Country megastar Toby Keith recently chose Nashville as the town to launch his new Wild Shot brand premium mezcal. Love him or hate him, you gotta admit the dude is smart. Not only does he already have a chain of 15 "I Love This Bar" (I'm not making that up) franchises affiliated with various Caesar's/Harrah's casinos to ensure that he has venues to push cases of the new product through, but the rollout/pep rally/fan club party that he threw in Nashvegas pretty much ensured a successful initial launch.
But a rabbit start doesn't necessarily mean you'll win the race. Sammy Hagar's star-branded Cabo Wabo Tequila shared a similar strategy out of the gate, but recently the Red Rocker has sold his share of the brand to Gruppo Campari so that it can now be marketed by Skyy Spirits out of San Francisco. Oh wait, Hagar got $80 million. Well played, Mr. Keith.
So Toby has now eschewed "Beer for My Horses" in lieu of "Mezcal for the Masses." How good is the stuff? Will it "put a boot in your ass?" In a word, yes.
Wild Shot Mezcal is a 100 percent green agave product imported by Shaw-Ross, and which claims to be an authentic central Mexican product right down to the worm in the bottle. That's right, Toby aims to return the hypopta agavis larva to the bar snack menu. In fact, at the meet-and-greet after the introductory presentation, patrons had to eat a worm before they could get a picture taken with the Artist of the Decade. You'll notice there are no photos accompanying this post. ...
