Beer company accidentally names itself after pubic hair

A brewery in Western Canada was forced to apologise after unwittingly naming a beer product after the Māori word for pubic hair.

Hell’s Basement Brewery in Alberta started marketing Huruhuru, a New Zealand craft ale, last year.

The brewery picked the name because it understood the word meant ‘feather’ or ‘fur.’

But Te Hamua Nikora, a Māori living in New Zealand and well-known former TV personality, said that the word ‘huruhuru’ also has an altogether different meaning for the Kiwi indigenous community.

‘Yes I know huruhuru means feather, fur and even hair of the head,’ he wrote in an Facebook post on August 1.

‘I know this. But it is most commonly used as hair from a person’s privates.’

Nikora called out the Canadian brewery as well as a leather shop in Wellington, New Zealand, which also adopted the name ‘huruhuru.’

He said he had contacted both the store and the brewery informing them of their mistake and asked for non-Māori businesses to use their own language to promote their products.

 ‘If you are selling leather, call it leather, don’t call it pubic hair unless you are selling pubic hair and don’t call beer pubic hair unless you make it with pubic hair,’ he said.

Both companies have apologised after being accused of cultural appropriation.

Hell’s Basement co-founder Mike Patriquin told news site RNZ that the company thought huruhuru meant ‘feather’ and didn’t realise it was a reference to pubic hair.

‘We did not realise the potential to offend through our artistic interpretation, and given the response we will attempt to do better in the future,’ Patriquin said.

He said it was not the company’s intent to infringe upon, appropriate, or offend the Māori culture or people in any way.

‘To those who feel disrespected, we apologise. We also do not think pubic hair is shameful, though we admit it may not go well with beer.’

A spokesperson from Wellington leather store Huruhuru also said they had meant no offence by the name of their outlet, which they also intended to mean wool, feather, or fur.

Aynur Karakoc said the company got approval for the name from the Intellectual Property Office’s Māori advisory committee. However, they did not have the money to undergo a rebrand.

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