And in the four weeks ended Jan. 13, sales of the Minneapolis-born brew are up 96.9% as case shipments grew 105.8% from a year earlier. That’s enough to move Hamm’s to Nielsen’s No. 8 growth brand.
Key to the success, says Amber Smith, a Hamm’s marketer, is “a lot of new drinkers who are drawn to the sense of nostalgia associated with the brand. We’ve seen a ton of positive momentum over the past year.”
The Hamm’s brand team’s strategy is to market around unconventional moments, such as throwing Hamm’s-branded happy hours in bars and celebrating offbeat holidays like “Groundhog Day,” “Tax Day” and today, “National Beer Can Day.”
The Hamm’s happy hours, which launched late 2017, are focused on driving more traffic to bars on slower days of the week by offering specials on Hamm’s beer and giveaways such as T-shirts, koozies and retro pins. They celebrate quirkiness and tongue-in-cheek humor with deals like pairing a Hamm’s beer with a ham sandwich.