History WILL repeat: Session IPAs gonna rock.

Here is the single best piece of marketing advice I ever received:

“In the history of any product category, you’ll find a very few big strategic ideas that drove major business gains. Search them out and study them carefully. Most of all, think about how they might work again. This is where creativity takes hold. Because with just the right fresh spin, these big ideas will always work again.”

By "study," the chief marketing officer who preached this look at history wasn’t talking about a quick trip through a historical reel of commercials. He drove his people and agency partners almost crazy compelling them to dig deeply into the history of beer brands to find inspiration for new success. Did all the energy he devoted to that effort pay off? You bet it did. Coors Light’s current focus on “ice-cold refreshment” was originally prompted by just such an analysis.

And that wasn’t the first time Coors Light benefitted from re-visiting, re-working, and re-generating another brand’s earlier marketing success.

Back in the late eighties, the brand took off behind the ad claim “There’s no slowin’ down with the Silver Bullet.”  The idea was that a lighter beer with fewer calories was better suited to energetic young-adult lifestyles of the day. A very good idea, but not completely original.

Decades earlier, the same basic notion was at the core of the success of regional beer powerhouse, Schaefer. Its “one beer to have when you’re having more than one” campaign is legendary. "The pleasure of Schaefer doesn't fade after one beer or two," the copy put it.

I was reminded of all this as I read of an emerging trend in the craft beer world. It seems launching “session IPAs” is about to become all the rage. The Urban Dictionary tells us a “sessionable” beer is one that “is suitable for a lengthy drinking session.” I assume that means it’s a beer that “won’t slow you down” and is a good choice “when you’re having more than one.”  

One of the first such brands out of the gate comes from Founder’s Brewery of Grand Rapids, Michigan. It will doubtlessly be supported with not a penny of advertising, and maybe partly because of that, it bears a perfectly descriptive brand name that nails what sessionable means: “All Day IPA."

Once again, a craft brewer takes Big Beer learning to heart. They study history, see what worked, and re-jigger the idea on their terms. My CMO friend is smiling somewhere.

Will these new IPAs with their more drinkable—sessionable—recipes be successful?

Bet on it.