Asbury Park Brewery‘s recent collaboration with the band The Gaslight Anthem to create a Hazy IPA called, Stay Lucky, showed beer and music lovers the brewery’s deep connection to music, stemming from its founders’ backgrounds in local bands and the connection they could make to lead to this creative partnership.
Managing Partner Brian Durand shared in a recent Brewer Mag Podcast that the release — which sold out in two weeks — helped develop three key aspects that any brewery can showcase when it comes to creating a connection for both fans of the band, fans of the brand, and connecting them together for success.
“We work in the beer business. It’s supposed to be fun,” Durand said about the New Jersey brewery’s idea to keep things simple and focus on the fun it can be to showcase music and good beer. “When you get a group of good people, and you want to hang out with them, it’s cool to make a beer. “We make great beer, we do a lot with music and hanging out with your friends, drink great beer and listening to music. That’s it. We don’t try and go too far off the rails with anything else.”
Creative Partnerships: Collaborating with musicians or other artists can introduce your brand to new audiences. By aligning the creative processes of both brewing and music, you can create unique products that resonate with consumers. The brewery has also done releases with The Front Bottoms and Panic at The Disco.
“It turns out he (Gaslight Anthem lead singer Brian Fallon) lives two streets away from me,” Durand said. “We just started shooting shit and going through everything else and he says, my favorite beer is Sea Dragon, which is one of our IPAs. He goes, ‘Let’s make it like 10% and we’ll call it Day Ender.’
“I’m like, all right, Brian, we want people to have a couple more than one.”
The bands all had their little preferences. And Durand said they just narrowed down what the preferences would be. Picking an ABV and style they went to Asbury Park Brewery’s Head Brewer Andy Lasiy.
“He went back and he worked up some recipes and we tried a couple of them,” Durand said. “We finally settled on the third version, and it did fantastic.”
Branding and Marketing: A well-executed branding and marketing strategy, including thoughtful label design and leveraging various media outlets, is essential for product visibility. In this case, involving a skilled marketing team along with in-house help from Social Media Manager Charlotte Nagy helped the brewery gain media coverage in both beer and music outlets, boosting sales and engagement.
“We were in Forbes Magazine, various brewing magazines … we were in music magazines, like all over the place,” Durand said. “It encompassed every person, from beer drinkers to music lovers. I normally find they’re kind of the same people anyway.”
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Crafting Unique Products: Offering something distinct and special for collaborations (rather than repurposing existing products) can enhance the perceived value. The brewery avoided rebranding an existing beer, instead creating a custom brew that reflected the band’s input and character, which led to greater consumer interest.
“We have other hazy IPAs, but…we wanted it approachable and we wanted it to have the color and the haze that we were looking for,” Durand said. “Then with the band and the whole playful attitude of it.
“I know it sounds kind of corny, but you can actually get, like, a playful kind of attitude with tasting. And we gave all that to Andy. He went away to his nook and came back … and he nailed it. So it kind of worked out perfectly. Again, we don’t try and overthink the room here.”
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