Modern Vespa

I keep seeing references to PBR on scooter boards.
What's the deal? How did it come to be associated with scooting?

it's not atrocious for cheap beer and it's quite popular with hipsters and other "cool kids." around here they refer to it as the "people's beer of richmond"

Weird because that was my grandfather's beer of choice He's been dead since 1978 I guess what is old is new now

PBR has a light beer now, it was news to me. I had one at a freinds house a few weeks ago and it was not bad IMO..

After five or six it becomes a really good beer..

HaHa!! I've wondered the same thing. All this talk about single malt and fancy wines on the forum, I figured PBR must stand for something other than Pabst Blue Ribbon. Now, I haven't tried it for years, but I don't remember it as being very good. Maybe it or my tastes have changed since then. I'm not much of a drinker, but I usually avoid cheap beer. It might be time to give it another chance. I'm still hoarding a bottle of Stanny's San Antonio Scooter Swill from Amerivespa.

Here's one for you, Santiago...

Are there longneck pbr's? i've heard aluminum is bad for the dome.

any beer from a can is pretty awful.

It's $44/bottle in China:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/evanosnos/2010/07/pardon-me-would-you-have-any-pabst-blue-ribbon.html

Pabst Calls It a Comeback
How PBR rose through word-of-mouth campaign

By Emily Patti

From 1978 to 2001, Pabst Blue Ribbon was a brand in decline. It wasn't hip, it hadn't yet developed that retro cachet we all know it to possess today, and it certainly wasn't selling. That all changed when Pabst Brewing Co. launched a word-of-mouth marketing campaign that prompted the national resurgence of the iconic American beer.

"We're going on 10 years now that this trend started, and it has had unbelievable staying power," says Neal Stewart, who worked for Pabst from 2000 to 2006. As brand manager, and later marketing director, Stewart worked with a team of brand ambassadors to direct and create the PBR re-branding campaign-a campaign that employed an unobtrusive approach to marketing that appealed to the consumers who had begun to adopt the brand in 2000 and 2001 in the Northwest.

These initial adopters were bike messengers in Portland, Ore.-a group that, according to Stewart, had created a subculture that didn't include supporting mainstream brands. It was unlikely that they had ever seen a PBR commercial, as Pabst Brewing stopped advertising in the early '80s; rather, they likely had grown up being inundated with ads from big breweries in the '80s and '90s.

"It didn't have the baggage and it didn't have the stigma of being this big corporation," Stewart explains. "People thought of it as this little, tiny company trying to make ends meet."

It was important to the growth of the brand that consumers continue to feel that PBR was the true alternative choice to mainstream counterparts.

"I don't want to overcomplicate what we did," Stewart says. "It was mainly finding people who were really supportive of the brand and supporting their efforts."

Pabst Blue Ribbon began sponsoring bike messenger races and scooter rallies. While bigger beer brands, like Miller (now MillerCoors) and Anheuser-Busch, were sponsoring large concert venues and festivals, Pabst Blue Ribbon focused on smaller venues and low-level clubs across the country, solidifying the brand as a supporter not only of independent live music, but of hipster culture in general. From bike messenger to bike messenger, and music fan to music fan, the buzz created by the word-of-mouth campaign generated sales in 2002, resulting in PBR's first volume increase since 1978.

"We tracked it state by state, and you could literally see it start in the Northwest and then jump to the East Coast, and then it slowly did make its way to the middle of the country," Stewart says. "Milwaukee was a different market for us, though, because the brewery used to be there, and there was a huge backlash against Pabst... I wouldn't say that Milwaukee was behind the trend, because of the late adopters. But maybe it was slightly late, because there was baggage with the brand back then."

The "baggage" was the closing of Pabst's Milwaukee brewery in 1996, after a 152-year presence in the city. According to Milwaukee historian and author John Gurda, the anger felt by many Milwaukeeans was directed at the irresponsible decisions made by the brewery's ownership, S&P Co.

"I had been a loyal Pabst drinker for 30 years," Gurda says, "and I wouldn't touch the stuff because I was angry. And I don't think I was alone. I think that there were a lot of people that were really miffed that this brand had been taken over by robber barons who drove it into the ground, ruining a proud heritage."

After shutting down the remainder of its breweries nationwide, S&P Co. began contracting with MillerCoors (then Miller) to brew its portfolio in 2001. To Gurda, this softens some of what he refers to as the "psychological reluctance" of re-embracing PBR, because "it's money, it's jobs and it's brewed here," he says.

It's funny that the rise in popularity of PBR has caused the price to rise too. Here in Dallas, there's a place called the Pizza Lounge (in Exposition Park). They have a special that is $6 and consists of a huge slice of cheese pizza, a shot of tequila, and a can of beer. When they first started doing that, the beer was PBR. Then they went to Lone Star. Because of the price increases to them, they now serve Schlitz.

There used to be a biker bar in south San Jose, at Calero reservoir, called the Calero Inn. They served PBR draft that was tooth-cracking cold (the only way it is tolerable, IMHO), and cheeseburgers off a grill that hadn't been cleaned since it was made. I miss that place.

Mentioned it a few times in his movie Blue Velvet.

It tastes horrible and gives a headache but yet I'll still drink it.


WTF

The only thing better than a PBR on a hot summer day is a cold can of Schaefer.

I fondly recall drinking many a PBR in High School. I also remember it was all we could afford by the case from the local liquor store which didn't bother with IDs. Fond memories of the '80s

I do however agree with Danny that I don't remember it tasting very good; not that I remember much the day after drinking it at a party.

Judging by its taste, PBR has enough formaldehyde in it to expand its use to embalming fluid.

If I'm gonna pickle my innards, I'd prefer that the alcohol content exceed the formaldehyde, thank you!

Ok Ok now must say that PBR has long been a just plain good beer. and not so hard on the wallet. It is one of the anti snob beers. WE took 4-30 racks down to the Cape for my sister's Wedding rehearsal dinner, we handed it our free along with 100 or so Lobsters and fresh Mussel "Zuppa". and still there were the upturned noses. My line was "this beer has been perfectly paired with the lobster, butter and mussels!"
Oh and by the way we call it "Le Cordon Bleu" Beer, Drink it ice cold baby! Drink it warm... livin' the dream....

50 cent 12oz taps at the neighborhood bar happy hour.

(not in this lifetime... )

My grandfather and uncle were the only people I had ever seen drink PBR. I started drinking it shortly after turning 21. I had my own apartment and I always had beer in my fridge. My cheap ass buddies used to come over and drink all my Budweiser or Sam Adams, I started buying Pabst Blue Ribbon because it was cheaper but they wouldn't drink it. So I kept buying it because I liked it and none of my friends were drinking it. It was a win-win for me!!!! Now I have my wife drinking it and my sister-in-law too.

When I was a kid, my grandfather had a place in Virginia along the Potomac river as it dumped into the Chesapeake. he always had a six pack of Pabst and then a case or so of Miller High Life. He used to call Pabst his fish beer. We kids would go down to a local pier with rope, a bushel basket and chicken pieces and in a half hour get a bushel of blue crabs ready for the steamer. Grandpa had the steamer rolling hot when we got back with two 16 oz cans of Pabst boiling under the screen and about a half can of Old Bay. What an amazing smell. In went the crabs one-by one to make sure they were still alive. Best eating -I can remember from my younger days. Grandpa never drank Pabst, but he did drink that Miller.

Red necks, white sox, and Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. That's Southern patriotism.

And a country song I grew up with.

Back in the early 80s we drank Red White & Blue. It was a PBR brand, but even cheaper. I think it was something like $1.25 or $1.50 a six pack.

Maaaaaaaany years ago in my drinking days we drank Orbit Beer, it was a whopping .79 cents a six-pack, Yep, a whole 79 cents. It also worked well for removing rust off of car bumpers.

For me it was Haffenreffer (green death). Cheap malt liquor. I think it was maybe $6 a case.

I remember drinking this generic beer when we were really broke. I think it was $4+ a case.

THE GREEN MONSTER!!! they still make it.

BRILLIANT!

Then, you'll like this stuff.......

Now you are approaching the right ballpark IMO (Moose Drool, this is). If there is a single scooter rider in Portland that drinks Pabst, I've never met him/her. We have so many great beers around here, I can't imagine being that hard up for a brew.

Just an observation.

Twenty four hours per day.

Twenty four beers in a case.

Is this just a coincidence??

I grew up in Milwaukee and PBR is about all we had (dirt cheap, and we teenagers didn't give a rat's behind!).

I had one about a year ago and had a bad flashback to the 70's. The taste hasn't changed, it still sucks, but it's such a specific suck that my memories were so precise: Barefoot girl sittin' on the hood of a Dodge drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain...

Yup, it was $1.25 per six pack. I used to work the dice game at our old Catholic church where each paddle was $.25 so we made a quarter on every game played... and we moved a lot of six packs in that parish!

Pathmark!!!! Lol, I remember shopping there with my mom in the 70's.

All this talk of beer in the south Florida heat makes me want to get on the vespa and buy some!

use to sneak my dads PBR and Hamms all the time. When he'd run out when having friends over he would send us kids down the block to the gas station and get him a 6 and a pack of cigs. We were 12-14 yr old, never any questions or carding back then.