I think that as long as there is a demand for light beer it will have a very strong presence in the beer market. I do agree with your blog light beer is inferior to others, but with people on the low calorie band wagon it will remain strong.

Guiness light flopped because Guiness as a whole is horrible.

Go suck a cock Beerfan

Guinness Draught(126) has less calories than a Budweiser (140)and I agree with BeerFan, our US Guinness as a whole IS horrible - there are much better options than a watery mess of a stout. Guinness draught is actually quite 'light' when compared to others within that style category because it has the about the same Alcohol By Volume of many American Lagers, around 4%.

In your article you snarkily engaged readers on why light beer sucks, but your didn't offer any insightful options for the light beer consumer the next time they would peruse through the beer isle. So I'll do it for you:

accessible beers for the craft brew newbie:
- Saint Arnold Lawnmower (local)
- Southern Star Bombshell Blonde (local)
- O'Hara's Celtic Stout
- Sierra Nevada Pale Ale
- Victory Prima Pils
- Allagash White
- Brooklyn Lager
- North Coast's Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout
- Bohemia (corona, pacifico, etc alternative)

Cheers!

brandon

There is one use for the lite products: You've been mowing the lawn, it's hot and you're thirsty but you just don't really want a beer or sugary (corn syrupy) drink. The slight fizz with white stuff on the top makes it better than water.

I will agree that light beer is a poor excuse for a brew, especially when there are great lagers that are refreshing and still have great taste. I happen to be making one right now.

A few great alternatives to light beer in my humble opinion are:

Boulevard Pilsner (local)

Killian's Irish Red

Guinness

New Castle Brown Ale

New Belgium Fat Tire

All these are delicious and refreshing especially on a hot summer day.

Try St Pauly Girl non-alcoholic. Excellent. Better than most lites, great for geezers who can no longer metabolize alcohol.

@ Beerfan -

Kevin Burnett? Is that you?? Did you ever find the myspace for Emergency Room?

@Charlie...

Beer isnt just beer...

Beer SHOULD be made up of 4 ingredients...WATER, MALT GRAIN, HOPS, & YEAST.

Below was taken from Wikipedia.

"Miller Lite at one point contained several ingredients not normally found in beer, including manufactured chemical additives. The Center for Science in the Public Interest reported in 1982 that Miller Lite contained propylene glycol alginate (a seaweed extract), water, barley malt, corn syrup, chemically modified hops extracts, yeast, amyloglucosidase, carbon dioxide, papain enzyme, liquid sugar, potassium metabisulfite, and Emka malt (a food coloring).[4] Today, the company claims their beverage contains water, corn, malted barley, and hops."

Commercial Breweries add chemicals to increase the abv % without increasing the calories in the beer (Craft Brewers use more grains to pull out more fermentable sugars to affect the desired flavor and AS A RESULT, it increases the ABV%.

you beer snobs are almost as bad as the potheads who give every plant a different strand name and swear like there is a big difference.

i personally like light beer cause i find it to be smoother and more refreshing

Why discriminate light beers?
I say screw all cheap beers in general, whether they're light or not.
If you aren't paying $10 or more for a 6-pack, you're probably not drinking very good beer.

LAGUNITAS FOR LIFE!

I'd have to agree about the commercials...to true.

why then has pabst, miller been given medals in the GABF(Great American Beer Festival) For how long!!! look it up yo!

and it's a hot fudge chocolate malt, thank you.

i dont fool around with watered down shakes

Fucking beer-elitists. I know what I like, and it's light beer.

@baconfacamask:

You always have to give awards to the companies that pay for the event you are at.

Honestly though, nobody goes to the Miller/Bud/Coors booths at GABF.

Americans have brewed beer for all of our history, though in the beginning it was primarily for the purpose of having safe water, since the alcohol would limit germ growth. We didn't have the amount of barley available to make the kinds of beers in favor in Europe at the time, and resorted to using freely available american grains - wheat and corn. These grains have higher fermentability, resulting in a beer that has a much lighter, more watery flavor than a beer of the same alcohol level made with barley, which has many unfermentable sugars that remain in the beer and give it character. Most americans brewed their own, and it was a cheap, standard drink for the home, with lower alcohol than today's beer and meant for everyday drinking.

When the large wave of german immigrants came, families like busch, pabst and miller started brewing beer the way they had in germany, with a strong character, medium hop bitterness, and made with entirely barley as the base malt ingredient. When they tried to market this European-style pilsener to the American public, our palates were vastly unappreciative, and demanded lighter beer. They resorted to watering down their recipes with 'adjunct' materials of corn and wheat to give us the flavor we wanted in our beer at the time, and by doing so became hugely successful. You can't expect these companies to change the flavor they've been branding for over a hundred years, and its not as though they are trying to pull something over on us or force it down our throats. Personally, I avoid the american megabrew whenever possible... I drink mostly craft beers and am an avid home brewer (which is the best way to get it how you want it for cheap IMO), but i'm certainly not mad at them for continuing to market a product they've made for over a century; its just business!

So everyone chill out, respect the history of beer in america, and drink what you like... whether that be a tasty west-coast IPA or a *gasp* bud light.

@bumpcity

Here's a little brewers science to help make sense of the mess that is (was) miller lite (note: this is by no means an argument in favor of lite beer, or american style lagers/pilsners in general):

propylene glycol alginate (a seaweed extract) - also known as 'irish moss', this stuff is used as a clarifier.

papain enzyme - old school enzyme used to break down the proteins that form bubbles, preventing boil-overs and fermenters bursting. newer versions are engineered to precipitate out when cooled so they don't effect head retention.

potassium metabisulfite - a no-rinse sterilizer. sterile is good.

amyloglucosidase - an enzyme used to help break that corn sugar (starch) down into fermentable sugars.

brewers use corn sugars, rice sugars, and all kinds of other sugars (adjuncts) to add fermentables to the brew without adding color or messing with the flavor profile. this buffs up the %abv without adding body. malted barley doesn't just bring sugars to the table, it brings proteins too. using adjunct sugars lets them use less barley, resulting in a cheaper cost of product, but processed corn, rice, and cane sugars are also vastly more reliable in terms of quality control. barley's flavor and efficiency not only changes from year to year depending on the environment, it's also subject to a lot of processing before it becomes beer that can radically change its fermentable sugar and flavor.

american lagers/pilsners may taste like week old dishwater, but from a brewer's standpoint, they've managed to repeatedly and reliably make beer that tastes, acts, and keeps the same for decades, and that's tough. that takes a hell of a lot of engineering, science, and a well educated master brewer that's dedicated to making the same tasteless crap, over and over, but dammit, it'll all be the same.

Amen my good man!

I enjoy a quality beer, but honestly I really enjoy Amstel Light. It's smooth and delicious. Is that so wrong?

I love BEER.

"Beer tastes like piss, period. If it didn't have alcohol, no one would drink it. In fact, just about all alcoholic beverages taste bad because alcohol tastes bad. The goal of every alcoholic drink is to hide the crappy taste of the alcohol so that the drinker can get drunk."

Try a trappist beer and then stfu.
those things taste like heaven

I had a friend who use to say that light beer was the piss of beer drinkers, I must say I have to agree with him. But what I don't agree is that all American beer is bad. My husband and I are from the UK but we have been living here for a few years. We have discovered some of the best beers here in the US that when we go home we get frustrated that we can't find as good of beer. You have some fantastic microbreweries that offer an amazing assortment of beers for every taste. A few of our favorite have been:

Firemans 4 - Real Ale Brewing Company
#9 - Magic Hat
Inversion IPA - Deschutes Brewery
Fireside Nut Brown Ale - Leinenkugel
Drifter - Widmer Brothers Brewing Company

I agree with your 5 reasons. So I have been drinking EDISON. It's a light craft beer. It's got excellent flavor. Here's the website: www.edisonbeer.com

well im a beer lover and ive just had my first light beer (coors light), and it was god-dam refreshing, drink what you like and bloody enjoy it!