One of the biggest clashes over alcohol advertising last year involved a "Back to School" catalog by college-oriented retailer Abercrombie & Fitch, which included a section entitled "Drinking 101" that featured drinking games and recipes. Critics said the catalog encouraged binge drinking and underage drinking (since most college students are under the legal drinking age), and the company eventually pulled the offending sections from the catalog.

Responding to a wave of binge-drinking deaths on college campuses -- many among underage students -- Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala called on colleges to cut the ties between their athletic programs and alcohol-industry sponsors. Shalala's plea to members of the National Collegiate Athletic Association last January was answered by several schools, including the University of Kentucky and the University of Minnesota, which decided to drop alcohol sponsorships. "We expect that to be a growing trend," said George Hacker, director of the alcohol policies project at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

College-age youth also are the purported target of much of the alcohol advertising that's taking place on the Internet, although critics say that alcohol industry web sites appeal to a much younger audience, as well. "Beer and liquor companies not only appeal to youth, but target and aggressively market to them," according to a report on online alcohol marketing released in December by the Center for Media Education (CME). The report examined 77 web sites and concluded that most used techniques designed to appeal to youth, including cartoons, video clips, games, contests, and youth-oriented language or slang.

Further, CME said that less than half the sites even took the minimal step of requiring visitors to enter their birthdate to "verify" their age before entering. Funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the CME Internet group is now conducting a follow-up study to determine whether such greeting screens adequately protect minors from alcohol advertising online. CME research associate Cathy DeLuca noted that all youths need to know is how to subtract a few years from their birthday in order to gain access. "The attempts at blocking are pretty lame," she said.

CME also will examine the effectiveness of Internet-blocking software against alcohol-related sites.

Some anti-alcohol advocates even take a dim view of instances when the alcohol industry has lobbied against sales and marketing practices that could impact youth. For example, the group Americans for Responsible Alcohol Access (ARAA) -- comprised of beer and liquor wholesalers and manufacturers, as well as prevention groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving and the American Academy of Pediatrics -- has been testifying in state capitols and Washington, D.C., against allowing direct alcohol sales over the web.

ARAA's main argument has been that Internet sales increase the potential for kids to order and receive alcohol at their home. But CSPI's Hacker sees the industry's involvement as less than altruistic: Direct sales are supported by California wine makers, who want to ship their products directly to consumers, while beer and liquor companies see direct sales as a threat to their powerful and tightly controlled distribution networks. "I think the primary reason [for the industry's involvement in ARAA] is to preserve business for the wholesalers, and they're exploiting the youth issue to make that case," said Hacker. "If they're really interested in the youth access issue, they would be helping the Justice Department with their youth access projects," which provide grant money for server training, compliance checks and other prevention measures, he said.

Drinking Holidays

More recently, groups like the Center on Alcohol Advertising have been waging a grassroots campaign to end alcohol sponsorship of ethnic community events, such as the popular annual Cinco de Mayo festivals in Latino communities. "Beer makers have been very successful, with relatively small amounts of money, in plastering their brand names all over what is supposed to be a family festival," said Center director Laurie Leiber. She charges that by sponsoring such events, alcohol marketers are attempting to market to three generations of Latinos at once, as well as garnering influence with powerful Latino political leaders.

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