True to my word, but admittedly delayed, I purchased the Shock Top variety pack sometime ago with a view to fulfilling my promise.

You came here to read about me drinking this shit. In a pinch, you might also drink Rickard’s White if shitty witbier is your thing as it seems to be essentially the same beer, but with perhaps a different ratio of butt beer.īut I digress. Blue Moon is marketed by Molson-Coors in Canada as “ Belgian Moon” because a Toronto craft brewery hilariously bought the rights to the name Blue Moon in Canada. Louis, is actually brewed in Labatt’s facilities in London, Creston, Edmonton, Montreal, Halifax, and St Johns. Here in Canada, Shock Top, the beer marketed as a product of a non-existent craft brewery in St. Originally released as Spring Heat Spiced Wheat in 2006, the brand was a rather transparent attempt by ABI to release a shitty witbier that would compete with Blue Moon, another shitty witbier, this one created by Miller-Coors with the obvious purpose to trick dumb people into thinking they were drinking craft beer and to compete with the growing small brewer segment. The original Shock Top is something like a Belgian Witbier–in much the same way that the Olive Garden in the Magic Valley Mall in Idaho is something like Tuscan dining. I once enjoyed a considerable amount of traffic on this very blog back in September of 2014 when I managed to get my hands on a marketing brief prepared by Canadian Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV subsidary Labatt that suggested they were planning an expensive, intentionally misleading ad campaign to promote Shock Top in Canada as craft beer after market research revealed how many of the beer’s drinkers were misinformed about the beer’s origins.

It actually says on the can that it is from “Shock Top Brewing Co.” and, in bars, it is typically positioned by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV to compete with craft beer among consumers who don’t know any better. First produced in 2006, the beer is made by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV, a marketing company that controls roughly a third of the world’s beer however, this beer is rather dubiously marketed as a craft beer. People seemed enthused by the idea of a beer snob drinking Shock Top.įor those who don’t know, Shock Top is a beer that is marketed as a “Belgian Stye Wheat Ale” but is in fact liquid garbage. Camp Shock Top took the quintessential lakefront sleepaway camp as its inspiration, cabins and all, with a boozy twist at every turn (see: slip n’ slide race with flip cup at the bottom).Quite some time ago, I realized I was getting close to having 5000 followers on twitter.Īccordingly, I tweeted that, should I reach that milestone within the next week, I would purchase and drink the variety mix pack from Shock Top and record the experience. In 2016, Shock Top sponsored a number of Camp No Counselors getaways outside New York City, Austin, Miami, and Los Angeles. Less conventionally, it also offers a twisted pretzel wheat flavor. Shock Top boasts other citrusy varieties, including a grapefruit Ruby Fresh flavor, tropical mandarin, lemon shandy, and a low-calorie, low-carb light wheat variety named Shock Top Zest. Belgian Ale Isn’t Shock Top’s Only Offering Unsurprisingly, many suggest serving your Shock Top with an orange wedge garnish. Shock Top’s flagship Belgian white is brewed with orange, lemon, and lime peels, along with two-row barley and imported Hallertau hops blended with Cascade and Willamette hops.

In 2017, for the first time in the brand’s history, Shock Top refreshed its branding, giving it “a dynamic look sporting a fresh new logo, hand-drawn graphics, and a reinvigorated Wedgehead.” An edgy block-letter logo replaced its previous, more traditional serifed font. Forbes called it “a pithy gift of an ad” in 2016. In a 2016 Super Bowl commercial, an animated Wedgehead exchanged verbal jabs with actor T.J. It even has its own Twitter account, …And It Even Starred in a Super Bowl Commercial That cool, mohawked orange slice gracing every Shock Top can and bottle has a name, and an apt one at that: Wedgehead. Upon its success - the ale took gold in the Belgian white category at the North American Beer Awards - Anheuser-Busch added it to its year-round portfolio. Anheuser-Busch InBev released Shock Top’s first variety, originally named Spring Heat Spiced Wheat, in 2006 as a limited seasonal offering.

Shock top pretzel beer