If reading beer labels isn't really your thing, you may be entitled to $50. According to Law 360, a judge has ruled that people who believed that Kirin Ichiban beer was imported from Japan are to be offered a refund. Turns out that since Anheuser-Busch purchased the company and took over brewing in 1996, Kirin hasn't been made with any Japanese ingredients, or brewed anywhere near Japan. 
 
 This upset imported beer lovers who felt like they were being mislead. The Miami New Times writes that plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against Anheuser-Busch in 2013 claiming false advertisement. They claimed that Kirin is "is deceptively advertised as being imported from Japan," even though the label notes reads: "Brewed under Kirin's strict supervision by Anheuser-Busch, Los Angeles, CA and Williamsburg, VA." 
 
 A judge sided with the plaintiffs however, and signed a settlement entitling anyone who felt deceived between October 25, 2009 and December 17, 2014 to 50 cents per six pack, and 10 cents per single bottle, for up to $50 in reimbursements. Maybe you can put it towards your truffle-infused beer fund. ||||| Looks like MillerCoors has not really been "tapping the Rockies" to produce its Coors Light beer. According to Court House News, a class action lawsuit is alleging that although MillerCoors claims to exclusively brew the beer in the Rocky Mountains, it has, in fact, been brewing it in other locations across the country. According to the suit filed in Miami-Dade County by plaintiff Joaquin Lorenzo, MillerCoors claims that Coors Light is "brewed with pure Rocky Mountain spring water," are false. Although MillerCoors still operates its famed brewery at the base of the Rocky Mountains, Lorenzo says it is no longer the sole location where Coors Light is produced. 
 
 MillerCoors advertises and markets its Coors Light beer through several media outlets with the language: "Proudly brewed in the Rocky Mountains tradition," "When the mountains turn blue it's as cold as the Rockies," and "What would we be without our mountains?" The plaintiff writes, "Based on this and other marketing by defendants, reasonable consumers believe that Coors Light sold in the U.S. through defendants is exclusively brewed in the Rockies, and not in other parts of the United States." He also suggests that these false advertisements have allowed MillerCoors to sell Coors Light at a premium price — a price he says he would not have paid if he knew it was not exclusively brewed at the brand's Colorado brewery. A 24-pack of the beer sells for about $15. 
 
 It's not the first time a boozy brand has gotten into trouble for falsely advertising its beer. In May, MillerCoors was sued for claiming Blue Moon was a craft beer when it is actually mass produced by the brand. However, the case was thrown out by a California judge several months later. AB InBev did not have the same luck. The company was ordered to pay $20 million in a payout settlement for duping customers into thinking Beck's was a German beer, when it has been brewed in St. Louis since 2012. In a similar case, Anheuser-Busch was ordered to reimburse consumers for leading them to believe Kirin Ichiban was made in Japan. ||||| Beer Drinkers Call Coors Light Ads Misleading 
 
 
 
 (CN) - MillerCoors deceptively marketed and sold its "Coors Light" beer as being exclusively brewed in the Rocky Mountains when in reality it's made in other breweries nowhere near the mountains, a class action claims. 
 
 In a lawsuit filed in Miami-Dade County, plaintiff Joaquin Lorenzo says that Coors beers have always been advertised as being "brewed with pure Rocky Mountain spring water." 
 
 The Coors brand's original brewery was founded in 1873 by Adolph Coors and Jacob Schueler in Golden, Colorado at the base of the Rocky Mountains. 
 
 "Coors Light is now the second most popular domestic beer sold in the United States, surpassed only by Budweiser Light Beer," Lorenzo says. 
 
 According to the complaint, in 2004 the Golden, Colorado brewery, then known as the Coors Brewing Company merged with Canadian brewer Molson and formed the Molson Coors Brewing Company. Then in 2008 Molson Coors through a joint venture with SABMiller created MillerCoors. 
 
 MillerCoors, Molson Coors and SABMiller now market, sell and distribute the Coors Brand of beers throughout the United States in the popular "yellow-bellied" cans, as well as the new different can presentations of Coors Light Beers, the complaint claims. 
 
 Lazaro alleges that defendants still operate the famous brewery in Colorado, which is considered the largest single brewery in the world. 
 
 "However, it is no longer the sole origin of the Coors brand of beers ... Defendants now brew Coors Light in various breweries located throughout the United States but nowhere near the Rocky Mountains," Lazaro says. 
 
 Lazaro claims that defendants wrongfully sell the Coors Light beer at a premium price under the representation that it's brewed in the Rocky Mountains. 
 
 Defendants advertised and marketed Coors Light in print, television, online, brewery tours and social media using statements such as "Proudly brewed in the Rocky Mountain tradition," "When the Mountains Turn Blue It's as Cold as the Rockies," "What would we be without our mountains?," "Our Mountain is brewing the World's most refreshing beer," and "Born in the Rockies." 
 
 "Based on this and other marketing by defendants, reasonable consumers believe that Coors Light sold in the U.S. through defendants is exclusively brewed in the Rockies, and not in other parts of the United States," Lazaro says. 
 
 Lazaro claims that if he would've have known that the Coors Light beer is not exclusively made in the Rocky Mountains he would've purchase other less expensive beer. 
 
 Lazaro is seeking compensatory damages on claims of unjust enrichment. 
 
 He is represented by Elizabeth Beck from Beck & Lee Trial Lawyers in Miami, Fla. 
 
 The MillerCoors and Molson Coors' media department failed to respond to email and phone requests for comment on the lawsuit. ||||| The company will produce beer in several U.S. locales after its merger with Miller. 
 
 Coors beer and the Rocky Mountains — a magical marketing combination for 135 years. 
 
 "Brewed With Pure Rocky Mountain Spring Water" is a slogan that every longtime Coloradan has heard a million times. 
 
 And who hasn't seen Pete Coors on TV, waxing poetic aside a cascading mountain stream with a backdrop of snowy peaks? 
 
 But with last week's merger of the U.S. operations of Coors and Miller, Coors products now will be brewed in such flatland locales as Trenton, Ohio, and Irwindale, Calif. 
 
 Can the legendary Coors mystique survive this kind of geographic upheaval? 
 
 Golden-based Coors is betting it can. And even if it can't, the brewer can take consolation in the projected $500 million in savings that the nascent MillerCoors joint venture will gain, in part, from "cross-brewing" at Miller and Coors facilities. 
 
 That means Miller products will be made at Coors breweries in Golden and Elkton, Va., and most Coors brands will be brewed at six Miller facilities spread across the U.S. — with no mountain springs in sight. 
 
 In a concession to the mystique, the original Coors Banquet brand will be brewed only in Golden with Rocky Mountain water. 
 
 But Banquet over the years has become a secondary offering for Coors, overtaken by the now-flagship Coors Light. 
 
 In addition to an unspecified number of job cuts, a portion of the MillerCoors synergies will derive from brewing Coors Light across the nation, putting it closer to distributors and consumers. 
 
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 Something in the water 
 
 MillerCoors brand and marketing spokeswoman Jennifer Volanakis offers this take on maintaining mystique and taste amid bottom-line concerns: 
 
 "We will use the same recipe that originated in Golden to brew Coors Light at other breweries. We'll use the same frost-brewing process, proprietary yeast and high-country barley. Any water we use at any brewery must meet our high-quality specifications before we would use it to produce any of our brands." 
 
 It was the water, plus a host of intangibles, that created Coors' cult status decades ago and in turn led to its successful leap from a regional brewer to nationwide distribution in the 1980s. 
 
 Ad executives could only shake their heads in envy as they witnessed the development of the Coors cachet — a phenomenon born of the beer's high-country image and its limited availability in only 11 Western states during the 1970s. 
 
 "In advertising, Coors spent only about a quarter of what other large brewers were spending," said Paul Gatza, director of the Boulder-based Brewers Association. "Instead, word of mouth was a major factor in growing brand awareness. Stories of smuggling were part of the mystique. President Ford requested Coors for the White House. And (the Coors-smuggling film) 'Smokey and the Bandit' didn't hurt either." 
 
 Cachet diluted for some 
 
 Countless Colorado teens going to college out of state can recount tales of their beer-drinking friends pleading for a couple of cases of Coors to be brought back from vacations and school breaks. 
 
 Some made it an entrepreneurial venture by reselling the brew to their friends at heavily marked-up prices. 
 
 "Anyone going back to Colorado was instructed to fill their trunks with the stuff," said Katy James, a Denver native and now Buena Vista real-estate agent who attended Wisconsin's Carroll College in the mid-1970s. 
 
 At the time, Coors was available nowhere east of the Mississippi River — at least through conventional distribution networks. 
 
 Yet James now sees the one-time Coors cachet as faded, not only with the beer's nationwide availability but from the image-diluting effects of the new Miller joint venture and Coors' 2005 merger with Molson. 
 
 "Now that it's Molson/Miller/ Coors, I think there is no mystique anymore; it's just beer," she said. 
 
 Other observers agree. 
 
 Stan Slater had a front-row seat to witness Coors' impressive national roll-out in the early 1980s when he served as the brewer's planning manager and assistant brand manager. 
 
 But consolidation in the industry and changing demographics have transformed the brewing landscape, said Slater, now a professor of marketing and beer-industry analyst at Colorado State University. 
 
 "I'm not convinced there is much mystique left around Coors," he said. "If you look at the target market for Coors Light, ages 21 to 27, there certainly is no mystique there." 
 
 Macro with mystique? 
 
 It may still be meaningful to a handful of older Coors Banquet loyalists, Slater said, although he notes that Banquet accounts for just 0.5 percent of U.S. beer shipments, compared with 8 percent for Coors Light. 
 
 "Basically, Coors is not a unique brewery anymore," he said. "They're a macrobrewer, just like Bud and Mil ler." 
 
 Silt resident Sean McKenna well remembers his first illicit tastes of Coors as a 1970s teenager growing up in Englewood. 
 
 And he's been a periodic patron of Coors products in the intervening years. 
 
 But he's disillusioned by consolidation in the beer industry, and particularly by the prospect of cross-brewing in Coors and Miller facilities. 
 
 "It's a big loss to the brewing heritage we've had in Colorado," McKenna said while sipping a can of Coors Extra Gold recently on the patio of his Silt Mesa home. 
 
 "Now it's just going to be another generic corporate beer." 
 
 Steve Raabe: 303-954-1948 or sraabe@denverpost.com
– That can of Coors Light in your hand may have a picture of the Rocky Mountains on it, but that doesn't mean the beer within was actually brewed anywhere near the Rockies. And Joaquin Lorenzo isn't happy about it. In fact, he's filed a lawsuit in Florida's Miami-Dade County against brewer MillerCoors claiming the company has become unjustly enriched by deceiving drinkers about the origin of Coors Light, Courthouse News reports. Lorenzo, in his suit, does concede that MillerCoors still operates its famed brewery in Golden, Colo. "However," according to the suit, "it is no longer the sole origin of the Coors brand of beers." A 2008 Denver Post article explained that post-merger with Miller, the then-135-year-old Coors beer would also be brewed in spots like Trenton, Ohio, and Irwindale, Calif. And that's not cool, Lorenzo says, especially when the company markets the beer under slogans like: "Proudly brewed in the Rocky Mountain tradition" "Our Mountain is brewing the World's most refreshing beer" "Born in the Rockies" Lorenzo, seeking compensatory damages, says he would have bought a cheaper beer had he known Coors Light was not brewed exclusively in the Rockies. (Eater points out a 24-pack goes for about $15.) Eater reports there is precedent for winning this kind of suit: In January 2015, a judge ruled Anheuser-Busch had to provide refunds to Kirin Ichiban drinkers who thought the beer was made in Japan; it's been brewed in LA and Williamsburg, Va., since 1996. However, a lawsuit claiming MillerCoors fooled people into thinking the mass-produced Blue Moon was a craft beer didn't fly.