Beer Wars Case Study
Case Analysis
Beer Wars
Strategic Marketing Management
Introduction
The market dynamics of the Australian beer market is given in the case study. The beer market in Australia is extensive due to high consumption by Australians. In the early 1800’s, there existed numerous independent breweries. Due to excise laws and better transport systems large breweries started acquiring smaller ones, and through widespread inorganic growth, by 1985 the industry became dominated by two corporate conglomerates, Elders IXL(CUB) and Bond Corporation. Both used aggressive marketing strategies for increasing market share.
Top highlighted reasons for beer consumption were mixing with others, relaxing, allowing social drinking and enhancing appetite and the concept of beer being equal to ‘liquid food’. Women in general did not like the beer taste and contributed to only about 12% of the total sales volume, whereas 37% of the 54% adult drinking population admitted to be regular drinkers. Only 10% were ‘ocker boozers’ who contributed to 60% of the volume. Hotels/pubs and retail outlet routes formed the bulk of the sales. Standard beer was the most consumed at 70% followed by light beer at 24%. Males across all age groups equally represented beer consumption with little higher consumption in the 31-40 age group.
The marketers strongly believed in the ‘beer image’ having a strong influence on beer brand preference. So the marketers started projecting the alcohol content by way of which they used to segment variants in different ways each brand being targeted at a specific segment. Several different brand imageries have been created. Lastly the several brands and variants that had been created with the hope of creating market share seemed to have fallen flat. A failed attempt in the same direction in the form of Swan Gold trying to entice consumption by women also failed.
Problem:
Due to increased competition, there was a flux of introducing new products
Beer Wars
Strategic Marketing Management
Introduction
The market dynamics of the Australian beer market is given in the case study. The beer market in Australia is extensive due to high consumption by Australians. In the early 1800’s, there existed numerous independent breweries. Due to excise laws and better transport systems large breweries started acquiring smaller ones, and through widespread inorganic growth, by 1985 the industry became dominated by two corporate conglomerates, Elders IXL(CUB) and Bond Corporation. Both used aggressive marketing strategies for increasing market share.
Top highlighted reasons for beer consumption were mixing with others, relaxing, allowing social drinking and enhancing appetite and the concept of beer being equal to ‘liquid food’. Women in general did not like the beer taste and contributed to only about 12% of the total sales volume, whereas 37% of the 54% adult drinking population admitted to be regular drinkers. Only 10% were ‘ocker boozers’ who contributed to 60% of the volume. Hotels/pubs and retail outlet routes formed the bulk of the sales. Standard beer was the most consumed at 70% followed by light beer at 24%. Males across all age groups equally represented beer consumption with little higher consumption in the 31-40 age group.
The marketers strongly believed in the ‘beer image’ having a strong influence on beer brand preference. So the marketers started projecting the alcohol content by way of which they used to segment variants in different ways each brand being targeted at a specific segment. Several different brand imageries have been created. Lastly the several brands and variants that had been created with the hope of creating market share seemed to have fallen flat. A failed attempt in the same direction in the form of Swan Gold trying to entice consumption by women also failed.
Problem:
Due to increased competition, there was a flux of introducing new products