A Liverpool man's gimmick saw '"thousands of beer bottles" dropped in the ocean and pieces of city's history sent around the world.
Over the decades, Liverpool has had many ties to the Guinness brand. As part of the Liverpool ECHO's How It Used To Be series, we recently spoke to Mike Graham who has worked at Guinness site in Runcorn since the 1980s, about Liverpool's links to Guinness and how trends have changed through the decades.
But one man who hailed from the region was also famed for a number of innovations that got the popular brand's name out there. Mike, 60, previously told the ECHO: "Guinness has got such a strong connection to Liverpool. Guinness was first brewed in 1759 and it started to become exported within ten years.
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"They used to send barrels to Liverpool and from there it would go on its journey all around the world - because it's such a robust beer it could survive these long sea voyages. In the Liverpool area, there were also a lot of secondary bottlers, because Guinness originally was only the brewery.
"It used to work with all these Liverpool co-packers. Eventually Guinness bought some of these companies up to form Guinness Exports Limited and that was based in Liverpool. It moved to Runcorn in 1970 to become a kegging plant and in 1985 it switched to become a pack facility."
But Mike also shared stories of his "personal hero" Arthur Fawcett, who he said was from Liverpool and was known for his innovative marketing ideas in years gone by. Mike told the ECHO: "The Liverpool managing director, who was called Arthur Fawcett, he was like a genius because he had so many unique marketing tricks up his sleeve.
"When Liverpool Council was getting rid of the gas lamps in the 1960s, he bought them all up and he would give them to people who would increase the sales of Guinness all over the world. I'd love to find one far off on the other side of the world, a Guinness Liverpool lamppost from the 60s.
"He also did these famous bottle drops where he dropped various beer bottles at different parts of the ocean supposedly to check on the sealing quality of the bottles but really it was a marketing ploy to like extol the virtues of Guinness. He dropped bottles in 1954, 50,000 bottles across the world and then in 1959, the bicentenary of Guinness, he actually had 150,000 bottles made, especially embossed bottles, dropped all over the world. Of course you could never do anything like that these days in case it would contaminate the ocean, but it was different back then."
On June 13, 1978, the Liverpool Daily Post also reported about when "empty bottles helped boost the brew." The report reads: "Guinness has always had a sharp eye for publicity. The Guinness is good for you slogan was devised as long ago as 1929.
"But it was the former chairman of Guinness Exports who dreamed up the most original advertising gimmick of all.
"Mr Arthur Fawcett, now 81 and living in retirement in Wallasey, arranged for thousands of beer bottled- empty ones - to be dropped over the side of ships at strategic points off the Eastern and Western seaboards of the USA with messages including extolling the virtues of the Guinness brew. Not only have sales gone well with the Americans ever since, but the occasional errant bottle still turns up."
Have you got a Merseyside nostalgia story? Let us know in the comments section below.
Last month, the ECHO reported how Diageo, maker of Smirnoff, Gordon’s Gin and Guinness, revealed the contents of an historic Guinness time capsule that was sealed in celebration of the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. The capsule was opened for the first time at the Guinness packaging plant in Runcorn and contained a bottle of Coronation Commemorative Guinness Foreign Extra Stout from 1953 and a selection of Sovereign Coins, as well as an edition of The Daily Express from June 3, 1953.
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The Coronation time capsule was laid down at Guinness Exports Norfolk Street, Liverpool – the precursor site to the Runcorn operation, which opened in 1970. It was sealed by the Managing Director at the time, Arthur Fawcett with an inscription on the top of the cask for opening at the time of the next Coronation.
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