Budweiser Launching Reality Show. Will It Be Any Good?

Budweiser is launching a “social-reality” show called Bud United Presents: The Big Time. Will there be drinking game challenges? Do you have what it takes to be on?  Will this thing be any good? Unfortunately, Bud United’s show will be nothing like their frat boy and bikini-clad girl commercials. Instead, they are focusing on the more profound side of beer drinking: achieving your dreams “like working in the kitchen with a celebrity chef or racing Nascar.”

The messaging is clear: cheap domestic booze will make you successful and a superstar. Their goal is also to build their Facebook and Twitter users and generate an online discussion like, apparently, "I am racing on a Nascar track while drinking." DUI= “Like.”

Each episode will feature four contestants with the same dream, and they will compete to have a chance to win.

"The beer and its logo will appear in the show, when appropriate. For example, contestants may drink Bud when they gather to reflect on a day of skills testing," executive producer Evan Weinstein told AdWeek.

Weinstein has reality TV cred. He previously worked on the Amazing Race, which may have been a concept that worked better. Teams given alcohol and told to climb mountains and overcome obstacles sounds like a ratings winner, along with Paris Hilton’s Best Friend Dances With Her On Banquette (while drinking bud), Booze Island, The Alcoholicette, and any other tried and true formula with the added addition of a can of beer. Look at how much people love walking, slurring alcohol receptacle Snooki!  Snooki must have dreams! Young people understand her, or something. Corona may have an exclusivity agreement with her though...

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The target age range of 20-30 may cause problems for the brand no matter what their chosen plot line. Bud United’s Facebook site is age gated, reports Mashable, “a restriction that doomed the brand’s previous efforts to cultivate an online following before, most notably with Bud.tv, a $30 million attempt to create its own content behind an age-verification wall.” That was killed in 2009, after two years.

Can they do better this time? The show will go live this week and the brand is still looking for the cast. Do you have what it takes?  The criteria is having a Facebook page. To get in on the action, simply "Like" their  them HERE.