At my local bar, Pabst Blue Ribbon is the cheapest beer on the menu, but according to AdAge, it’s not the best deal out there at the supermarket. After two price hikes, your spend for a case of PBR is 50 cents more than High Life (and that’s the “Champagne” of beers, people!) and a full buck-fitty more than Keystone. They don’t do advertising, and, yet, while other brands decline, PBR’s sales and market share are growing:

Sales of PBR are up an astounding 25% this year, according to Information Resources Inc. And while cheaper beers — a group within which PBR has long been something of a mascot — are outperforming their more expensive peers as consumers look for low-cost options these days, there’s clearly more than pricing at work here.

The answer, wholesalers and beer-marketing experts said, is likely found in marketing activity that occurred long before the current recession. Back in 2004, Pabst executed a highly effective word-of-mouth campaign that made the long-declining brand an “ironic downscale chic” choice for bike messengers and other younger drinkers who viewed the beer as a statement of non-mainstream taste. PBR sales surged by nearly 17% that year, and have climbed at single-digit rates since, until this year, when the recession sent its sales soaring as more drinkers were pushed into the subpremium category.

Think of it as conspicuous downscale consumption, or something like it.

So, now there’s an expression that almost makes “recessionista” look non-ridiculous by comparison… “ironic downscale chic.” All kidding aside, I am a little impressed that a downscale brand has made itself a counterculture status symbol. We were actually pretty emo when we couldn’t find a 12-pack of them at Harris Teeter for our barbecue in DC on Labor Day weekend. Who knew that when LoLo, Esq., and I endorsed PBR as the “Official Beer of LOLFed” would have it flying off the shelves at this rate?

Also, a little social commentary from the “What is this world coming to?” department (h/t to Peter H.) – nothing is sacred in this economy, not even the e-sheets you sleep on:

You know how counterfeiters make fake Louis Vuitton and Kate Spade bags and sell them on the street — and how the real Louis Vuitton and Kate Space absolutely hate this practice? Well now there’s a digital spin, as one company is suing the virtual world Second Life for allowing the sale of knockoffs of its digital products on the quirky website.

The company in question is called Eros, and it markets beds and other products — only in this online world, mind you — under the SexGen name. I guess they’re a hit. For years, counterfeiters have been copying its products — which sell for as much as $40 — and selling them as originals.

(Second Life is still around?)

There’s quite a large economy of Linden dollars out there in Second Life, which can be converted to real dollars by some kind of alchemy that involves naked elves and other things we don’t want to think about, so this really comes as no surprise. And here’s the 2009 version of “Don’t Copy That Floppy” apparently crossed with a PETA ad (content warning: naked cartoon elf butt).

So please, people, I bed of you. Drink your PBR reponsibly in a genuine Second Life e-bed or that elf will have to go nude forever. Thank you.