Get on the beers— the right words for a pandemic?
Imagine, for a moment, that you’re the top official in charge of the state of Victoria, Australia.
It’s a Monday morning, the world is 3 months into a serious public health crisis and you’re about to front up to a press conference.
People are panic buying groceries and toilet paper is exceedingly hard to come by.
Last Wednesday, gatherings of 100 or more people were banned. Things are escalating.
Today, you have to tell some 6 million people that pubs, clubs, cafes, restaurants and gyms, will be legally forced to close for at least three weeks.
Schools, too, will close from the end of the day. And more restrictions and shutdowns are, most likely, just around the corner.
Your job today is to convince your audience to not only follow the rules but also use their better judgement and limit their interactions with others as much as possible.
You’re a serious person, with a serious job and this is a serious message. What do you say?
On 23 March 2020, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said this—
'You won't be able to go to the pub because the pub is shut. That doesn't mean you can have all your mates around to (your) home and get on the beers, that's not appropriate. It's not essential, it's not needed, and all it will do is spread the virus.'
There are plenty of reasons to believe this statement was scripted, rehearsed and deliberate.
There are teams of people dedicated to crafting these messages to make sure they hit the mark.
And the exact phrase 'It doesn’t mean you can have all your mates round and get on the beers' was included in an official Tweet from Dan Andrews just after the conference.
Consider also, that just a month earlier, Dan Andrews’ official Instagram account posted a photo of the Premier on a tour of bushfire ravaged regional areas smiling and holding aloft a 6-pack of local craft beer.
The caption read 'Beers are on me Victoria. You’ve just gotta pick them up from East Gippsland.'
But even if the statement was a happy accident and beers weren’t an intentional part of the Dan Andrews brand before 23 March 2020, they were from that point on.
Because after Dan Andrews’ Monday morning press conference, the internet responded swiftly with a flurry of tweets, Tik Tok videos and memes riffing on the phrase ‘get on the beers’.
Things were escalating.
And Andrews and his team didn’t miss a beat, reposting memes, sharing Tweets and capitalising on the virality of the phrase to further their message.
Just 10 days later, Brisbane duo Mashd N Kutcher published their song, Get On The Beers, to YouTube. An absolute bop that would eventually reach #2 on the iTunes charts, nab the number 12 spot in the Triple J’s hottest 100 for the year, and would be used as the backing track for not one but two Christmas light displays.
So iconic was the phrase that by August, it had inspired branded merchandise, Facebook groups like has Daniel Andrews said we can get on the beers yet?, a mural, and even a limited-edition craft beer from Public Brewing Co called the Dan Anbrews.
In October, when Dan Andrews announced that Victoria had recorded zero local COVID-19 cases for the first time in months, a reporter asked the Premier if he would be ‘getting on the beers’ to celebrate.
He responded, 'I don't know that I'll be drinking a beer tonight; I might go a little higher up the shelf.”
‘Get on the beers’ became the rallying catch cry of Victoria’s lockdown
And it continues to be used in official messaging. Most recently, to support the campaign to increase vaccination rates in Victoria.
But why did it work so well? What made ‘get on the beers’ the right words?
And what can we takeaway from this scenario as communicators, creators, writers and small business owners?
Let’s take a look—
Specific, relevant and relatable
Andrews could have given a vague directive like ‘don’t gather with people.’ Instead, he anchored the message in specific details and a relevant, relatable scenario.
In this imaginary scenario, people weren’t people, they were ‘mates’. And gathering wasn’t gathering, it was ‘having them around to your home.’
Finally, he included a relatable activity (drinking) but made it hyper-specific, anchoring it in the type of drink, in this case, ‘beers’.
All of this creates a clear, tangible picture in our minds. It’s not just words. It’s a scenario we can imagine ourselves experiencing.
Why is this important? Because being able to imagine a specific scenario, and place ourselves inside it, enhances our understanding and increases our retention of the message.
Win-win.
Attention-grabbing
Slang, pop culture references and humour grab our attention. But the juxtaposition of someone in a position of authority delivering a serious message using a laidback Aussie phrase? That’s taking things to a whole new level.
Andrews could have said ‘have a few drinks,’ but he chose ‘get on the beers’ knowing it would cut through the dry and boring content and get his point across with impact.
Authentic
‘Get on the beers’ had just the right amount of cultural relevancy for the Premier to pull it off in the context of a press conference and official tweet.
Andrews didn’t sound like a daggy Dad trying on youthful slang. He didn’t use trending and obscure slang like ‘break the rules and you’ll be yeeted into a jail cell.’
He stuck to a clear and widely understood phrase and delivered it with real authenticity.
Targeted to the audience
The use of ‘mates’ and ‘get on the beers’ makes this phrase specifically targeted at young men— a demographic that’s historically difficult to engage with public health messages.
What would the message have looked like if Andrews was targeting older Australians? Perhaps ‘have your neighbours over for a cuppa.’
What about Mums of young kids? Maybe ‘meet your Mums group for a playdate.’
It’s important to note that while the message was targeted to a specific audience, it didn’t exclude.
By making the message clear, and by using an easily understood and recognised phrase, Andrews ensured that everyone—non-drinkers, older Australians, people who don’t like beer—knew that he was speaking to them, too.
Responsive
‘Get on the beers’ became a viral hit partly because a bored Brisbane music duo with cancelled gigs had nothing better to do with their time but turn it into a bop. Andrews and his team couldn’t have planned for that.
But when it did happen they were paying attention. And they were ready to capitalise on the popularity of the phrase, rolling it into their own campaigns and content messaging.
Because what pros like this understand is that communicating with your audience is a two-way street, and when you find something that works, you stick with it.
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