweights and small players alike began
cranking out imitations (St. Louis rapper Nelly recently jumped on the train
with his Pimp Juice), but only two companies are serious contenders in the
'on-premise' nightclub market.
One of them is Rockstar, launched with a bang out of San
Francisco and Las Vegas. Competitively priced and shipped in 16- ounce fat-boy
cans (Red Bull and most other brands come in sleek 8.3- ounce cans) it was
attractive to bar managers wanting to decrease waste and boost profits. And the
kids glommed onto its claim of a liver-rejuvenating ingredient, milk thistle.
Energy drinks in clubs and bars have changed the way people
party. Some medical professionals have raised concerns about mixing alcohol
with energy drinks, especially those with big doses of caffeine and taurine.
They warn that the combo could create potentially fatal heart arrhythmias,
especially when strenuous exercise is involved.
But the newest and perhaps most serious contender targeting
Red Bull's crown is Roaring Lion, and it was clear from the start that these
boys - all Red Bull expatriates - knew what they were doing.
They knew what the bars disliked about Red Bull: the wasted
product, the company's perceived reluctance to partner with liquor companies
for theme nights, the space it took to store the cases of cans - and the very
fact it came in cans.
Roaring Lion addressed all those issues. They put their
syrup- product in a bag-in-a-box and sold it on the soda-dispensing gun. They
also formed relationships with multiple vodka companies and Jagermeister,
launching their product two years ago to astounding numbers.
First year: The company enjoyed $900,000 in sales. After 16 months
in business, the company was in the black. Second year: $2.5 million in sales
gave the company an even bigger boost.
Roaring Lion now boasts 2,600 accounts, making it a serious
competitor.
'(Red Bull) can't stand that we're taking so much of their
business,' said Chris Hannemann, the national sales manager for Roaring Lion
and the former marketing director for Red Bull Los Angeles. 'They're losing all
the cool bars, and they're making it worse by hassling them and threatening
lawsuits.
'The Goosetown (Tavern) in Denver has really been hassled by
Red Bull,' he said.
The Austria-based Red Bull at first declined comment on
Roaring Lion or any of the bars it has lost to the new kid on the block. But
Patrice Paul in Red Bull North America's communications department later said
the only lawsuits being brought up are against bars that are passing off
non-Red Bull products as Red Bull.
'We want to make sure to protect our brand to make sure that
(consumers) are getting what they're paying for,' Paul said.
Hannemann says he finds it irritating that Red Bull markets
itself as an energy drink, even though they've had such success as a mixer.
'It's very hypocritical,' he said. 'They don't co-promote or
co- brand with liquors, meaning you won't see a Red Bull-Stoli night, even
though you know darn well that Red Bull opens a market in the bars first and
then it trickles down to the retail segment.'
For all the talk of local bars supposedly in heated
disagreement with Red Bull - including the folks at the Goosetown Tavern, which
recently made the switch - nobody wants to comment on it. Some declined to talk
about it for fear of legal retribution; others simply weren't interested in
fueling the fire.
'But customers don't really care if it's Red Bull or it's
some other energy drink,' said Eun Sommatino, office manager for Goosetown and
the Red Room. 'And for us, there's less waste because it's served on the gun
and you're making drinks to order instead of having cans that are only
partially used. Plus we've been very happy with Roaring Lion as a product.'
Roaring Lion's impact in Denver is made more obvious by the
many we-do-not-serve-Red-Bull signs the company provides to new accounts. The
signs are meant to head off charges that the bars are selling Red Bull when
they aren't.
Bartenders and barflies alike have heard stories of Red Bull
threatening its clients into retaining the product.
The Larimer Lounge, a small rock club in Denver's warehouse district,
is switching from Matador, another bag-in-the-box energy drink, to Roaring Lion
because it tastes better, owner Scott Campbell said.
'I guess we'll have to put one of those signs up, too,' said
Campbell, 'which is fine by me, because I don't want any trouble from Red
Bull.'
The Ogden and Bluebird theaters, owned by promoter Nobody in
Particular Presents, joined other Colfax Avenue bars and now carry Roaring
Lion. And they've posted signs.
'(Roaring Lion is) so much easier and also a lot cheaper,'
said Jim Norris, the venue manager at the Ogden and the Bluebird. 'And now I
only have to store one little box instead of having 10 cases stacked up in the
back.'
Norris was won over by Roaring Lion's sales pitch, which
goes something like this: Red Bull, at approximately $1.33 per can, is one of a
bar's most expensive mixers. The same amount of Roaring Lion would cost a bar
53 cents, saving 80 cents per can, or 60 percent. If a bar went through 50
cases of Red Bull a month and switched to Roaring Lion, the company says the
bar would save $990 a month, or $11,880 a year.
``We changed everyone's paradigm of thinking in bars,"
said Hannemann. ``It's a functional drink, and when people drink it, people
dance longer, they drink longer, and they stay in your club longer."
What's exactly in those power cocktails?
What are Go Fast-Captains, you ask? With the rapidly
changing world of energy drinks and their growing popularity in bars, drink
names are becoming even more difficult for the folks behind the pine to
remember. With the help of a few bartender friends and yours truly, The Post's
bar columnist, we've come up with the dos and don'ts of energy drink
mixmasterdom.
Red Bull: This is what we were weened on, where we learned
that mixing 80-proof liquor with excessive amounts of caffeine and taurine and
ginkgo was fun - in moderation, natch. Red Bull is the original, and we're not
sure if that has anything to do with the fact that it tastes the best with both
vodka and Jagermeister, but it does.
Roaring Lion: This is not Red Bull, although it's obviously
doing everything in its power to become the next Red Bull. The company
admittedly bought the rights for a flavor that tastes almost exactly like Red
Bull, with an emphasis on almost. Roaring Lion is a treat with vodka, seeing as
how vodka - ideally - goes virtually unnoticed in any cocktail. But Roaring
Lion-Jager? No. The medicinal tinges are illuminated when Jager's introduced to
the mix.
Rock Star: Quite the opposite here. Rockstar-Jager - yes!
The drink is almost as good as Red Bull-Jager, which at first seemed like a
disastrous pairing. Rockstar-vodka, no. You wouldn't drink Rockstar on its own,
so why mix it with a neutral flavor? For some reason, Rockstar mixes
beautifully with Midori and/or peach schnapps. Experiment.
Go Fast: It's the local guy done good. The unusual citrusy
taste makes Go Fast the only one out of these four that didn't go straight
after Red Bull's medicinal aesthetic. A favorite at the Red Room is the Go
Fast-Tuaca, a sugary treat. Ordered in a tall glass at the Cap City Tavern, and
it's a right-proper drink. Rum options include Bacardi O or Captain Morgan for,
natch, Go Fast-Captains.
8. DPS 'Safety and You' Report Shows Continued
Increase in Alcohol Arrests
By Jolene Hull, Staff
Writer – Iowa State Daily
September 23, 2003
The Department of Public Safety's "Safety and You" report, released last
week, showed arrests relating to alcohol overwhelmingly rank as the No. 1
offense committed in campus boundaries.
The
annual publication is designed to inform the ISU community of department
services, crime prevention intervention, comparative crime statistics,
disciplinary procedures and resource information, said DPS Director Jerry
Stewart.
Liquor
law arrests ranked as the No. 1 committed offense within campus boundaries,
according to the report. In 2000, there were 193 alcohol-related arrests. Those
numbers increased sharply in 2001 (494 offenses) and again in 2002 (577
offenses).
"The
number of liquor law violations has certainly increased during the past few
years," Stewart said. "That is due, in part, to proactive law
enforcement efforts."
Stewart
said in some cases, the number of custodial arrests have remained steady or
declined during that time period, which is a direct result of DPS's philosophy
of early intervention.
"I
would much rather our officers deal with a minor law violation earlier in the
evening than deal with a more serious incident that might arise later on,"
Stewart said. "It is far better to issue an underage possession citation
at 10 p.m. than respond to a drunk driving accident at 2 a.m."
Stewart
added ISU Police will purposely have officers on duty at certain times and days
of the week when alcohol activity may be more prevalent, such as tailgating
parking lots at ISU football games.
The
number of drug law violations also saw an increase, according to the report. In
2000, there were 40 arrests for drug law violations; in 2001, there were 39
arrests and in 2002, 52 arrests.
"Drug
law violations have increased somewhat," Stewart said. "They are
primarily driven by complaints from residence halls or by special events such
as concerts."
Burglaries
were one category that decreased in occurrence. In both 2000 and 2001, there
were 48 reported burglaries; in 2002 these numbers dropped to 32.
One
noticeable noncrime statistic was in the hate crime category. Although a
handful of biased criminal activity occurred on the ISU campus last year, the
report showed in 2000, 2001 and 2002, there were no hate crimes reported to
police.
"We
as a department feel that those incidents that happened last year were
disturbing and that's why we offered a reward for the person or persons
involved," Stewart said. "They did not constitute as a hate crime
because of the lack of identification of a personal victim."
Stewart
said the offenses are compiled as required in the provisions of the Jeanne
Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act.
According
to www.securityoncampus.org, the Clery Act, originally enacted by Congress and
signed into law by President Bush in 1990 as the Crime Awareness and Campus
Security Act of 1990, is a federal law that requires colleges and universities
to disclose certain timely and annual information about campus crime and
security policies. The Act was championed by Howard and Connie Clery after
their daughter Jeanne was murdered at Lehigh University in 1986.
Stewart
said the report is not an entire depiction of the DPS charge summary.
"The
crime statistics listed in the 'Safety and You' [report] do not represent the
total number of charges filed by ISU Police officers because the Clery Act
specifies geographic boundaries that define on campus and campus-related
jurisdictions," Stewart said. "That said, all officers respond to
calls and take action in areas that might be immediately adjacent to defined
Clery Act boundaries."
ISU
Police Capt. Gene Deisinger said one of DPS's goals is to prevent crime from
occurring.
"As
a department, we choose to go above and beyond," Deisinger said. "As
a rule, we are very open about investigations and we'll continue to be
so."
Deisinger
encouraged students, faculty and staff to "look at a variety of sources
about risk of victimization.
"The
crime data is a valuable source, but not the only one," Deisinger said.
"I encourage people to review all the material presented and I hope it
generates questions and discussion."
