A Salute to Innovation: The Wildest Beer Bottle (and Can) Gimmicks

Updated
Miller Lite / YouTube.com - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvi66xlG0Q0
Miller Lite / YouTube.com - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvi66xlG0Q0

If you're throwing or attending an Independence Day cookout this week, we're sure there will be plenty of beer to help celebrate our nation's birth. And hopefully, the host will be switching things up by offering a wide range of American brews, from light macros like Bud Light and Coors Light to the craft brews that have swept the nation in the last decade.

But there's another way to keep your imbibing interesting: You can salute American ingenuity by stocking your cooler with all the gimmicky bottles and cans that beer companies use to market their wares.

A lot of these come courtesy of the macrobrewers, which have a hard time differentiating themselves through taste alone, but some smaller brewers have also played around with their bottle and can designs. And the gimmicks run the gamut, from subtle design tweaks to questionable "innovations" to redesigns with actual functionality. Some are dumb, some are cool, but all of them catch your eye on a crowded shelf.

Here are a few of the most interesting gimmicks from the last few years, from both American and foreign brewers.

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