American Craft Beer The Best Craft Beer, Breweries, Bars, Brewpubs, Beer Stores, And Restaurants Serving Serious Beer.
The iconic Mac the Moose sculpture in Moose Jaw. COMMONS.WIKIMEDIA.ORG
Moosehead Breweries LTD has donated $25K to a growing effort to help a beloved Saskatchewan moose statue, once the tallest in the world, regain the crown it lost to a Norwegian competitor in 2015.
New Brunswick-based Moosehead has announced a partnership with the mayor of Moose Jaw to help restore the town’s moose sculpture, affectionately known as Mac the Moose, to its former glory.
(We realize there’s considerable amount moose references going on, but we just can’t get around it.)
Located in Saint John, New Brunswick, Moosehead is Canada’s oldest independent brewery. The brewery was founded in 1867 and after six generations is remains privately owned and operated by the Oland family.
Home to its award-winning Moosehead Lager, moose kinship runs deep at the company. And the fact that Moose Jaw “Mac the Moose,” once the world’s largest moose statue in the world, at a height of 9.8 meters, has been usurped by a silver moose statue designed by a Norwegian artist Linda Bakke, was something the company could not abide…
Vice president of marketing and sales at Moosehead Breweries, Trevor Grant, told Calgary Herald: “We’ve never been one to back down from a fight, and we do recognize that same resilience and sort of fighting spirit in Mac the Moose.”
The moose symbol had been used in the brewery’s branding since 1933 when it first a Moosehead Pale Ale and it’s something the company is willing to fight for…
In 2017 Moosehead Breweries LTD forced an American craft brewery to abandon its name Mooselick Brewery or face international litigation.
They also took on Rutland, Vermont’s Hop’n Moose Brewing. That time around the issue wasn’t about the use of the word moose, but over the moose imaging the American brewery used in their logo and marketing campaigns.
LINDA BAKKE/FILES
And this ‘moose on moose’ conflict is also stirring up international ‘moose madness.” Norwegians are apparently as attached to their moose as are the Canadians….Who knew?
Things have already gotten ugly between the mayor of Moose Jaw, Fraser Tolmie, and deputy mayor of the Norwegian municipality of Stor-Elvdal, Linda Otnes Henriksen…
Tolmie told CTV News: “I’m doing this on behalf of Canada. Our pride is on the line here.” Henriksen responded: “I say bring it on.”
Built in 1984, the infamous Mac the Moose statue stands on the grounds of Moose Jaw’s visitor center. And according to the Drinks Business the money generated by the current Go Fund Me campaign “will be spent on lengthening Mac’s antlers and carrying out some more general restoration.”
