Images of a Magic Hat Brewery bottle cap with the slogan "Condoms prevent minivans" have been floating around the Internet for a while so I decided to track down the story behind this insightful slogan. It turns out a mom came up with it!
Vermont's Magic Hat Brewery produces more of the #9 "not quite pale ale" fruit brew than any other beer. They describe it as an "ale whose mysterious and unusual palate swirl across your tongue and ask more questions than answers."
I had many questions and wasn't going to be satisfied without a few answers so I called up the brewery.
Steve Hill, the company's Social Network Manager, confirmed the "quip" (as they call it) was not only real. It was "the absolute truth."
Employee who have been with the company for three years or more get to pitch their own quips for the caps on #9 and, if selected, a quip goes into circulation. There are currently about 500 of the quips out there being randomly circulated.
One of Hill's favorites is "What could be better than a beer with Eddie Vedder?"
So how did they end up with this one?
"One of the parents of a few lovely children came up with that," Hill told me. "A mom"
Was this a deeper message about her own situation, I wondered.
"I don't think there was any personal reason behind it, it's just something kind of funny that occurred to her."
It may be funny, but it's more than a joke. Magic Hat has partnered with safe sex advocacy groups in the past and even sells their own condoms with the message "Get tested, get a condom, get it on!"
Just do it safely so you don't end up with a minivan.
Photo Credit: Flickr/Dmolsen, Flickr/Brostad