By By Tina Romito
Remember mimicking mom with her make-up and heels, or putting on dad’s tie collection around your neck – being a child and wanting more than anything to act like an adult? A new drink named Kidsbeer, is selling fast, in an attempt to mock the traditional adult beverage.
In its brown bottle, the appearance of Kidsbeer is identical to a bottle of beer. When poured into a glass, it even develops a foamy surface and is the same color of traditional beers.
Kidsbeer is alcohol-free and is currently selling bottles by the thousands in Japan. The manufacturer, Tomomasu, started by shipping as little as 200 bottles a month but since 2003, that number has grown tremendously to 75,000 a month.
This carbonated beverage started off as a sweet soda drink called Guarana named after its core ingredient. Guarana was first sold at Yuichi Asaba’s Shitamachi-ya restaurant in Fukouka, Japan. Restaurant owner, Asaba, is responsible for the new and well-known name Kidsbeer. The change in name created an enormous change in business, now selling thousands rather than hundreds of bottles of Kidsbeer a month.
Satoshi Tomoda is president of the beverage maker, the Tomomasu Company. According to an article in The Japan Times, Tomoda said, “If you get this drink ready on such occasions as events and celebrations attended by kids, it would make the occasions even more entertaining.”
The slogan advertised on the bottles is “Even kids cannot stand life unless they have a drink.” A Japanese ad depicts boy going from hysteria over a math test, to a frenzy of joy after a swig of Kidsbeer.
“It [Kidsbeer] reminds me of those Truth ads,” Shannon McCartan, a fine arts senior, said. “It just seems that all these companies are trying to market products like cigarettes and alcohol towards children with products like candy cigarettes and soda that is called ‘Kidsbeer.'”
Organizations in the U.S. have already striked the idea of even bringing the beverage into the country. The Alcohol Policies Project at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, nonprofit group based in Washington, has already made statements about an instant opposition to this product in the U.S.. Yet in Japan, where beer is sold in vending machines and the legal drinking age is 20, Kidsbeer is a huge hit.
According to a New York Times article, the director of the organization, George Hacker, said, “Given the strong anti-drug movement in this country, my sense is the outrage would be immediate and overwhelming.”
An article in The Sunday Telegraph this past August, mentioned plans to introduce Kidsbeer to Britain then to the rest of Europe. The mention of Kidsbeer entering the U.K. caused a bloody commotion among government officials and the alcohol industry critics.
In the past, there have been controversies in the U.S. over other sodas. Royal Crown enraged the White House drug policy advisor in 1995 with its Royal Crown Draft Premium Cola, which was also the color of beer and sold in a brown bottle. Royal Crown agreed to change the soda’s packaging, especially because it said “draft” on the label.
Ironically, a line of products by White Rock Soda Company brand-named Sioux City is currently on the market despite the appearance of the bottles that look very similar to beer bottles. A few of their beverages include sarsaparilla, root beer, and birch beer, all of which are in bottles comparable to alcoholic beer. Yet it doesn’t seem there is any issue about these brands of soda.
Sean Boettcher, an elementary education graduate student also disagrees with the Kidsbeer entering our country and poses a question he feels is important before allowing our children to indulge in Kidsbeer.
“If children are drinking pretend beer, does it make it okay to copy parents and act drunk as well?” he asks.