Boston Beer Seeks Fresh Ideas

Never content with any particular creative approach or agency partnership for long, Boston Beer is looking beyond McCarthy Mambro Bertino for creative ideas for its flagship Samuel Adams brand and may be mulling a review or account shift, sources said.

The Boston-based client, which spends $15-20 million annually to advertise Sam Adams, has held meetings with at least one sizable shop in Boston; but at press time Friday the client had not committed to a review or placed MMB on notice, sources said.

One source, who requested anonymity, went so far as to suggest that the client is “not serious” about hiring another shop, but merely trolling for ideas and perhaps looking to put pressure on MMB to ratchet up its creative efforts.

Neither MMB executives nor officials at Boston Beer—including chairman and founder Jim Koch, who has voiced Sam Adams ads in the past, and vice president/brand development Robert Hall—returned calls.

The client...