If you haven’t heard of a church key, it’s one of those old timey beer can openers prevalent before the common place pull tab took over.  The only reason you’d ever have seen one is if you’re old (sorry old timers) or if you pay very close attention to the beer they drink in Mad Men. Now Churchkey Can Co is bringing back the church key opener and can.  Why?  Probably because, as hipsters know well, old stuff is cool.

I came across this new venture not through one of my preferred beer news sources, but from tech sources.  Indeed, Michael Arrington (of Techcrunch fame) is an investor via Crunchfund.  Apparently other tech executives are investing too.  The investors must see a potential gold mine in this to get involved in non-tech investing.

The beer itself is a pilsner and the recipe comes from home-brewers Lucas Jones and Sean Burke.  The reviews on BeerAdvocate and RateBeer are in the range of mediocre to decent.  As a beer geek, it’s hard to get too excited about anything but the best pilsners.  If it’s not about the beer, then what’s this company all about?  Oh right, marketing and making lots of money.  I think they are going to be very successful for the following reasons:

• Adrian Grenier is a cofounder, yeah the Entourage guy
• Epic marketing appeal, especially to hipsters
• The beer is a decent pilsner, a style suitable for the mass market
• Every six pack comes with a weapon…I mean church key opener
• Big investment from big people means big budgets
• They even have an environmental argument to support their old timey steel cans, apparently steel is recycled more than aluminum

The beer and opener are already on sale in the states of Washington and Oregon, apparently selling well.  Excellent launch plan, marketing to a beer obsessed hipstery corner of America.  Now I need to try some.

Cheers,

Chris