Easter and green beer?

So despite decades of Communism, and a 50% atheist rate in the population Easter is a HUGE deal here compared to the U.S. While the devout in the US do have a set of traditions to follow leading up to Easter Sunday, for the secular portion of society there is almost no visible impact. Here on the other hand university students got off from school starting on the Thursday, and the Monday is a national holiday. Most of the city shut down, except for the foreign restaurants (thank you Asian restaurants), and the most commercial areas (the shopping mall was virtually undiminished in its services).

The entire week though has been a lead up to Easter with a special festive market set up in the town square, and constant rotation of traditional entertainment groups.










But most unique of all is probably the tradition that takes place the Thursday before Easter, where people partake in the consumption of something green as a symbolic gesture relating to continued life. In Czech fashion of course this tradition has manifested in the creation of a green beer! So that afternoon as a form of company bonding I had the pleasure of joining my coworkers at the pub to partake in a few ;)

Now many Americans, especially the cynical ones, will say well we do the same thing on St Patricks, and it's just food coloring in the beer. No company would brew a batch for a single day... Well STAROBRNO the local brewery does! With a secret addition of certain herbs for color and taste along with special distribution requirement that the beer be only served on the Thursday by its vendors. Why would the company do such a thing? Well if you think of the consumer base creating a 1 day batch probably isn't any different than their regular production schedule, and it's nice PR plus. For further marketing parallels consider the seasonal McRib at McDonald's.