“They Sell Bud. We Sell Weed”: Travails On Pot Prohibition’s Silly Side (Unless You’re Getting Screwed By It, Then It Ain’t So Funny Or Cheap)
May 30th, 2008 By: Allen St. Pierre, NORML Executive DirectorShare this Article
One of the only things that makes me madder than seeing the day in, day out waste of public resources and abuse of citizens’ rights associated with pot prohibition are some of the absurd stepchildren born of the government’s zeal in trying to enforce cannabis prohibition laws, quash popular culture and stymie entrepreneurialism.
Case in hand, a federal bureaucracy, the US Treasury Department’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau is harassing a family-owned microbrewery in Northern California for some creative marketing, while looking the other way regarding the advertising practices of a huge, politically powerful beer company.
Treasury technocrats are taking umbrage with the Mt. Shasta Brewing Company’s use of bottle caps imprinted with ‘Try Legal Weed’, claiming that beer (AKA a drug) can’t have a drug reference, even when the reference is the name of the brewery’s hometown and last name of the city’s (Weed, California) 1880s wood baron founder (Abner Weed).
Mt. Shasta Brewing Company’s already sold 400,000 brews with names like Shastafarian Porter and Mountain High IPA (an additional catchy slogan on these notable craft beers: ‘A Friend in Weed is a Friend Indeed’), and had started printing up an additional 400,000 bottle caps in February when the feds put the kibosh on these funny and effective marketing double entendre.
Vaune Dillmann, Mt. Shasta Brewing Company’s 61-year-old owner and a former cop, irked by the government’s heavy handedness and lack of a sense of humor, is vexed by the obvious double standard that the feds don’t harass Budweiser for their now ubiquitous slogan ‘This Bud’s for you’.
Dillmann tells the LA Times’ Eric Bailey, “They Sell Bud. We Sell Weed”.
The ‘Weed’ beer debacle reminds me of a another recent and equally absurd government effort to ‘protect’ citizens from marketing imagery prohibitionists and well intending public health officials don’t like…
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Tags: BATF, Beer, California, cannabis, marijuana, NORML, weed
May 30th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Absolutely rediculous. The DEA is restricting freedom of speech, and this company’s ability to successfully market their products!
June 2nd, 2008 at 9:23 pm
Ya this is crazy, the U.S. government is ridiculous. When will they learn? I guess it will take a couple more years and a couple more mess ups on their part.
June 3rd, 2008 at 5:51 pm
There’s an energy drink called “cocaine.”
http://www.drinkcocaine.com/default.htm
June 4th, 2008 at 5:05 am
I believe the energy drink cocaine has been renamed. But I agree, this is ridiculous.
June 6th, 2008 at 11:24 am
the Energy drink “Cocaine” was pulled off of shelves because of the name.
June 6th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
what else is new? I’m just waiting for my P.I.L. to be implanted in my arm!
June 7th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
There is also an energy drink called NOS.Does that promote children to try and sip on NOS containers or use Nitrous Oxide for recreation?
Hmmm.
http://www.drinknos.com/
June 10th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
this is stuiped to bust eveyone and every good idea why don’t they make coke change their name people could say is promotes cocaine use but hell while not take my name adam and make illegal it can promote ecstacy this is just stuiped it just go to show if you a big bussness and have money your untouchable
amercains stop the B.S.
June 10th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Isn’t the term “weed” a poor description of cannabis? Weed is “(1): a plant that is not valued where it is growing and is usually of vigorous growth; especially: one that tends to overgrow or choke out more desirable plants (2): a weedy growth of plants” I value my plants, although they are vigorous. I can’t think of another plant that is more desirable.
June 13th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Actually, it made me chuckle a lil bit, so much money wasted on expensive college tuitions, and people still make mistakes like that!
June 14th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Wow, the “This Bud’s for you” thing doesn’t even have to do with a town, but the “Try legal weed” thing is just saying the name of the town.
If either beer company should be persecuted, it should be Budweiser. >.<