If you see a ruddy-faced Bavarian going into a business meeting at 10 am with a massive glass of cloudy yellow beer in his hands, then you know it’s Electronica.
So many of Europe’s trade shows have declined or died, but Electronica has stayed huge.
“I don’t know if much business gets done there”, says an executive who has been to every Electronica for 30 years, “but it’s a terrific party.”
As everyone who made the journey to the World Cup Finals found out, Germans know how to throw a party, and whether much business is done, or not, everyone comes back from an Electronica with a good appreciation about what is going on in the industry, who is doing it, and what their friends are up to.
Unfortunate Electronica remark: at a Silicon Valley meeting in October between a group of European hacks and a US company, the CEO signed off with a cheery: “Come and see us at Electronica. We’ll have a barrel of beer on the stand”.
“American beer or German beer” asked a hack.
At this, up jumps the company’s PR officer: “Why should that make any difference?” she asked sharply.
Amid the hacks’ stunned silence, the CEO could just be heard shushing his patriotic, but obviously non-beer-savvy, PR specialist.
Well David, Sierra Nevada is not a bad beer, is it? (not to mention all the other brands...)
Thanks Veijo, you're right. Sierra Nevada is excellent, so is the beer at the Rocky Bottom brewery in Campbell, and at the Los Gatos Brewing Company and at a brewery I once encountered in North Carolina near the Great Smoky Mountians but finding these are historically wonderful occasions and most of the time its back to cold, yellow and tasteless beer with places actually advertising 'the coldest beer in town'. I ask you.
Veijo, you are right. Sierra Nevada is excellent beer and, as we also both know, the Rocky Bottom Brewery in Campbell, CA brews excellent beer.
But these are rare, honourable, islands of sublimity in an ocean of frozen, tasteless, fizzy, yellow p***
David, I totally agree. As we could see in Munich. If you take a totally awful place like the Hofbrauhaus any day of the show, it´s packed. Well, some people might go there to listen to the music. Some people might like the sight of Helgas and Gertrudes. But then again, a lot of people are lacking proper medication.
You can judge a nation by it´s beer and in that comparison Munich ranks pretty well. If Electronica was held in Stockholm, no one would go.
Would you?
Thanks Veijo but I have to ask whether local issues like intra-Scandinavian feuding should obscure a debate about eternal truths like the quality of beer.
But, since you ask the question, No I don't think Electronica would work in Stockholm.
Yes, I do like the intra-Scandinavian feuding, but in this case thats not the reason. Swedish beer is awful beyond words.
And to proove my point, here are some scientific facts: Beer runs through you faster than vodka, because the body has to change its color. Its also a fact that Swedish beer runs thru you faster than any other beer. I think you get the reason.
But there are plenty of excellent things about Sweden. Im sure there are.
You may be right about the beer. But remember Abba. And many people like IKEA.