Craft Brewers Are Upping Their Name Game

Craft brewing is going gangbusters in North Carolina­­–and with it more competition for those great beer names.  Now, established brewers are getting more aggressive about protecting their brands.

The Triad Business Journal's Owen Covington is reporting on the disputes. For this week's Business Report, he tells WFDD's Emily McCord craft brewers are looking for more ways to distinguish themselves.

Interview Highlights

On why there's an increasing pressure for unique beer names:

You've got very creative people. They're creative in coming up with the recipes for different beers and that goes into making that unique, memorable name, too. Just here in North Carolina, you've got a brewery called Dirtbag Ales, Barking Duck, Duck Rabbit. With the amount of work they put into coming up with those creative names, they want to protect that, as well. 

What if we wanted to trademark our own beer? Let's say it's called "Hop Muppet". What goes into that? 

You want to think about how far a field you're going to be selling this beer. If "Hop Muppet" is going to be your signature beer that you're going to distribute up and down the East Coast, then you're going to want to trademark that. It's an extensive and sometime expensive proposition. You have to go through the U.S. Patent and Trade office to register that trademark to see if there's any other names that are similar and give the opportunity for others to challenge and say 'you've got Hop Muppet, but I've got Hop Muppy'. There really can be some disputes that arise.

Is it worth all the effort to brand these things in these creative ways?  

It really is because you have so many different beer discussion groups and craft beer lovers like to get together and talk about the beers they like. So, you really want brand equity. For example, Natty Greene's Brewing Company out of Greensboro– they actually butted heads with Anheuser-Busch. Around here, Natty's is a pretty well-known name. But Anheuser-Busch trademarked a number of variations related to their Natural Light Beer... Fatty Natty and Natty Daddy. So, Natty Greene's tried to trademark name and I imagine that was a scary prospect. But they were able to work it out. 

The Business Journal on 88.5 WFDD is a partnership with the Triad Business Journal.