Follow Up to "I'm Not Laughing"

Heinecken (Who owns Newcastle) responds

Dear Susan,
Thank you for your inquiry regarding our recent advertisement. We appreciate the time you took to share your opinion with us.
The hallmark of the Newcastle brand is its wit and authenticity and the crux of the campaign is intended to use refreshing honesty to call out the “Bollocks” or “BS” that is typical in most beer advertising.   In this case, the real Newcastle Brewmaster is actually a man and the actor in the ad is a man and is also wearing a tie to reinforce this point.  We believed that the hands were obviously male hands and the irony would be immediately evident.  It was intended to be a comment on the typical beer ads that only show attractive women and was certainly never our intent to offend anyone.
As always, we are interested in the opinions of consumers regarding our activities and your input on this issue was important to us. We are hopeful that the information we have provided to you in this regard addresses your concerns. Thank you again for taking the time to share your views.
Sincerely,

HEINEKEN USA Consumer Affairs


My response:
Respectfully (because your reply was courteous, professional and respectful), my brain didn't analyze the ad along the lines of your intended joke (it's really a man). I didn't go to the standard beer advertising gimmicks of beautiful women (and I'm not a dummy) as you intended. It went to the types of ads that show the process of how a product is made (normally with "lovingly hand crafted" and "using only the finest ingredients"). Since I have made home brew myself, it's not impossible that Newcastle's master brewer is a woman.

I will say, the joke misfired. Badly. Whoever, wrote it has seen "Seinfeld" too many times or maybe not enough times because the woman attached the to "man hands" in that particular episode was beautiful. Given a couple of days, I could write a far more effective send-up that would make the joke and not offend.

Thank you for your response.