(FORTUNE Magazine) – ADOLPH COORS CO., once considered a flashy lightweight in the beer business, has pushed its way through the crowd and is taking a seat at the bar. As recently as 1984 the Golden, Colorado, brewer was selling only about the same amount of suds annually as it did in 1977, even though it distributed the product in 23 more states. In 1985, though, an aggressive move into New England and a heavy dose of advertising got a turnaround going. In an industry whose sales have gone flat, Coors is one of the few companies selling more beer than it used to. No. 5 in the U.S. beer business, Coors sold 14.7 million barrels last year, up 12% over 1984. The only other major brewer with increased sales volume was top-ranked Anheuser-Busch. Coors's 1985 sales were $1.3 billion; its profits, $53 million. The company's market share increased from 7.1% in 1984 to 7.9%, thanks to Coors Light, the second-best-selling low-calorie beer, which represents 40% of Coors's beer sales. The company also nearly stopped the market share losses its regular brand, Coors Banquet, had been suffering. Security analysts attribute much of Coors's success to its move into the Northeast, where it quickly gobbled up over 10% of the market, according to figures compiled by Emanuel Goldman, a beverage industry analyst with San Francisco-based Montgomery Securities. Coors says it may begin distributing beer to the mid-Atlantic states in 1987. It is pinning its hopes for the East on a $95-million plant being built near Elkton, Virginia. For now Coors will use the facility as a packaging plant -- the company intends to haul its product in refrigerated railroad tank cars from the brewery in Colorado to be bottled or canned in Virginia. While Coors says it will start brewing in the East someday, at present there seems to be more manufacturing capacity in the region than the market can absorb. Miller, for example, has yet to open a new brewery in Ohio that it completed in 1984. Coors launched its first national advertising campaign in 1985, spending what amounted to $10 per barrel on ads, more than any other major beermaker. In print and TV ads, actor Mark Harmon, judged the sexiest man of 1986 by People magazine, explains why unpasteurized Coors, brewed with Rocky Mountain spring water, tastes better than the competition. The company also helped sales by mending fences with minority groups that had protested its allegedly discriminatory hiring practices; Coors agreed to spend about $650 million over five years on black and Hispanic businesses and charities. Sales to Hispanics were up 80% last year, while sales to blacks increased 60%, according to Viewpoint, a Chicago market research firm. Security analysts give much of the credit for the turnaround to younger family members who have bubbled up into top management jobs. Last May, Jeffrey Coors, 41, was named president of the company, and his brother Peter, 39, president of the brewing division. One idea they are exploring is a joint venture with Molson Breweries of Canada and Kaltenberg Castle Brewery of West Germany to produce a new brew called Masters, which has been tested in four U.S. cities since October. They are also carefully watching test-market results for Coors Extra Gold, a darker and more robust beer than Coors Banquet. ''We've gone through years of troubled times,'' says Jeffrey, ''but it seems as if the public is accepting us more than in the past.'' A lot of new Coors customers will drink to that.