Chapter 4 Corporate Beer and Circus

Chapter 4 discusses the marketing strategies used by beer corporations such as Miller Light and Coors Light to make money off of student’s at large universities. The strategy was to target universities that had large an influential collegiate subcultures, flourishing intercollegiate athletic departments, a well earned reputation as a party school and administrators who emphasized research and graduate programs over undergraduate education ones.

Large universities are no place to learn. It is shown a big time sport school is ran by the athletic department and a school such as USC would rather be a part of large drunken festivities and a NCAA title rather than have good academics. The more I learn about the “business world” the more I noticed that a lot of things are influenced by money. People are selfish and will do anything to get as much money as they can, even if it means to give the students alcohol poisoning.

Alcohol producers at sporting events spend disproportionate amounts of their advertising budgets on campaigns aimed at college age drinkers and more specifically sports fans. The goal was to turn the major characteristic of college sports fans that have personal loyalty to their teams into an allegiance to their favorite alcohol brands.

Is it immoral to market to these young and immature college students who are underage? Has the market campaign caused any negative effects? What is the schools intention for the good of the students? These are some questions that should have been asked or researched by the school. I feel the intention of the school is just to make money and not care what the students learn as long as they get tuition money. Schools are becoming more of a business environment rather than a learning environment.

The marketing strategies used by beer companies during this time were manipulative and shouldn’t have been done. I feel administrators at universities are learning to control the parties and from students who drink excessive amounts of alcohol and don’t want the drunken festivities to ruin the “good” reputation of the university. I just hope college doesn’t turn into a ruthless business enterprise hungry for money.