Brewery's new ad campaign focuses on its dinky market share.

In a victory for local liquor wholesalers, the Masschusetts Appeals Court ruled today the state can bar an Anheuser-Busch subsidiary from branching into hard liquor sales in Massachusetts.

Beer shipments nationwide dropped in June, but not in Massachusetts, where we can't get enough of the stuff, the Boston Business Journal reports.

Boston Beer Map.

Has the Boston Brewing Co. started adding chutzpah to the beer whose name it appropriated from one of our local heroes?

Portland, OR has a city councilor named Sam Adams who is now running for mayor. A pair of DJs at a radio station out there set up samadamsformayor.com and said they would give it (and another samadams domain) to him if he came on their show. The beer company found out about the domains and got hopping mad: It is demanding the station pull the site down because it owns a trademark on "Sam Adams."

Associated Press reports:

The candidate says he's amused by the flap, pointing out that while Boston Beer claims to have owned the Sam Adams trademark since 1984, he's owned it since he was born in 1963.

The beer company told the Oregonian it would consider letting Adams use the domains, but only until the campaign was over.

That's not good enough for Portland bloggers, who are foaming mad and are now boycotting Sam Adams - the beer, that is, not the city councilor.

Special bonus Portland fun fact: The city was founded by, surprise, a pair of New Englanders, one from Boston, one from Portland, ME. Both wanted to name the new place after their hometown. What do do? They flipped a coin.

This Sam Adams seems upset (then again, he always seems upset):

Photo by Chris Kirkman.

This Sam Adams doesn't seem to be feeling any pain:

This Sam Adams is no longer being consumed by some Portland bloggers: