National Marquette Day has always celebrated the talent of Marquette basketball, students’ school spirit and the university community, but another part has joined the fray. NMD now also heralds the arrival of the latest from Blue & Gold Brewing, a team of students who regularly release Marquette-themed beverages.
For NMD in 2023, the team released the ‘77 Golden Ale followed by The Beer Can, named after the late McCormick Hall, in 2024. The newest member of the family is The ‘Lanche, a lemon-lime flavored canned vodka cocktail. In Blue & Gold Brewing fashion, the name is a reference to Marquette history, pulling from the university’s football program (1892-1960) which was unofficially named “The Golden Avalanche.”
This year’s team was made up of Jack Hartle, Donovan Jones, Maggie Starker and Hitinder Singh, all seniors in the College of Business Administration. Previous teams had months to work on the project, but this year Jones and his teammates only had about a month from conception to launch.
“The first meeting we had was, ‘Should we aim for National Marquette Day?’ and I said, ‘Why not?'” Singh said. “Everybody was on board.”
That settled it. The team was finalized the week of fall semester finals, and they worked tirelessly over the holidays with some members traveling back and forth from out-of-state over winter break to put in more hours.
“It was about four or three weeks of putting our heads down and doing all the things we needed to do,” Jones said. “Testing out flavors, designing a can with Carl Collective or going to the distillery and looking at how Central Standard actually makes the vodka, it was a great experience.”
In past years, Blue & Gold has worked with breweries like Gathering Place Brewing and Broken Bat Brewing. This year the team collaborated with local Milwaukee business Central Standard Craft Distillery on the drink’s creation. The team and their partners wanted to move away from beer this year to hopefully appeal to a younger audience. The company creates the alcohol that is mixed into the cocktail along with assisting in the actual canning through one of their business partners.
“It always great to have new ideas in the building,” Pat McQuillan, co-founder of Central Standard Craft Distillery, said. “Collaborating with Marquette students brings fresh energy and a shared passion for innovation.”
Aside from Central Standard, Blue & Gold also worked with Carl Collective, a Marquette student-run advertising agency. Carl Collective helped design the can along with assisting in the advertising of the product. The can draws from throwback MUBB jerseys from 2007-2008 season with a bright gold background and alternating champion blue and navy stripes.
The ‘Lanche will be available at Fiserv Forum on NMD and is also being sold around the city. Find locations using Central Standard’s product locator. McQuillan said the company produced 1,000 cases which should be available through May depending on the drink’s popularity.
This story was written by Izzy Fonfara Drewel. She can be reached at isabella.fonfaradrewel@marquette.edu.
