Beer for buddies – for 90 cents!
Photo: Futura
Photo: Futura
BEER PER MONTH
Can you imagine a world where you put 12 euros in your pocket on a Friday evening to buy a dozen and more beers for yourself and your friends?
You need to hear our daring idea. What would you say if a monthly subscription for 10, 30, or 50 euros could get you just as many beers, for example bottles filled with the imaginary hit beverage of this summer The Beer? And it would work in any pub in Slovenia. For less than a euro for each beer.
Photo: Futura
Photo: Futura
The idea is essentially very simple. If you want The Beer, you can get it in any Slovenian pub for a fixed price. As many euros as you’re willing to put down, that’s how many 90 cent beers you can buy at the pub.
The equation is as follows: 50 euros = 50 beers. For each beer, you pay 90 cents out of pocket, and a euro is automatically deducted from your prepaid subscription amount, which goes to the owner of the establishment. An additional bonus is cheaper beer in shops and in gas stations, where it would also cost the unbeatable 90 cents, regardless if you choose to buy a bottle or a can. In that case, of course, nothing is deducted from the prepaid amount.
If you subscribe to The Beer, a beer in a pub costs only 1.90 euros, of which you pay 90 cents, and a euro is deducted from the prepaid subscription amount. In shops or at gas stations, the price is 90 cents with no deduction.
Life per month is constantly bringing up new business models, which are increasingly inovative. Brewers have already taken advantage of the traditional subscription models to recruit fans of hoppy brews, who receive a certain amount of bottles or cans of beer to their homes each month for a fixed sum.
Photo: Shutterstock
Photo: Shutterstock
Sounds familiar? The first ones to do this sold razor blades, cosmetics, clothes, or various boxes of goodies, from meat to vegetables or snacks.
But in Slovenian and European society, beer has a meaning different from that of meat, vegetables, or cosmetics. Enjoying a beer involves a very strong social component. Beer fans much prefer having a pint with friends to drinking beer by themselves on the sofa. Outside barbecue season, the preferred gatherings for most groups of friends are clearly defined: on weekdays they meet at their local pub, and over the weekend at a bar downtown.
Do you know any beer fans that could resist a subscription package offering savings along with their favourite beverage? Do you think this would hurt the pub owners whose margins to serve beer often exceed a euro? That might be true, but the music industry had similar doubts, and today, Apple, Google, and Spotify’s subscription models are among the most successful in the business.
It is true that CD sales margins are lower, as they would become lower in the sales of The Beer, but the subscription model would attract new customers to the pubs. And a full house is the goal of every pub owner. The fact the subscription model could attract customers that would otherwise enjoy their The Beer somewhere else – and spend their money elsewhere – is an added bonus.
Photo: Shutterstock
Photo: Shutterstock
The subscription solution possibilities for The Beer producers or any other brewery are endless.
Life per month with a beer in your hand naturally also calls for a potential upgrade in the form of the traditional subscription component; a package of beer »in your mailbox«. It would also work as a loyalty programme that offers gifts in the form of special new beers to regular pub visitors. So, cheers with a subscription!