Fat Tire, the beer that me and your mountain biking neighbor have loved for years - the beer that is the father figure to what former hipsters call ‘craft’ beer - have gone and changed themselves completely.

The label is sleeker and more centered, the recipe is changed, and I am in distress. For close to a decade, Fat Tire has been my favorite beer. A classy little treat at the end of a long day drinking rubbish in the skate shop parking lot. It was the only thing keeping my nose raised above the plebian cool kids making art, getting laid, and having fun. Now, Fat Tire looks, feels, and tastes like something that those cool kids will probably be sessioning. 

I have a difficult time adjusting to change, particularly when things that I’ve interacted with for years get an update. When the diner by my apartment got new tables, I stopped going to that diner. Likewise, Fat Tire’s rebrand and restructure threw me. The look of it is simplified, focused, and the labeling hones in on the values and personalities of those brewing. For example, from their start in 1992, when it was just a couple of people brewing in a basement, they rigged up a trash can and some copper pipe to capture and reuse heat, reducing energy usage. Since then, Fat Tire has been a leader in sustainable brewing, constantly seeking to increase efficiency and reduce their impact. 

Sustainability and environmental preservation are core values for Monster Children because you can’t surf in toxic dead oceans and you can’t skate through a flood. Likewise, sustainability and reducing environmental impact has been a day one cornerstone for Fat Tire as well, and as such, much of the language found on the cans encourage the consumer to be more aware, take action, and remain informed. 

And, I mean, yeah, sure. I love the planet as much as the next guy. But you know what I love more than the next guy? An unchanged Fat Tire. It feels almost personal, like something I thought of as mine has been altered without my consent. I feel the way I did when they rebooted Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, or Star Wars, or when I see NYU kids walking around with iPods. They weren’t even alive when iPods came out, or Star Wars, or TMNT, or Fat Tire. They don’t know how good it was at the start, the quality was impeccable. So really, the most important question I have is, ‘does it taste good?’

‘Yeah, it’s good.’ affirms Taylor Boyd, Fat Tire brand manager and a mastermind of the rebrand.

‘But is it?’

Yeah.’

‘I don’t know man, maybe you need to send me some cases of the new beer so I can decide for myself.’

They did not send me cases of the new beer, so I schlepped over to the corner and bought a pack myself, and son of a bitch. Yeah. It’s good. It’s not the same beer I used to feel superior with, but it’s a good beer. ‘It’s crisper, with a little less sweetness. We just thought, ‘if we were to brew Fat Tire today, what would that taste like?’

The new bev is very drinkable, with a label and look that no longer screams, ‘I’m trying to be outdoorsy!’ A corporate rebrand is always a tough move, because a key to good marketing is not letting the person you’re marketing to notice that they are being marketed to, and when you completely change your corporate brand, it’s a very noticeable change, and like me, people don’t like change, or corporate.

‘I've heard people speculate that the move was a ploy to increase margin. I can say with certainty that this is not a cheaper beer to brew," says Boyd. "When we started this process with LAND [Fat Tire refresh partner and one of our favorite design firms], the first thing we looked at together was the original Fat Tire watercolor label. This is where it started, and we wanted to root it there. We were very intentional about retaining what made Fat Tire the beer and brand it is."

That sentiment is essentially the rebrand in a nutshell; it is the people at Fat Tire bringing the brand, the product, and production just a little bit closer to them. Less of a corporate rebrand, more of a unification. A simplification - a distillation. From Anna Wintour to the Marlboro Man, corporate marketers try to sell you a vision rather than earnesty. For Fat Tire and their consumers, that has become exhausting. Instead, they’ve elected to create a look, taste, and feel that says, ‘this is who we are, this is what we value, this is what we think tastes good, and we hope you will, too.’

Check out Fat Tire, here.