McGargles Craft Beers, Kilcock, Co. Kildare

[CMulla]

Hi home brewers,

I'm wondering if I might be able to enlist your help. I'm a student doing a paper for my strategic branding class and I'm basing it on McGargles Irish Craft Beers.

I'm trying to find out what people think of the brand, (Granny Mary, the family story etc.) and the products themselves.

If you have five minutes to spare, it would be awesome if you could take a short survey to help with my research. Here's the link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/YWS7PVZ

Thanks a million for your help and insights brewers,

An interested student.

[auralabuse]

No problem,  done

[LordEoin]

done.

[Parky]

All done, just need to watch the Likert scale options at the end. Usually a Likert scale will have an equal number of positive and negative options around a neutral midpoint, but there are too many positive statements at the moment, which will introduce a confounding bias when you come to do your stats (nerd alert  )

[LordEoin]

i strongly agree

[brenmurph]

"an interested student"

no name, college, course, location aims and objectives of project? just "an interested student"

Otherwise its just a load of questions suitable as feedback by the brand itself,  if u are a real student and answer the above I might actually do it and pass it on to a lot of other people ...

[CMulla]

Hi again, and thank you everyone for both taking the survey and the feedback.

I took a while to decide whether to write the interested student or my actual details, to be honest. This is my first time reaching out in such a way, so I'm learning. While the Internet is a great tool, I thought a certain level of caution might be necessary when posting to blogs and learned that brevity in requests more often than not results in a better response rate. Hence my final decision.

For the purposes of clarity; my name is Christine. I'm a student at Dundalk Institute of Technology and also from Dundalk. I decided to do the project on McGargles as a result of watching friends get into deep conversation about it in the pub. My subject is 'Strategic Brand Management'. McGargles decided to challenge industry norm when launching their brand and go for 'brand first, beer second.' The aim of the paper is to ascertain the impact of this decision. As a result, I am trying to determine the market's view of the brand and its products, from a brand essence point of view (as studied during classes). In addition, I intend to speak to the company itself, determine their aims for the brand, and compare. The approach of the company will also be discussed in relation to brand building theory and, if I do it properly, conclusions will be drawn.

I hope this serves to make me more human. You can find me on LinkedIn if you need more. https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=64202556&trk=nav_responsive_tab_profile

Re the Likert scale, I see what you mean. I overlooked the necessity of neutrality in response. Excellent to have had that pointed out. I will ensure to note the error when writing.

Thank you again, great feedback. Much appreciated everyone.

An even more interested and now knowledgeable,

Christine :-)

[LordEoin]

when launching their brand and go for 'brand first, beer second.' The aim of the paper is to ascertain the impact of this decision.

I know the result in my case is that the disappointing beer I tried resulted in me never wanting to try another of their brews, regardless of how many childish stories they print on the packaging.
But feck it, more power to them. There's enough punters in Tesco to replace my custom.

[Ozbrewer]

I'm in agreement with LE.

@Christine - bear in mind that a brand is the some of the parts. All the beautiful brand design in the world means nothing if it doesn't translate into the purpose (or "belief") of the product - in this case a craft beer that is interesting (in flavour) reflecting the design work and story. Together they don't match and the brand fails in its entirety.

[johnrm]

My company were getting internet service from a company which was very poor.
I could not wait to get rid of them.
They sent surveys every now and then to get feedback on how well they performed. I never filled then in. If I did I would have scored them very low.
Their marketing was all '90% customer satisfaction' which did not contain my opinion a they did not deserve my time.
What makes you think that the response to your request will be fair and unbiased?

[LordEoin]

of course it'll be biased. Isn't that the whole point of having an opinion?

[johnrm]

You got me. I should have said accurate, not unbiased.

[Qs]

I find their name and the branding tacky. Worse still their beer is awful.

[Beerbuddha]

I tried a bottle a while back, it was not good so i doubt i'd ever buy another.

But too many times i have tried craft beers that  i found to be overpriced muck !

But at same time made me happy i could produce better 

[CMulla]

Everything you're saying is the whole point of my doing the paper. The company went for 'brand first' - my question is, was it the right decision, does it correlate with the product they're offering and is it sustainable? You're exactly right Ozbrewer, and your point is part of what I'll try to pull out of the responses I get.

Johnrm, all that I can do is try to get opinions from as broad a spectrum as possible. Had I solely asked people who are engaging with the McGargles brand what they think, the aim of the research would, for sure, have been completely biased. Instead, I approach this forum and another, wrote a blog post to the general public and sent the link out through my social media accounts. Within my current constraints as a student, that is the best I could do.

Again, to everyone, many thanks for the feedback. This is an excellent forum!