innovation insights community for a dynamic brand portfolio

Challenge

With new insights leadership and a growing portfolio, Boston Beer® was craving a fresh direction.

Boston Beer - the parent company of Sam Adams®, Truly®, and other admired brands – is an innovator across craft beer and other categories. Like many companies, their previous learning approach centered on ad hoc research – which led to inefficiencies, lack of agile data collection, and an insights program that wasn’t adaptive enough for such a dynamic company in an ever changing category.

Insights On Tap

Starting with a pilot focused on the Samuel Adams Brand, Finch Brands and Boston Beer realized the potential of a FinchSight® insights community to multiply the impact of consumer insights.

This led to the ‘Happy Hour’ insights community, an unbranded 1,500+ member program that crosses over brand and category lines to deliver key insights when and how Boston Beer needs them.

We work closely with the Boston Beer insights team in an ongoing way – fielding qualitative and quantitative research to provide decision support around new format/flavor innovation, packaging, advertising, and other topics.

Initiatives of note include using advanced highlighter tools to aid in packaging redesign, in-home taste tests to launch new flavors, and much more.

Real-World Results

The Happy Hour community has become a trusted resource and central capability. An internal analysis found that, in only 6 months, the research completed in the community saved over $800k compared to a similar volume of ad hoc studies. We’re proud of this, the relationship, and its results.