Michael Roarty
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Michael J. Roarty (August 24, 1928 – March 16, 2013) was an
American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...
marketing Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...
executive for the
Anheuser-Busch Anheuser-Busch Companies, LLC is an American brewing company headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. Since 2008, it has been wholly owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV (AB InBev), now the world's largest brewing company, which owns multiple glo ...
brewing company. He has been widely credited with turning Anheuser-Busch and its products, including Budweiser, into globally recognized
brands A brand is a name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that distinguishes one seller's good or service from those of other sellers. Brands are used in business, marketing, and advertising for recognition and, importantly, to create an ...
through
advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers. It is typically used to promote a ...
. Roarty created the
advertising slogan Advertising slogans are short phrases used in advertising campaigns to generate publicity and unify a company's marketing strategy. The phrases may be used to attract attention to a distinctive product feature or reinforce a company's brand. Etym ...
s "This Bud's for you" for Budweiser and "Weekends were made for Michelob." He also oversaw the creation of the
Bud Light Anheuser-Busch, a wholly owned subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV, is the largest brewing company in the United States, with a market share of 45 percent in 2016. The company operates 12 breweries in the United States and nearly 20 in othe ...
ad campaign An advertising campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme which make up an integrated marketing communication (IMC). An IMC is a platform in which a group of people can group their ideas, beliefs, and conce ...
featuring Spuds McKenzie during the late 1980s.


Biography


Early life

Roarty was born in
Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...
,
Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...
, on August 24, 1928, to immigrant parents from
Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
. His father, John Roarty, was a member of the
Sinn Féin Sinn Féin ( , ; en, " eOurselves") is an Irish republican and democratic socialist political party active throughout both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The original Sinn Féin organisation was founded in 1905 by Arthur Gri ...
political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...
. He graduated from University of Detroit, a
Jesuit , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders ...
university which is now known as the
University of Detroit Mercy The University of Detroit Mercy is a Private university, private Catholic Church, Roman Catholic university in Detroit, Michigan. It is sponsored by both the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) and the Sisters of Mercy. The university was founded in 1877 ...
.


Career

Roarty was hired to promote
beer Beer is one of the oldest and the most widely consumed type of alcoholic drink in the world, and the third most popular drink overall after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of starches, mainly derived from ce ...
to taverns and
bar Bar or BAR may refer to: Food and drink * Bar (establishment), selling alcoholic beverages * Candy bar * Chocolate bar Science and technology * Bar (river morphology), a deposit of sediment * Bar (tropical cyclone), a layer of cloud * Bar (u ...
s in Detroit's East Side in 1953 while he was still a student at the University of Detroit. The job earned him the nickname "Mr. Budweiser" from bar owners and other neighborhood residents. After college, Roarty worked as am Anheuser-Busch
brand manager A brand is a name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that distinguishes one seller's good or service from those of other sellers. Brands are used in business, marketing, and advertising for recognition and, importantly, to create an ...
in Detroit,
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
,
Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
and
Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more ...
while gradually working his way up in the company. Roarty became the Vice President and Director of Marketing for Anheuser-Busch from 1977 to 1990. Under Roarty, the company's share of the beer market doubled from 21% to 43%. In 1992 he was the company's executive vice president of corporate marketing and communications. He created many of the best known beer slogans of the era, including "Weekends were made for Michelob," "This Bud's for you," and "Head for the mountains of Busch" to promote Anheuser-Busch's beer brands. he oversaw the creation and launch of Spuds MacKenzie for Bud Light in 1987. Roarty also created the "Know when to say when" commercial campaign for Anheuser-Busch, which promoted awareness of
alcohol abuse Alcohol abuse encompasses a spectrum of unhealthy alcohol drinking behaviors, ranging from binge drinking to alcohol dependence, in extreme cases resulting in health problems for individuals and large scale social problems such as alcohol-relat ...
. Roarty also pioneered
sports marketing Sports marketing as a concept has established itself as a branch of marketing over the past few decades, however, a generally accepted definition does not exist. Academicians Kaser and Oelkers (2005, p. 9) define sports marketing as 'using spor ...
in the industry and first promoted Anheuser-Busch products at major
sporting event Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, t ...
s. He sponsored race cars and added billboard signage at stadiums. In 1980, Michael Roarty convinced Anheuser-Busch to give one million dollars to the fledgling sports
cable network Networking cables are networking hardware used to connect one network device to other network devices or to connect two or more computers to share devices such as printers or scanners. Different types of network cables, such as coaxial cable, opt ...
,
ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...
, which had launched in 1979. Under Roarty's advisement, Anheuser-Busch continued to support ESPN during the network's difficult early years. Roarty promoted these investments as a smart business decision by Anheuser-Busch, telling the ''
St. Louis Post-Dispatch The ''St. Louis Post-Dispatch'' is a major regional newspaper based in St. Louis, Missouri, serving the St. Louis metropolitan area. It is the largest daily newspaper in the metropolitan area by circulation, surpassing the ''Belleville News-Dem ...
'' in 1994, ""We gave them $1 million that first year. And if we hadn't, they'd have gone under...I believed the beer drinker was a sports lover...The next year we gave them $5 million. I think it turned out to be the best investment we've ever made." In 1993, ''
Sporting News The ''Sporting News'' is a website and former magazine publication owned by Sporting News Holdings, which is a U.S.-based sports media company formed in December 2020 by a private investor consortium. It was originally established in 1886 as a pr ...
'' named Roarty the sixth most powerful figure in American sports citing his early commitment to ESPN and his pioneering work on sports advertising. Roarty was inducted into the
Advertising Hall of Fame The Advertising Hall of Fame, operated by the American Advertising Federation (AAF), began in 1948 as a result of a proposal by the New York Ad Club and its president, Andrew Haire, to the Advertising Federation of America, the predecessor organiza ...
in 1994. He retired shortly after the honor. Outside of marketing, Roarty was highly active in the
Irish American , image = Irish ancestry in the USA 2018; Where Irish eyes are Smiling.png , image_caption = Irish Americans, % of population by state , caption = Notable Irish Americans , population = 36,115,472 (10.9%) alone ...
community. ''
Irish America magazine ''Irish America'' is a bi-monthly periodical that aims to cover topics relevant to the Irish in North America including a range of political, economic, social, and cultural themes. The magazine’s inaugural issue was published in October 1985. ' ...
'' named his "Irish American of The Year" in 1991. Roarty was grand marshal of the
Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
St. Patrick's Day Parade Saint Patrick's Day, or the Feast of Saint Patrick ( ga, Lá Fhéile Pádraig, lit=the Day of the Festival of Patrick), is a cultural and religious celebration held on 17 March, the traditional death date of Saint Patrick (), the foremost patr ...
in 1994, becoming only the fourth American to hold the honor in the parade's history. Roarty suffered a heart attack at his home in Town and Country, Missouri, on March 15, 2013."Michael Roarty, whose ad campaigns helped Anheuser-Busch market share soar, dies at 84"
''Global News'', March 18, 2013. By Jim Salter
He died the next day on March 16, 2013, at Mercy Hospital in Creve Coeur, Missouri, at the age 84. He had suffered from poor health in recent years due to a series of strokes. He was survived by his wife of fifty-eight years, Lillian Roarty; his daughter, his son, and four grandchildren.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roarty, Michael 1928 births 2013 deaths American marketing people American business executives Anheuser-Busch people Anheuser-Busch advertising University of Detroit Mercy alumni American people of Irish descent People from St. Louis County, Missouri Businesspeople from Detroit 20th-century American businesspeople