Category Archives: Authenticity

Authenticity, History, International, Lager, Neolocalism

Welcome to Wrexham (Lager)

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I have a deep passion for football—known as soccer here in the United States. Most of that passion is devoted to Glasgow Celtic, the Scottish club I’ve supported avidly since I was seven years old. Thanks to the internet and cable television, I can keep up not only with my team but with the sport more broadly. Beyond watching matches, I occasionally enjoy football documentaries. Two of my favorites are Sunderland ’Til I Die and Welcome to Wrexham. Both series chronicle the challenges faced by the men’s teams of Sunderland and Wrexham as they strive to win enough points to climb the tiers of English football. Interestingly, although Wrexham is based in Wales, its team competes in the English Football League—a legacy of the early 20th century when no Welsh league existed. As a result, Wrexham, along with Cardiff City, Newport County, and Swansea City, was invited to play in English League.

Of the two documentaries, Welcome to Wrexham has received the most publicity. This is in large thanks to the fact that, back in 2021 actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney became the co-owners of the club. Both have a starring role in Welcome to Wrexham. The takeover has been hugely successful and over a four-year period (2021-2025) the club gained three successive promotions and moved from the fifth to the second tier of the English football pyramid.

But it’s not just the local football team that Reynolds and McElhenney invested in. They also, along with the Allyn family of Skaneateles, NY, became majority co-owners of a local brewery, Wrexham Lager Beer Co., in 2024. It is a brewery with an interesting history. It was founded In 1882 by two German Immigrants, Ivan Levinstein and Otto Isler. During the 1900s, Wrexham Lager was exported worldwide, finding markets in places as far away as Australia, India, and the Americas. Such was the popularity of Wrexham Lager during the early 20th century that it was available to passengers on the ill-fated Titanic.

In 2000, due to declining demand, the brewery closed its doors. The then owners of the brewery, Carlsberg-Tetley, continued to produce the Lager at a brewery in Blackburn in England. They did so until 2002 when production ceased completely. In 2011, a local family, the Roberts, decided to revive the brand and brew Wrexham Lager in a newly constructed microbrewery. Along with Reynolds, McElhenny, and the Allyn family, the Roberts remain co-owners of the brewery.

Long before Reynolds’s and McElhenney invested in either the football club or the brewery there was a strong connection between the club’s fans and Wrexham Lager. It was, indeed, a staple brew for many Wrexham fans, so much so that the Lager got its own chant. To the tune of the Welsh hymn Bread of Heaven, the chant goes:

Wrexham Lager, Wrexham Lager

Feed me ’til I want no more (want no more),

Feed me ’til I want no more..

As both a football fan and a beer enthusiast, I was familiar with Wrexham Lager and its connection to the local football club—though I had never actually tasted it. That changed a few weeks ago. While browsing the beer section of the dinner menu at a local restaurant, I noticed Wrexham Lager listed among the offerings. At $9 a can, it was pricier than the other craft beers on the menu—likely due in part to the fact that it had traveled all the way from Wrexham to Toledo. Or so I thought.

As I examined the can (as I do with most canned beers that I have for the first time) I noticed that the beer inside was not brewed in Wrexham, but in Normal, IL at Destihl Brewery. Curious about Destihl I visited their website. Established in 2007, in addition to their own line of beers Destihl brew a number of what they call ‘partner beers’. Included in these is Wrexham Lager.

I have to admit, I was a little disappointed by this discovery. One of the things I value most about craft beer is its local character—the way it reflects and connects to a specific place. This sense of place has been widely studied by several geographers, including Scott Taylor Jr. and Robin DiPietro of the University of Houston and the University of South Carolina-Columbia, respectively. In their work, they explore the concept of place-based brands—brands that are defined by their geographic origin and cannot be authentically reproduced elsewhere because of the unique qualities tied to that location.

With respect to Wrexham Lager, the question is simple – can Wrexham Lager be brewed anywhere except Wrexham. Martyn Jones who represented the people of Wrexham as a member of the British Parliament between 1987 and 2010 doesn’t think so. He put it very simply “It isn’t Wrexham Lager if it isn’t brewed in Wrexham.” Before becoming a Member of Parliament, Jones worked in the Wrexham Lager Brewery. In 2020 (when the Lager was being brewed in Blackburn) Jones spearheaded a campaign to bring production of the famous Lager back to Wrexham.

The statement by Martyn Jones gets right to the heart of the question of authenticity. Is the Wrexham Lager that is brewed in Illinois authentic? One might argue that as long as the Lager is brewed using the same ingredients and the same recipe then what’s the big deal? Others, such as Martyn Jones, would suggest otherwise and would argue that where Wrexham Lager is brewed is a big deal.

This is not the first time the issue has been raised with respect to the brewing industry. Back in 2016, a judge found in favor of the plaintiff in a class action lawsuit filed against Anheuser-Busch (A-B). The lawsuit revolved around Beck’s beer. While ostensibly a German beer, Beck’s was owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev. In addition to being brewed in Bremen Germany, since 2012 Beck’s had been brewed in St. Louis, MO. The lawsuit alleged that Anheuser-Busch “misrepresented to consumers that Beck’s Beer is brewed in and imported from Germany”. Plaintiffs alleged “that these beers are in fact domestically brewed but priced as a premium imported beer”.

In a case study of a Scottish craft brewery, David Brown of Heriot-Watt University (UK) examines the challenges the owner faces as he considers expanding beer distribution into England and Wales. Many of the brewery’s products feature names inspired by local landmarks and Scottish idioms, with labels referencing regional issues—such as a nearby nudist colony. As they enter more geographically distant markets, a key question arises: should these local references remain unchanged, or be adapted to make the brand more accessible and transparent to non-local consumers? Selling a beer with a strong sense of place beyond its home region can presents some unique branding challenges.

Wrexham Lager is brewed at Destihl in Normal, IL

The story of Wrexham Lager—and its connection to football, community, and identity—highlights a broader debate about authenticity in an increasingly globalized world. While recipes and branding can travel, the sense of place that defines a product is harder to replicate. For some, brewing Wrexham Lager in Illinois may seem inconsequential, but for others, like Martyn Jones, it strikes at the heart of what makes the beer unique. This tension between tradition and practicality is not new; it echoes similar controversies across the brewing industry, where geographic origin remains a powerful marker of authenticity. Ultimately, whether in football or beer, place matters—not just as a backdrop, but as an integral part of the story we tell and the experiences we value.

Further Reading:

Brown, David M. 2023. Managing neolocalism outside the locale in real ale and craft beer entrepreneurship: The case of Ben Lui Brewery. The International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

Taylor, Scott, Jr and Robin DiPietro. 2020. Assessing consumer perceptions of neolocalism: Making a case for microbreweries as place-based brands. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, Volume 61, Numbr 2, Pages 183–198.

Authenticity, Sense of Place, Small Towns

Yuengling, Rolling Rock and Mare of Easttown

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My wife and I recently finished watching a seven-part crime drama called Mare of Easttown. The show is set in the small community of Easttown, PA. The main character is Marianne “Mare” Sheehan, a police detective, who has to solve a missing persons case and the murder of a young single-mother. Sheehan’s character is played by English actress Kate Winslet. It is a well-made crime drama, with enough twists and turns to keep the viewer engaged and entertained.

The Mare of Easttown is a drama which does a great job of creating what Geographers call a ‘sense of place’ with respect to its setting. According to Geographers Ken Foote and Maoz Azaryahu sense of place is “used to describe the distinctiveness or unique character of particular localities and regions,” Easttown is a gritty, working class, Pennsylvania community which has Rust Belt written all over it. Indeed, in discussing the drama, the show’s creator Brad Inglesby refers to Easttown’s “blue-collar vibe” In making the show, Inglelsby strove to capture the “cultural authenticity of eastern Pennsylvania”.

There are a number of ways in which Inglesby conveys Easttown’s sense of place, one of which is having Winslet’s character talking with an authentic Delco accent. The fictional Easttown is located in Delaware County (aka Delco). The Delco accent is “characterized by its rounded vowels and shortened long-e and long-a sounds” so that the word “water” comes out as as “wooder”. In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Winslet said that “It is absolutely up there amongst the top two hardest dialects I’ve ever done”.

Promotional poster for Mare of Easttown

In addition to Winslet’s accent, another feature of the show is the fact that the only two beers that the characters seem to drink are Yuengling and Rolling Rock. Both have strong associations with Pennsylvania and both appear frequently throughout the series. Mare’s preference is Rolling Rock. I did find it a little strange that no one in the show drank Budweiser or Coors Light. This surely has to be the result of ‘product placement’, the practice of featuring well-known products in movies and television shows. According to a 2022 article in the New York Times, product placement is a $23 billion industry. It should be noted that in a 2023 survey, a sample of Pennsylvanians identified Yuengling as their favorite beer.

Historically, beers have had a strong connection to place. Numerous examples abound, including Pilsner Urquell (Plzeň, Czech Republic), Newcastle Brown Ale (Newcastle, England) and Guinness (Dublin, Ireland). The surging popularity of craft beer has reignited an interest in sense of place and what it means. Many craft breweries adopt names that they believe connect them with the neighborhood/city/region in which their beer is brewed. Thus, the Edmund Fitzgerald Porter brewed by Great Lakes Brewing Co. in Cleveland, OH makes an explicit connection to the Great Lakes freighter that sank in Lake Superior during a storm on November 10, 1975. The entire crew of 29 men were lost. The use of locally grown hops and other local ingredients are responsible for discussions as to whether beer can have a terroir (a term usually used in reference to wine) which connects it to a specific place. See here and here for contrasting positions on this debate.

Yuengling and Rolling Rock – the only two beers that Easttown’s residents seem to consume

A key concept when connecting a beer with a place (or vice versa) is that of authenticity. Authenticity can be defined as “the quality of being real or true”. Dictionary definitions are useful as they provide formal definitions of terms. Equally important, however, are the terms that the average person uses to express ideas such as authentic/authenticity (and their antonyms inauthentic/inauthenticity). The work of Balázs Kovács and his colleagues, which was published in the journal Organization Science, is useful in this regard. In a study of the restaurant industry, Kovács et al. (2013) asked consumers to identify words that expressed authenticity and inauthenticity. Words that consumers most frequently associate with authenticity include genuine, real, and legitimate, while words they most commonly associate with inauthentic include unreal, deceptive, and phony. So what about Yuengling and Rolling Rock? To what extent are they authentic Pennsylvania beers?

The Yuengling Brewery in the small town of Pottsville, PA (population ~13,000) is the oldest brewery in the United States. Established in 1829 by a German immigrant by the name of David Gottlieb Jüngling (anglicized to Yuengling) the brewery today remains under the ownership of fifth and sixth generation family members. While Yuengling is also brewed in Tampa, FL (in a brewery purchased by the family in 1999) and Fort Worth, TX (under contract with MolsonCoors) it remains loyal to its Pennsylvania roots. It is an authentic Pennsylvania beer.

The same, I would argue, cannot be said for Rolling Rock. First produced in 1939, this American Lager was brewed by Latrobe Brewing Company in the small town of Latrobe, PA (population ~8,000 and the birthplace of golfing legend Arnold Palmer and children’s television presenter Fred Rogers). In 1987, the brewery was purchased by Labbat Brewing Company. Further mergers and acquisitions occurred and, by 2004, Labbat (and Rolling Rock) was owned by InBev. In 2006, Anheuser Busch purchased the Rolling Rock brands from InBev for $82 million. Shortly after the purchase, production of Rolling Rock was shifted from Latrobe to Newark, NY where it was brewed in an Anheuser-Busch facility. Rolling Rock had left Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.

The brewery in Latrobe where Rolling Rock was brewed before production to Newark
The brewery in Latrobe where Rolling Rock was brewed before production shifted to New Jersey

When it was brewed in Latrobe, part of the branding of Rolling Rock highlighted the fact that the water used to brew it came from nearby mountain springs. Latrobe sits at the foot of the Allegheny Mountains. Writing for The Pennsylvania Center for the Book, Nick Stumpo noted that the taste of the beer changed “ever so slightly . . . from year to year due to the sediments that run off the hills into the mountain streams that feed the main brewing reservoir”. This is effectively an argument for terroir. After the transfer of production was announced, one resident asked, “So will Rolling Rock now taste like the swamps of Jersey (with apologies to the Boss) rather than the mountain springs of Old Latrobe?”. Another stated, “If it ain’t from Latrobe, it ain’t Rolling Rock.” When the shift to Newark was announced, Anheuser-Busch brewmaster Doug Muhleman, stated, “we locate our breweries where we know we have an excellent source of fresh water. And, of course, Newark is no different. We are very confident we are going to produce a beer that is indistinguishable from the beer that is produced in Latrobe.”

Rolling Rock beer comes from the mountain springs to you

When news of Rolling Rocks imminent departure became known, there was significant local backlash. Consumers like Michael J. Pleva vowed “never to drink Rolling Rock again”, while local bar owners reported patrons shifting to other brands. In the State’s House of Representatives, House Resolution 798 was introduced. It read:

“A Resolution urging Pennsylvania residents to boycott Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., by discontinuing the purchase of all Anheuser-Busch products if Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., proceeds with its plan to close the Rolling Rock Brewery in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.”

These responses are understandable. Nick Stumpo suggests that Latrobe “owes its identity and national recognition” to Rolling Rock, a beer “embraced by mill and steel workers who shared pints after long days on the job”. Local restaurant owner Joyce Stern referred to Rolling Rock as “an icon. It’s the identity of this town.” Dave Taylor of Taylor Brand Group, described Rolling Rock as beer with a “blue collar following and steeped in the appeal of small town authenticity”. It was an identity that Anheuser-Busch tried to leverage after it moved production to New Jersey. They did so by creating and using the slogan “Born Small Town” to brand the beer.

So, to use a soccer analogy, did the creators of Mare of Easttown score an own goal when using Rolling Rock as a symbol of small-town Pennsylvania? If you wanted to make that case, there is certainly enough supporting evidence. However, I am going to give the creators of the show a pass here. Even though I know that Rolling Rock is no longer brewed in Pennsylvania, my subconscious mind immediately jumps to the the Keystone State (and specifically Latrobe) whenever I hear the beer’s name. It may no longer be brewed in Latrobe or Pennsylvania, but it’s identity is still strongly tied to both the town and the state.