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Brand Mysticism: Cultivate Creativity and Intoxicate Your Audience - Hardcover | Diverse Reads

Brand Mysticism: Cultivate Creativity and Intoxicate Your Audience

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An irreverent and wide-ranging treatise on building and maintaining a standout brand in business or in life, from the marketing mastermind behind countless iconic booze labels.
 
Steven Grasse made a name for himself as not only a distiller but also the mind behind beloved brands like Hendrick’s Gin and Sailor Jerry Rum and the guy who made cheap-beer-standbys like Narragansett and Miller High Life cool again. Through his work in advertising and marketing, Grasse has changed the game in the booze world and become an authority on building an authentic, enduring, and deeply beloved brand. Food & Wine has called him “the punk-rock prince of small-batch spirits.” 
 
So how did he do it? Through practicing brand mysticism, a mentality for all endeavors based on keeping an open mind, taking risks, and developing authenticity—skills that have benefited him in booze, business, and beyond. In this book, he’s sharing this practice with the world. Through lessons (big life things that feel like just cool stories), case studies (how did Sailor Jerry become the punk rock Captain Morgan?), and magical ingredients (what makes a great message sing), Brand Mysticism guides you through the steps it takes to channel entrepreneurial spirit into a brand, a business, a creative practice, or a life that breaks with tradition to achieve the remarkable.

ISBN-13: 9780762475827

Media Type: Hardcover

Publisher: Running Press Book Publishers

Publication Date: 11-08-2022

Pages: 208

Product Dimensions: 6.50(w) x 8.60(h) x 0.90(d)

Steven Grasse is the founder of Quaker City Mercantile and the creator of Hendrick’s Gin, Sailor Jerry Rum, Art in the Age Spirits, and Tamworth Distilling, among many others. He’s helped revive brands such as Narragansett, Miller High Life, Guinness, and Pilsner Urquell. He is the author of The Cocktail Workshop, The Evil Empire: 101 Ways That England Ruined the World, and Colonial Spirits: A Toast to Our Drunken History. Aaron Goldfarb is a novelist, author, and journalist, who frequently writes about the spirits industry and drinking culture for Esquire, Playboy, PUNCH, and VinePair. His two most recent books are Hacking Whiskey: Smoking, Blending, Fat-Washing, and Other Whiskey Experiments and Gather Around Cocktails: Drinks to Celebrate Usual and Unusual Holidays. His 2018 VinePair article on Grasse, “How Do You Make a Booze Brand Go Viral?,” fittingly, went viral itself and has since been shared online hundreds of thousands of times.

Table of Contents

Caveat Emptor xi

If a Bonehead Like Me Can Do This xiii

Wait! I've Still Never Heard of You xv

Disclaimer! xvii

Part I Before Booze 1

Avoiding the Khmer Rouge and Understanding the Value of Old Books 3

Taking a Global Vision Quest, Turning into One Odd Fellow 7

Going a Little Insane, Beginning to Understand Virality 11

Case Study: Red Kamel and the Marketing Marine Corps 15

Learning the Value of Being a Troll and Fucking with People 21

Case Study: Puma and Creative Grenades 25

Pursuing Bikini Bandits, Starting to Do Things My Way 31

Realizing that Enchantment Has Disappeared, Brand Mysticism is the Key 35

Part II My Booze Life 41

Starting My Booze Career with a Bang 42

There's Nothin' Better than Booze 44

Lesson 1: The Four Magical Ingredients in a Great Booze Brand 46

Case Study: Hendrick's-Beginner's Luck? 47

*The Magical Ingredient*-A Complex Brand World 52

A Great Brand World Extends to Your Creative Team Too 57

Case Study: Sailor Jerry Rum 60

*The Magical Ingredient*-Great Packaging 63

Advertising Awards are Worthless 67

(Important! Read Me) My Onion Method 71

Deez Nuts and the Value of Performance Art 77

You May Live in a Shitty Place, But It's Y'our Shitty Place 81

Lesson 2: Be Like Bowie and Completely Ignore What Everyone Else is Doing 83

My All-Time Favorite Business and Marketing Books 87

Don't Email Me: A Day in My Life 89

Lesson 3: How Belting into the Past can Revive the Present 95

*The Magical Ingredient*-Good and Differentiated Liquid 99

Good Taste is Not Subjective 102

So You Refuse to Listen to Me and Wanna Create Yet Another Sourced Bourbon Brand? 105

Case Study: 'Gansett, Knucklehead Marketing, and Coming Ahead on a Sucker Deal 109

Lesson 4: You Need to Think Like Four Uneducated Guys in a Garage 114

Self-Esteem for Bio Brands: High Life, Pilsner Urquell, and Guinness 119

Micro-Case Studies 120

Authenticity is Everything-How Do You Create It? 126

Lesson 5: Don't Dumb it Down 131

If You Went to a Fancy Pants Business School, I Probably Won't Hire You 134

So Whom Do I Hire? 136

Case Study: Art in the Age 137

Lesson 6: The More Things are Reproduced, the More they Lose their Mystical Power 143

Case Study: Tamworth Distilling and My Colonel Kurtz Moment 146

Lesson 7: Launch Creative Grenades 152

Use Restrictions to Your Advantage 158

Case Study: The Worst Brand I Ever Created 160

*The Magical Ingredient*-Full Control 163

Spirits Awards are Worthless Too 165

I Want to be the Hermes of Booze 167

Lesson 8: Turn Your Brand into a Cult 170

Chekhov's Grenades: Salem Witch Whiskey, Going Bat Shit Crazy, and Thanksgiving in a Glass 173

*The Magical Ingredient*-Time 177

The Final Lesson: Continually Find Ways to Generate Buzz and Blow People's Fucking Minds 181

Thank-Your 185

About the Authors 186