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Coors chilling out this summer

Roger Fillion, Rocky Mountain News

Published May 23, 2007 at midnight

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Coors Brewing Co. is turning up the heat in its campaign to deliver cold beer to consumers who have a hankering for frosty brew.

The nation's No. 3 brewer has unveiled two products to give beer drinkers "cold, refreshing beer."

A "cold-activated bottle" has mountains on the label that turn to blue from white when the beer is chilled to 42 degrees Fahrenheit, or below. Twelve-ounce bottles of Coors and Coors light sport the label, which relies on thermochromatic ink to change color.

A "super cold" bar-top dispenser pours Coors Light into a glass at 28.5 to 31.9 degrees Fahrenheit. Coors said traditional tap systems pour beer at 36 to 40 degrees Fahrenheit.

Denver has been one of the first markets where the dispenser has been rolled out at bars and restaurants.

As part of its push, Coors points to research that claims "most adult consumers enjoy a colder beer."

"It's part of our corporate mission to continue to excite the consumer," Mark Weslar, innovation director for Golden-based Coors, said of the cold campaign.

The new bottle and tap dispenser dovetail with the company's current Coors Light ad tagline: "The World's Most Refreshing Beer."

They also come after Coors introduced a single-use cooler that beer drinkers can load up with ice to keep plastic bottles cold at venues that don't allow glass.

"Coors has been really successful at grabbing that territory of cold," said Paul Gatza, director of the Brewers Association in Boulder.

"We see Anheuser-Busch responding to it," he added, pointing to Anheuser-Busch's "Flippin' Cold" campaign.

Gatza also said Coors appears to be playing to demands among Hispanic beer drinkers. "It's a principle of Latino marketing that cold is good for beer," he said.

Coors' cold crusade appears to be paying dividends.

"Coors has been taking (market) share away from (Anheuser-Busch) in the domestic market from its clear marketing message 'refreshment as cold as the Rockies' and focus on its three core brands: Coors Light, Blue Moon, and Keystone Light," Citigroup analyst Bonnie Herzog wrote recently in a research note.

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