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It's hard to get excited about whether television should carry ads for distilled spirits, but these days, you take your issues where you find them. After all, the president of this great republic has concerned himself with momentous matters like school uniforms, and our own governor finds it his duty to proclaim the pleasures of skiing, so who are we to object?
For about 50 years, the makers of distilled spirits -- whiskey, rum, vodka, etc. -- have voluntarily agreed not to advertise on television. Now they want to run TV ads. So far, the networks and major cable systems have resisted, but local stations might not be so steadfast.
Beverage alcohol -- beer and wine -- is already advertised on TV, and that may explain why the distillers want to get on the tube.
In 1950, the average American drank 19.6 gallons of beer and 3.5 gallons of distilled spirits. In 1970, per-capita consumption was 30.6 gallons of beer, 2.2 gallons of wine, and 3.0 gallons of the hard stuff. In 1990, 34.4 gallons of beer and 3.9 gallons of wine -- hard liquor was down to 2.2 gallons.
That is, the average American now drinks more beer (up
75 percent in 40 years) and wine, and less distilled liquor
(down 38 percent). Assuming there's a single alcoholic
beverage market,
the brewers and vintners have been
gaining market share, and the distillers have been
losing.
Since beer and wine advertise on TV, and hard liquor doesn't, the distillers apparently see the tube as the cure for their loss of market share.
They say that they're not trying to get anybody to start
drinking, and that they don't want to attract underage
customers -- they just want you to think Hmm, maybe I'll
order a shot of redeye instead of enjoying some vintage
local wine with dinner.
Opponents argue that television is a powerful advertising medium that invades our living rooms, and that children thereby exposed to whiskey ads will develop a thirst for the stuff.
By and large, they're the same world-improvers who also worry about things like Joe Camel encouraging children to start smoking -- and Joe Camel does not appear on television, since tobacco advertising is forbidden on that medium.
Further, the big growth in the beer and wine markets comes from microbreweries and boutique wineries, which are generally too small to advertise on television.
So the televised presence or absence of a given substance doesn't seem to matter.
The big brewers do advertise, of course, and doubtless
it has some effect. An impressionable young man, under the
influence of his surging hormones, might indeed observe a
beer commercial and opine, If I drink Budmiller, I'll
instantly be transported from this bleak and wintry
environment to a warm and sunny beach, where I will be
invited to play world-class volleyball with a bevy of young
women with huge bosoms in revealing outfits.
Another village lout, too ignorant to know the
difference between porter and pilsner, might succumb to the
Coors last real beer
pitch and swill away,
blissfully unaware that rice is not an ingredient of
traditional real beer.
Add hard liquor to this propaganda barrage, and we'd see little dramas where the hard-charging Type A learns to relax among the simple easy-goin' folk with some genuine Tennessee sippin' whiskey, or the young executive gets her promotion after switching to the proper brand of social-climbing scotch.
Little wonder that the do-gooders oppose this prospect. Why should our airwaves be used to encourage products that often lead to stupid behavior, they ask?
But if the do-gooders were serious about this, they'd go after some ads that already run on TV, specifically those for four-wheel-drive sport-utility vehicles.
There are ethical and responsible four-wheelers -- I met some last summer when the Mile High Jeep Club held its convention near Salida.
But you won't meet them on the television ads. Instead, you see people merrily passing on snow-packed paved roads.
Off the pavement, they're charging across fragile meadows, careering through pristine forests, roaring across primitive fords of rippling creeks, churning muddy back roads to create monster ruts and aspiring gullies -- in general, chewing up our landscape, causing permanent damage for some momentary pleasure.
In short, this is advertising that promotes a product on the grounds that the product will allow the purchaser to enjoy stupid and anti-social behavior. If the do-gooders are serious about purifying society by monitoring television advertising, why don't they start with those sport-utility-vehicle ads that already run, rather than fret about whiskey ads that haven't been aired yet?
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