Intro
Technology and social networking have become a major influence in the world we live in today. The paper is about how technology affects the beer industry, specifically if it’s a threat or an opportunity. This summary focuses on the marketing traits using opportunity and threats to describe how the beer industry changes when the influence of technology in involved. In this analysis it is shown how the beer industry uses technology to their advantage to create more opportunities, as well as how technology is an opposing threat to major beer corporations. The opportunities and threats are stated with respect to the beer industry have been summarized and explained using sources from websites.
Threat
The technology to brew beer in the comfort or your own home certainly would grab a lot of people’s attention, and that’s exactly what Bill Mitchell and his partner Avi Geiger have done. They’ve created a device that’s about the size of a large microwave to brew beer called the PicoBrew Zymatic. The PicoBrew Zymatic has also been created to connect to the internet so that consumers can share recipes as well as see the beer progress live on their cellphone. This is a potential threat to the beer industry because will seek the newer and different way to get beer. This machine would cater to a specific niche market of people who prefer to make things themselves (ex. people who make their own wine).
Beer companies need to be weary of this kind of technology because other inventions can be created and people can go from being interested in already made bottles of beer to just wanting to buy the wheat to make the beer. This would impact the industry because there’s now the possibility that the new future of beer is no longer sold in bottles but just the wheat itself. Beer companies will need to grow with the market and become an equal competition to other companies in order to stay relevant. (Dudley, From Microsoft to beer: Pair create home-brewing machine, 2013)
Opportunity
Beer companies have used technology to adjust the traits of beer that’s best fit for each individual person. Beer has been modified using new technology in microbiology and biotechnology to make low calorie and low carb beers. Beer was never low on calories and carbs, therefore some people who were more health conscious or possibly only dieting would avoid beer in order to stay committed to their diet. Since the technology has been available to create healthier beer, people who weren’t consumers became consumers.
Beer companies have then gained new customers, therefore more profit due to the technology to do so. Companies have evaluated the consumer need and have discovered the opportunity that in order to improve they must come out with something completely different. Some beer companies have released beer that show when it’s at the perfect temperature to drink on the can. This is an opportunity because it shows people that companies care about what interests the consumer.
If there is a demand to be met, companies seek it as an opportunity and try to meet that demand. This kind of change to beer changes the industry because people are now more health conscious and beer companies are taking that into recognition. With more choices of beer, companies will cater to all kinds of demographics. (The Canadian Brewery Industry, 2013)
Fact source
With the technology to move one million bottles in one delivery creates an opportunity for some beer companies. When the technology to carry that much beer to one destination surfaced, it created a lot of awareness in social media to tell people about the news. The project to deliver that much beer came to a total cost of $24 million. A logo was also created to represent the project as well as a Twitter and Facebook page. This impacts the industry because technology and social media is what we use on a daily basis to connect with one another. With the use of social media, it is easier to connect with consumers.
