Edison Beer - Press Room

Boston Globe
October 21, 2001 Edition

New light beer has local twist
Cohasset woman enters market

By Emily Shartin, Globe Staff Correspondent, 10/21/2001

HINGHAM - With only five full-time staffers, the New Century Brewing Company may look like a small business. But by Rhonda Kallman's definition, you would be wrong to call it a microbrewery.

''I'm fond of saying the only thing `micro' about us is our office,'' said Kallman, the company's CEO and founder.

From its home base on Lincoln Street across from the Hingham Shipyard, New Century has begun vying for its segment of the booming light beer industry - dominated by brands like Miller, Coors, Michelob, Amstel, and Budweiser - with its flagship brew, Edison Light Beer. Unlike microbrews, which are typically produced in small quantities, Edison is mass-produced at a brewery in New York and is expected to be available nationwide in 18 months.

Kallman, who lives in Cohasset with her husband and three young children, spent more than 15 years working for the Boston Beer Co., maker of Sam Adams, before deciding to strike out on her own with New Century Brewing. She opened the company in Hingham to be closer to home, but soon expects to be flying back and forth across the country promoting Edison Light. Marketed under the slogan ''light beer, reinvented,'' Edison was created by Joseph Owades, a California-based brewer who is referred to as the father of light beer.

Even with that pedigree, New Century's approach - marketing a light beer as its premiere product - is, by many accounts, unusual.

''Generally, light beers have been spin-offs of other brands,'' said Eric Shepard, executive editor of Beer Marketer's Insights, an industry newsletter.

But light beer seems to have achieved legitimacy among beer drinkers, and particularly among the industry's target demographic - men in their 20s. Industry watchdogs report that it accounts for nearly 50 percent of all beer consumption, and for the first time this year, Bud Light will overcome Budweiser as the largest-selling beer in the country.

''The time is really, really right,'' said Kallman, referring to her company's decision to focus solely on Edison Light.

Sam Adams is test-marketing a light beer in Providence and Maine. Brewer Jim Koch, Kallman's former partner at Boston Beer, says that because today's light beers are similar in flavor to their full-calorie counterparts, it makes sense that beer drinkers are gravitating toward them.

''From the beer drinker's point of view, you might as well save the calories,'' Koch said.

Koch, who calls Edison Light ''a very nicely made beer,'' lauds Kallman's resolve to take on some of the country's largest brewers. Despite Sam Adams' recent foray into light beer, he doesn't consider his former partner to be a competitor because the two companies are targeting different areas of the industry.

''We're probably looking at a much smaller market,'' Koch said of Sam Adams.

Many microbreweries have come and gone during the past decade. Although Edison Light is not technically a microbrew, Shepard notes the difficulty of introducing a new product to a market inundated not only with beers, but with other beverages - wine, energy drinks, even mineral water - that people are willing to pay for.

''New brands are tough because there are a lot of brands out there,'' he said. ''There's more, and stronger, competition for that beer drinker's dollar.''

But Kallman, a former waitress and bartender, remains undaunted, both by the competition, and by the economy's recent southerly turn. While most would consider an impending recession to be disastrous for a fledgling enterprise, historically, the opposite has been true for the beer business.

''Beer continues to grow in hard times and is recession-proof,'' Kallman said. ''So I think I picked the right industry.''

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