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Craft Beers: Lies, Marketing, and Public Relations


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1 hour ago, B.A.R. said:

I was in Lexington, VA last weekend and the 7-11 on the outskirts of town had a growler filling station. About 10 craft beers on tap and three sizes of growlers to purchase and fill.

Obviously, the greatest 7-11 in the world.

You know what? I was just thinking about this maybe an hour ago. What I have to say may not win any popularity contests, but I'm going to say it anyway:

"If you can buy it at 7-11, it isn't a craft beer."

I get that the formal definition of "craft beer" is:

1) 6 million barrels of beer or less per year (*)
2) Only 25% of the company can be controlled by a company that *isn't* a craft brewery. Restated, at least 75% of the company must be owned by craft breweries
3) A majority (meaning "over 50 percent") of the ABV must come from traditional brewing techniques

Lipstick on a pig. This isn't craft beer; it's crap beer. You can go through the whole list of 7-11 beers: Fat Tire, Yuengling, Sam Adams, Lagunitas, Bell's, Deschutes, Brooklyn, Oskar Blues, Anchor Steam, even the once-excellent Great Lakes ... it's *all crap* or quickly turning into crap. Some of these were good, honest beers at one time in the past - and some still may be while they "establish themselves as 7-11-Level Craft Beers," but if any remain that haven't totally gone to shit, they will within the next 5-10 years: Bet on it.

As I said, I don't expect to win the Miss Congeniality Award for this opinion, and I couldn't care less because I know I'm right.

(*) Do you know how much beer this is? 186 million gallons, or 12 million kegs.
Divided equally into 50 states (which doesn't include exports), that's 3,720,000 gallons of beer, per year, per state.
Divided by 365 days, that's 10,200 gallons of beer, per day, per state.
Divided into 12-ounce cans, that's 108,800 cans of beer, per day, per state.

That means that every day, in every state, someone walks in and buys a six-pack 18,000 times.

Enjoy your "craft" beers.

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Enjoy your "craft" beers.

Thanks, Don, I do and will continue to, hopefully for the remainder of my years on this planet.

In my opinion, the issue as to whether the output of established craft breweries has been or will be on the decline is overshadowed by the issue that many of the new breweries that are popping up, and particularly locally here, started selling crap beer at the outset, thereby taking shelf space and taps away from much better beers of the same and different styles in institutions that attempt to promote local beers.

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Don,

While I agree with some of what you're saying, the numbers you provided don't necessarily tell the entire story. 

I certainly do not like the fact that mass-produced beers with crappy ingredients (Shock Top, Blue Moon, etc) are often passed off as "craft beers", but I've never seen them offered as growlers in a 7-11 or anywhere else. (Watch "Beer Wars" if you haven't already)

While a craft brewer must indeed brew 6M bbl or less per year, the entire craft brewing market in the US is 24M bbl. While Yuengling (ugh) is technically a craft brewer, they produce 2.8M bbl per year. Compare that output to the output of Oskar Blues (150k bbl), Anchor Brewing (132k bbl), and Lagunitas (640k bbl) in order to get a better idea of the craft beer industry. 

I've been very skeptical of smaller breweries that have sold out to the multinational corporations, but fortunately, there are so many other good choices that it doesn't bother me. (Sorry Goose Island, but I've moved on). Here's an interesting article that goes into much more detail:

Sep 8, 2015 - "It Doesn't Matter Who Owns Your Favorite Brewery" by Aaron Goldfarb on esquire.com

 I agree with the author's assertion that the quality doesn't necessarily decrease after breweries are sold, and I also find it hard to fault those who profit by selling to larger

Thanks to your post, I perused https://www.brewersassociation.org/ for the first time, and discovered it offers a wealth of information about local breweries as well as the industry as a whole. 

Slightly off topic; Finally, if you want a great place to fill a growler or enjoy a frequently changing tap selection by the glass, check out the Whole Foods at Fair Lakes. The sports bar offers 20 beers on tap, including two nitro taps. Inside the main store, they offer an additional six taps at the cheese counter, and a few more at the barbecue and seafood areas. Oh by the way, they have a wine tasting room upstairs with 80 wines on offer.

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On 7/7/2016 at 5:01 PM, JBag57 said:

Thanks, Don, I do and will continue to, hopefully for the remainder of my years on this planet.

In my opinion, the issue as to whether the output of established craft breweries has been or will be on the decline is overshadowed by the issue that many of the new breweries that are popping up, and particularly locally here, started selling crap beer at the outset, thereby taking shelf space and taps away from much better beers of the same and different styles in institutions that attempt to promote local beers.

You're probably right - I honestly don't know. We may not disagree with very much here.

I do know that I've spent thirty years witnessing the decline of previously *awesome* beers (granted, there wasn't much to choose from) which are now no better than Michelob, and in some cases, worse, because Michelob is at least no worse than club soda, i.e., it's not offensive.

In the early 80's, Anchor Steam Ale, Sierra Nevada Porter, Pilsner Urquell, Samuel Smith's Taddy Porter, Hacker-Pschorr Munich, and Spaten Oktoberfest were legitimately world-class beers - those are the ones that I'm certain were sold back then, and I can attest to them having been *incredible*. 

Just a couple years ago, I wrote my friend with whom I traveled around Europe in 1989 (this is in the Italy thread). Shortly after that trip, we were at "Steak Night" at The Saloon in Georgetown (later renamed "The Saloun" due to conflict with The Saloon on U Street), which I believe was a Tuesday. We each ordered a pint of a brand new keg (so we were told) of Spaten Oktoberfest, and perchance took our first sip at the exact same moment. We both immediately looked up at each other, eyes as wide as saucers, knowing full well that the beer we just took a sip of was better than anything either of us had ever tasted in America (we later agreed on this) - and comparable to what we had in Germany at the local biergartens in Heidelberg, Munich, etc. This beer was so good that he wrote me right back after my email, and remembered the incident just as clearly as I do - this guy is a *serious*, hardcore beer lover (he also got to the final three to be Ozzy Osbourne's lead guitarist, I shit you not, and went out to dinner with Osbourne and the other two candidates, only to be told at that meal he didn't make it - this is after Osbourne left Black Sabbath - anyway, interesting anecdote about one of my best friends which reminds me about "Tank." Curtis (my friend), Gary (Tank's drummer), and I used to hit up The Black Rooster Pub pretty regularly, downing beers and shooting darts - I was like a fish out of water next to those two (especially Gary) because I was like Richie Cunningham, but the three of us got along famously. What the hell am I even talking about right now?)

I do apologize for the extremely strong tone in my post, but it's an issue I feel passionately about, and unfortunately, not one I can back down from - but that doesn't mean "I'm right and everyone else is wrong"; it just means "I'm fiercely passionate about this issue."

On 7/7/2016 at 6:35 PM, reedm said:

Don,

While I agree with some of what you're saying, the numbers you provided don't necessarily tell the entire story. 

I certainly do not like the fact that mass-produced beers with crappy ingredients (Shock Top, Blue Moon, etc) are often passed off as "craft beers", but I've never seen them offered as growlers in a 7-11 or anywhere else. (Watch "Beer Wars" if you haven't already)

While a craft brewer must indeed brew 6M bbl or less per year, the entire craft brewing market in the US is 24M bbl. While Yuengling (ugh) is technically a craft brewer, they produce 2.8M bbl per year. Compare that output to the output of Oskar Blues (150k bbl), Anchor Brewing (132k bbl), and Lagunitas (640k bbl) in order to get a better idea of the craft beer industry. 

I've been very skeptical of smaller breweries that have sold out to the multinational corporations, but fortunately, there are so many other good choices that it doesn't bother me. (Sorry Goose Island, but I've moved on). Here's an interesting article that goes into much more detail:

Sep 8, 2015 - "It Doesn't Matter Who Owns Your Favorite Brewery" by Aaron Goldfarb on esquire.com

I agree with the author's assertion that the quality doesn't necessarily decrease after breweries are sold, and I also find it hard to fault those who profit by selling to larger

Thanks to your post, I perused https://www.brewersassociation.org/ for the first time, and discovered it offers a wealth of information about local breweries as well as the industry as a whole. 

Slightly off topic; Finally, if you want a great place to fill a growler or enjoy a frequently changing tap selection by the glass, check out the Whole Foods at Fair Lakes. The sports bar offers 20 beers on tap, including two nitro taps. Inside the main store, they offer an additional six taps at the cheese counter, and a few more at the barbecue and seafood areas. Oh by the way, they have a wine tasting room upstairs with 80 wines on offer.

Reed, your post is an excellent one, and I have no doubt your figures are absolutely correct - I was giving a nightmare, worst-case scenario of what might come to pass. And I absolutely don't fault breweries for selling out - who wouldn't? But those breweries, God love 'em, are no longer my friends, and to a large degree, are my enemies; but I do not fault the people involved for wanting to make money. 

I'm equally passionate about over-hopped beers, which I compare to over-oaked wines. Mercifully, that trend seems to be dissipating with the wane of Robert Parker's influence.

BTW, I strongly, strongly disagree with the majority of what Aaron Goldfarb said in his Esquire article. It seems innocuous, but to my eyes, it's an extremely dangerous piece of writing.

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1 hour ago, DonRocks said:

Reed, your post is an excellent one, and I have no doubt your figures are absolutely correct - I was giving a nightmare, worst-case scenario of what might come to pass. And I absolutely don't fault breweries for selling out - who wouldn't? But those breweries, God love 'em, are no longer my friends, and to a large degree, are my enemies; but I do not fault the people involved for wanting to make money. 

I'm equally passionate about over-hopped beers, which I compare to over-oaked wines. Mercifully, that trend seems to be dissipating with the wane of Robert Parker's influence.

BTW, I strongly, strongly disagree with the majority of what Aaron Goldfarb said in his Esquire article.

Don,

Not to be argumentative, because I find this very interesting, but I'd like to know why you disagree with the author so strongly. While I'm no expert with regards to the beer industry, I enjoy beer quite a bit, and have a reasonable amount of experience with the beverage :-). I'm not concerned with InBev buying up smaller breweries as long as they don't change the product. If InBev uses their power to displace some of the budlimeorangewhatever in order to replace it with Lagunitas, for example, isn't that a good thing?

I get tired of overly hoppy beers after a while, as well. As long as Kolsch-style beers don't become trendy, though, I'm not too concerned about the prevalence of hoppy beers. 

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I totally disagree and do not have the time to write a complete analysis, however, although the evil giant InBev now owns Goose Island, Goose Island still produces world class beers (and they are more available then before the purchase).  I have always thought Fat Tire sucked, from the first day I tasted in in 1991 on a school trip when we crossed the Mississippi (for the longest time I thought the whole brewery sucked because Fat Tire is such a retched beer).  Lagunitas Sucks is a world class brew.  Bells makes amazing beers still to this day.  Sierra Nevada still uses only whole cone hops and carbonates naturally and has figured out a way to remain relevant.  Just because something is small doesn't mean it is good.  Just because it is big it doesn't mean it is bad.  I have always just followed this one rule: if it tastes good drink it.  If not, pour it down the toilet (last night at Flying Dog I gave them back my glass of Hibiscus Grapefruit Raddler and demanded another beer!)

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Reed and pras, I just woke up, so now's a good time to respond to both of you - I don't want to argue; instead, I'd like to try to work together towards a common goal (a meeting of the minds), and perhaps learn something along the way. This is the way I prefer to discuss subjects where there are multiple sides to an issue. Reed, I disagree with Goldfarb so strongly becuase he seems to represent young America's taste in beer right now: for grotesquely hoppy, high-alcohol monster beers with macho names like "Super Truck Triple IPA." Also, I simply do not believe Anchor Steam is the same beer it was 30 years ago - same with all those beers I listed. At this point, I'd like to propose that I possess two foibles: 1) an over-sensitivity to hops and 2) a bias against bottled beer in general.

1) I consider America's taste toward hoppy beers equivalent to our taste in oaky wines (worse ten years ago), some people's taste in peaty scotch (Nick Offerman likens Lagavulin 16 to "mother's milk"), and Germany's penchant for trocken wines, even when some of those wines would benefit from at least a touch of residual sugar. I have what can only be called an "extreme sensitivity" to rancid oil, and can often detect it in foods when others at the same table cannot (this is not an attribute so much as "a condition," and not a particularly enjoyable one). I think we have a nation-wide crisis regarding over-hopped beers (which is a blessing, because we're discussing *beer* like it's Armageddon - kind of refreshingly harmless when you think about it).

2) I value subtlety, nuance, and balance in my beers, and I think the carbonation process really hurts those, so I tend to like bottled beers less than other people do, and cherish the moments when I find a beer engine pumping out something that isn't a dark stout or porter (it seems like they often are). An example is here in Sacramento, CA at a Ruhstaller beer outlet, where the beer served out of the engine put everything we'd been drinking earlier that evening into perspective. I was with DIShGo, and she - a complete beer novice who barely even drinks - had her eyes wide-opened also - tasting this incredible beer from the engine was like taking blinders off.

These two things are admittedly my personal flaws and biases - I hope I don't allow them to become prejudices, but if I do, please correct me. I'm sure we'll be discussing this more, later. Anyway, I want to work *towards* understanding what you're arguing for here; right now, I'm not sure what it is.

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Don, I realize you were ranting on this one, but I'm going to have to disagree on a couple points.  "Craft brewing" as a designation of quality measured only in output of barrels per year is meaningless.  MEANINGLESS.  Beer is an industrial product.  Zymurgy is ultimately a science, not an art. The true "craft" part comes with innovation in recipes and attention to quality ingredients.  Once you have the recipe down production is limited only by your equipment and budget.  Smaller brewers can get away with more experimentation because the risk is so much lower at a small production volume, but even the big micros have small batch labs for this purpose.  You can produce really shitty beer in 1 bbl increments, or very good beer at 1 million bbl's.  It is literally a question of scale and quality control.

I once heard a very well-respected small craft brewer say (I'm paraphrasing): "The brewers at Anheuser Busch don't brew crappy, watered down beer because they have to.  They brew it because they want to, that is the exact product they are trying to produce."  Macro brewed products are perversely the envy of the brewing world in that they hit the mark they are trying to hit. Every. Single. Time. (Note: I'm talking actual beer here, not the lab-created "malternatives" like Lime-A-Rita or whatever).  Cheap beer isn't cheap because it is made in large quantities, it is cheap because it is made with readily available cheap ingredients (adjunct grains, hop extracts, etc.) at the lowest acceptable cost in order to sell it by the truckloads.  Brewers like Sierra Nevada show that you can brew beer in industrial quantities and still maintain quality that comes with good ingredients, and do so consistently.  They've been doing it for a pretty long time now.  There is no magic there.  You just need to have the space and capital to scale up, and the drive to maintain quality.

Now, back to "craft" brewers.  Yes, there are certainly some that have traded quality for consistency on the march towards nation-wide distribution, but that doesn't mean that finding a beer at a supermarket chain means it's crap.  I think that is the greatest thing about the craft brewing "revolution".  It has allowed brewers to bring their products to the masses due to increased demand for better beer.  Some do it well (in my mind: Sierra Nevada, Bell's, Dogfish, Lagunitas, Green Flash, Flying Dog), some have not and succumbed to the siren song of short cuts, whether by choice or at the heeding of their new overlords (the main Goose Island brands, Anchor, Red Hook, Pyramid), and some I don't think were ever very good in the first place but had a product that was palatable and "craft"-y enough to attract attention when there weren't many alternatives (New Belgium, Sam Adams come to mind).  Think about it: 20 years ago you would have had a Sierra Nevada and though "Hey, that's a really good pale ale!".  It stuck out because, hey!, there were very few good pale ales available at that scale.  Now it sits on the shelf with literally dozens of others of similar quality.  A relative embarrassment of riches.

I'm with you on the skewed production towards hoppy beers, but like the wine and whiskey worlds that is a matter of marketing.  Market makers (as the case may be) hype them up and the producers are happy to respond.  Then it became a feedback loop as they tried to out-lupulin each other.  The fads will always pass, but with the growth they produce comes opportunity.  I was at Whole Foods just last night and counted no fewer than 6 brands of gose on the shelf.  Gose!!  Even knowledgeable beer drinkers couldn't have named a producer of gose 5 years ago, and now Sierra Nevada is making one!  Not all of them are very good, mind you, but that they exist at all is pretty incredible.

It's an amazing time to be a beer aficionado, and I don't see it dying down any time soon.  Lament that fact that you can find good alternatives to BudMillerCoors at 7-11.  I think it's fucking great.

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TedE took the time that I don't to write the well developed response that I either didn't have the time to, or didn't know how to develop.  I agree 100%.  Budwiser from a brewing perspective is a good brewer in that every bottle that comes off the line tastes exactly the same, which especially impressive given it is brewed in several locations.  New Belgium makes a lot of mediocre beers, but they are masters at producing tarts (which is done in small quantities, because of space/production/time issues).  Flying Dog because of production limitations has contracted with FX Matt to produce their number one seller (Raging Bitch) and free up production space and create some interesting stuff.  While this may raise concern, FD went about a very scientific approach before they moved production of their number 1 brew.  In blind taste tests with bitch brewed in Frederick vs. Utica, they actually preferred what FX Matt made in Utica.  For anyone who doesn't know, FX Matt who makes their own beers such as Saranac and Utica Club, is probably the largest "contract brewer" in the country.  Their ability to make beers consistently for other companies is truly amazing.

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On 7/7/2016 at 1:47 PM, DonRocks said:

Fat Tire, Yuengling, Sam Adams, Lagunitas, Bell's, Deschutes, Brooklyn, Oskar Blues, Anchor Steam, even the once-excellent Great Lakes ... it's *all crap* or quickly turning into crap. Some of these were good, honest beers at one time in the past - and some still may be while they "establish themselves as 7-11-Level Craft Beers," but if any remain that haven't totally gone to shit, they will within the next 5-10 years: Bet on it.

Bell's and Deschutes?  Oh, no no no.

Don, I'm interested in your perspective: I was back home in Southern Oregon recently for Fourth of July, and was perusing the beer selection of the local hypersupermegamart Fred Meyer, a Portland-based chain that is now an arm of Kroger.  There are Fred Meyers throughout Oregon, Washington, and Idaho, including in Brookings, my tiny little corner of southwest Oregon just above the California border.  The beer selection in the Brookings Fred Meyer is prodigious, with many, many Oregon-based beers from brewers such as Deschutes, Ninkasi, Full Sail, Rogue, Laurelwood, Portland Brewing, Base Camp, Caldera, Cascade, Green Flash, McMenamins, Pelican, Bridgeport, and so forth.  If these beers are readily available down in Brookings, then they are surely readily available at the other hypersupermegamart Fred Meyer locations throughout the state, and many of them can also easily be found in supermarkets up and down the West Coast (I definitely remember seeing Laurelwood, Full Sail, Green Flash, and Ninkasi in a random market in Truckee, California last summer, for instance, and of course Rogue is a standby of Whole Foods throughout the country).  Are they all "crap or quickly turning into crap" by virtue of having the volume to be carried in abundance by Fred Meyer stores in the Pacific Northwest?  If not, where are you drawing the line?  What makes Deschutes a crap beer now, just because we can (hallelujah) finally get them on the East Coast?  Is the difference in scale for 7/11 (if Deschutes is indeed available there, which I haven't seen yet) really so massive compared to their previous footprint of the Western half of the country (they were easy to get in Austin two years ago) for you to write them off so summarily?  Or is it that the Black Butte Porter and Fresh Squeezed IPA now are presumptively crap because they are now available on the East Coast (brewed out of Deschutes's North Carolina facility, unless I'm mistaken), while their Armory XPA and Deschutes River Ale still are as good as ever because you can't get them out here?  Has Rogue's Morimoto Soba Ale been crap all this time because you can get it in Whole Foods?  I think you do a disservice to the brewers from places like Deschutes and Bell's who have clearly been quality-focused for such a long time; unlike something like Blue Moon or even Goose Island (which is FAR more ubiquitous), they deserve the benefit of the doubt in believing they can scale their operations without compromising their integrity as committed craft brewers.

It's one thing to say, look, if a beer is so widely available that 7/11 can stock it, then it's not a "craft beer" for some definitions of the term.  It's quite another thing to then proclaim that all such beers are crap or quickly will be, which I find ridiculous.

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Wow, I have never disagreed more strongly with the original post. In fact, the whole premise I disagree with. Where you buy a beer or how many barrels are produced has little or no relevance to if it is craft or not. Not just relying on the definition that you noted (which was created with the help of BIG BEER to include things that are most certainly not craft beer). 

To say Deschutes or Bell's are not craft because they finally cracked the distribution cartel is just plain silly. It means they have finally broken some of big beer's lobbyist's vice grip on the system. It doesn't mean they've sold out, it doesn't mean their quality is less. It just means they finally can distribute. And if you're just picking the hoppiest brews from those specific breweries, you're missing out on a lot of great beers. It's very passe in Oregon in NoCal to be focused on that. The amount of lambic-esques, farm house beers (not the saisons being pumped out at 7% ABV), the radlers, the goses, and  the Brett monsters that pucker your mouth that are being brewed and served even by larger breweries will give you all the subtlety and nuance you want without taking a porn star style blast of hops to the back of the throat. 

If Pliny The Elder ever makes it to the 7-11 on Mt. Vernon Ave because they figured out how to break down the byzantine distribution structure that currently exists doesn't make it a non-craft beer. That must means the good guys won and the bad guys lost. It's still being made in a little bar that serves damn good pizza in Santa Rosa. Some people don't love Port City, but it's in my local 7-11, and some of their stuff is quite tasty, I like the Metro Red, currently. DC Brau and 3 Stars (occasionally) is in the Del Ray 7-11, and those are most certainly craft, and respectable beers. 

You're not "wrong". "Wrong" would be me treating the wrong breast with radiation. What you've done is treated the wrong person, and instead of their breast, you treated their lung instead :)

EDIT: Also, from what I gather, the individual franchisees "curate" what beers they sell at 7-11. If you have a pretty sharp owner/operator, you probably get better beers. If not (like the 7-11 a mile up from the one on Windsor, in "El Salvador), you have lesser quality beers and many more options for malt liquors. So, I think the selection at 7-11s will be quite variable, I don't think it's a "top down" management decision of what to supply.

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Again, if it is good, drink it, if it isn't don't.  It is beer for god's sake, not a cure for cancer.  It is just meant to be enjoyed.  If you like a gose, lambic, hop monster, high alcohol bomb, something so funky it smells like puke, malt forward beer, double, tripple, quad, wild, kolsch, raddler, and on and on and on, drink it.  If you don't, then move on.

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7 minutes ago, Simul Parikh said:

I think I'm going to go to Churchkey right now to get something nobody has ever heard of .. 

We should meet up sometime.  I still need to use my $50 gift certificate from volunteering at Snallygaster, which I highly recommend doing (volunteering that is).

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4 hours ago, Simul Parikh said:

all the subtlety and nuance you want without taking a porn star style blast of hops to the back of the throat. 

Probably the funniest line on this site. Bad visual though! 

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Never in my life did I expect to see someone I respect calling Deschutes a crap beer.  It took me quite aback.

Their Black Butte Porter is damn near my personal idea of beer perfection, eminently quaffable on all occasions.  And not hoppy neither.

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I think what the recent explosion in the number of breweries and the different kinds of beer styles have accomplished is just expand and deepen the continuum of beer choice.  Back in the day people had little choice between which fizzy yellow beer they could drink.  Other options were out there as Don originally referred to, they were just harder to access.  Now, as TedE wrote so well, there are a number of goses commonly available.  Some suck, some are amazing, some are middling.  Same with IPAs, double IPAs, stouts, pale ales, saisons, etc.   Once the final frontier of different or "extreme" beer styles has been explored, what I see signs of is a number of craft breweries doubling back and focusing on the "old school" styles like pils, lagers, red ales, brown ales, and the like. At that point there will be amazing, middling, and sucky examples of them also commonly available.  I don't think having that choice is a bad thing at all.

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21 hours ago, johnb said:

For what its worth, I stumbled upon the following article: (I know nothing about the author)

"Craft Beer is Dead. Gose Killed It." by Joe Koehane on thrilllist.com

Whether one agrees or not, it seems to me to have some interesting comments about staying ahead of the crowd for its own sake.

I've read this twice, and I still don't get it.  Or maybe I do get it and find it to be a terrible thought piece at best.  The chain of reasoning goes:

  • Gose, as a beer style, is disgusting.
  • Craft brewers have jumped on the gose bandwagon and are producing them in non-trivial quantities.
  • Therefore, craft brewing has become a pointless and aimless exercise in one-upmanship.

The whole premise hinges on the first proposition being universally true for all beer drinkers.  It's not, and everything that follows is just silly.  I don't think it actually has anything interesting to say about staying ahead of the crowd for its own sake.  It's just saying that the author thinks some sour beers taste like stale sweat.

For people who do like gose, tell me again how increased diversity in available beer styles is a bad thing?

Look, nobody is doubting that there are novelty beers out there that appeal mainly to people looking to be at the forefront (or radical fringe) of beer: habanero IPAs, chocolate peanut butter porters, mango doughnut ale.  It's not my thing, but I recognize it as A Thing that can be ignored if you aren't into it.  I think there may be an argument to be made by focusing on those, not historical styles that might have been lost to history but were not precisely because the popularity of craft beer created enough room at the table to accommodate both.

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Objectively speaking, it's a terrible article that make those that read it dumber, and wish I could take back that 4 minutes of my life. But, I can't. You can't. We all can't. 

When you think about it, all craft beer is basically "the fringe," since it only makes up 7% or so of what is drank. Yet, it's talked about like it is so common. "Real America" hardly drinks any craft beer, it's just urban people/cultural elite. Basically, people that watch Breaking Bad or Sopranos or shit like that. Or people that read and post on regional food message boards :) 

 

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On 8/15/2016 at 2:37 PM, reedm said:

Well Harumph...

"Amid Deal with Anheuser-Busch, Craft Brewery Gets Kicked Out of Its Own Festival" by Fritz Hahn on washingtonpost.com

I read the article.  It is interesting, but I still hold that if the beer is good drink it.  I have a bunch of Miller Lite hanging out in my fridge from a party I had several months ago, that no one will drink.  Mind you I am a self proclaimed beer snob.  You know what?  Last Friday, when it was 100 degrees out and we were eating crabs on the deck, nothing could have tasted better.

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1 hour ago, pras said:

This article confirms what I have been saying all along.  That being purchased allows the breweries to focus on making new and interesting beers and making them in larger quantities.

Where do you see this confirmation? I honestly can't finish the article.

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59 minutes ago, DonRocks said:

Where do you see this confirmation? I honestly can't finish the article.

For instance, with Goose Island, production of full year beers has been moved to a beer factory, freeing up capacity and allowing the actual brewery to use their resources towards making more esoteric or special beers that had more limited production runs.  Goose Island has made more barrel aged and sours and the distribution is better.  

People discount what the brewing giants do, but what they do is pretty amazing.  Try a miller light anywhere in the world at any time and it tastes just like the last one you had.  This is no small achomplishment.

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One point made in the article is the craft breweries can move their flagship beers to large production facilities and brew them with more consistency while freeing up space at their own production facilities to experiment with new beers. 

Or what Pras said.

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5 hours ago, pras said:

People discount what the brewing giants do, but what they do is pretty amazing.  Try a miller light anywhere in the world at any time and it tastes just like the last one you had.  This is no small achomplishment.

Pras, you know I respect you, but this is *exactly* the thing that I heard Todd Kliman say about McDonald's about ten years ago. He added that it was a thing of beauty - I think it's a think of great ugliness, replicating mediocrity. Schweppes Club soda tastes exactly the same all over the world - so does Diet Coke (I'm guessing here and may be wrong),. and I'm just not impressed at all.

*However*, I thought your first paragraph had some teeth in it.

5 hours ago, Tweaked said:

One point made in the article is the craft breweries can move their flagship beers to large production facilities and brew them with more consistency while freeing up space at their own production facilities to experiment with new beers. 

Or what Pras said.

I guess my point - which you obviously disagree with (and I'm certainly not saying "I'm right and everyone else is wrong*) is that the main product has gotten worse. I agree that my sample size may not be large enough, and that I don't pay close enough attention, but my perception is that quality declines. Yes, space is freed up at their production facilities, but that's no guarantee of anything. I just use restaurants as a parallel example - I cannot think of one example where expansion has helped a restaurant. Not one. There may be some that I'm not thinking of, but in all cases that I am thinking of, there is a decrease in quality, and I've seen too many formerly great beers become mediocre to be excited about any of this. There's a *reason* these "knee-jerk" quotes about quality going to hell were being issued by people who know what they're doing, and when I was reading the article, I couldn't help but feel it was subsidized by Big Beer, because these are exactly the things that my marketing machine would say to appease people.

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I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you, just stating the points made in the article.  The former craft brewers also state that they now have access to better technology (brewing equipment), brewing experts, and ingredients.  Which they believe allows them to brew a better product.

I drink a lot of Brooklyn Brewery beer and it's always a solid product even though it is massed brewed in Utica. 

Now, do I look at Devil's Backbone differently after they sold a stake in their company.  Absolutely.  And given a choice I'll definitely buy another local craft beer over them.

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7 hours ago, DonRocks said:

Schweppes Club soda tastes exactly the same all over the world - so does Diet Coke (I'm guessing here and may be wrong),. and I'm just not impressed at all.

Brewing beer is a technical process (with biology also involved), which is not comparable to making club soda or diet coke.  Tons of variables must be controlled, such as temperature, timing, ingredients, yeast.  Some of the variables are very hard to control.  A local brewer recently moved production of their number 1 seller offsite to be brewed by FX Matt in Utica.  They had to work over a period of several months so that FX Matt could dial it in and get it right.  Once they got it right, in a blind taste test, they thought the product brewed offsite by a big industrial brewer actually tasted better than what they brewed in their brewery.  The flagship has been brewed offsite for almost a year now and it has freed them to be more creative and producer a wider variety of beer.

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36 minutes ago, pras said:

Brewing beer is a technical process (with biology also involved), which is not comparable to making club soda or diet coke.  Tons of variables must be controlled, such as temperature, timing, ingredients, yeast.  Some of the variables are very hard to control.  A local brewer recently moved production of their number 1 seller offsite to be brewed by FX Matt in Utica.  They had to work over a period of several months so that FX Matt could dial it in and get it right.  Once they got it right, in a blind taste test, they thought the product brewed offsite by a big industrial brewer actually tasted better than what they brewed in their brewery.  The flagship has been brewed offsite for almost a year now and it has freed them to be more creative and producer a wider variety of beer.

I just want to say two things: First, surely brewing Diet Coke is a technical process also.

More importantly, I'm not saying either you or Tweaked are wrong and that I'm right; I'm merely offering up a different opinion, so please don't take my comment(s) as some sort of sniveling nyah-nyah. I was tired when I first read the article, and I really *couldn't* finish it - every time I got 1/3 of the way through, my mind started drifting, and I'd have to start over (I found it to be a rather dull, monotonous tome). However, it is absolutely my experience that no food product (beyond a certain level that one individual can supervise to some degree) improves when expanding beyond a certain size - I cannot think of a single one, and my personal experience with beers selling to large breweries has been a decades-long anecdotal witnessing of a decline in quality. Please do *not* think I am arguing or disrespecting either one of you two - I would be *thrilled* if great beer was mass-produced and widely available for less money; I've just never seen it before.

Cheers,
Rocks

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I overall agree with you, Don, that almost no food product (or heck, fashion, art, whatever) seems to improve with mass production. But, there are degrees of what constitutes mass production. Fundamentally, if you don't think Lagunitas or Brooklyn or Deschutes or Bell produce good beer, then I think we (Pras, Tweaked, and I) are talking past each other. Not that it makes it right or wrong, but I think most beer fans would say those are pretty great beers. Russian River products are somewhat better than other beers I've had, and so were the sours and lambics at Cascade in Portland, but seriously, just marginally. But, I can't get them anywhere. But, I wouldn't say it was so much better, and if someone who knew beer pretty well felt that a Goose Island sour was better than a specific Cascade product, I wouldn't really have a leg to stand on to say that it was that much better, other than the fact I just love Cascade's stuff. Anyway, it's certainly too short of a time point. Goose has surpassed expecations, let's just hope it stays that way. 

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7 hours ago, DonRocks said:

I just want to say two things: First, surely brewing Diet Coke is a technical process also.

More importantly, I'm not saying either you or Tweaked are wrong and that I'm right; I'm merely offering up a different opinion, so please don't take my comment(s) as some sort of sniveling nyah-nyah. I was tired when I first read the article, and I really *couldn't* finish it - every time I got 1/3 of the way through, my mind started drifting, and I'd have to start over (I found it to be a rather dull, monotonous tome). However, it is absolutely my experience that no food product (beyond a certain level that one individual can supervise to some degree) improves when expanding beyond a certain size - I cannot think of a single one, and my personal experience with beers selling to large breweries has been a decades-long anecdotal witnessing of a decline in quality. Please do *not* think I am arguing or disrespecting either one of you two - I would be *thrilled* if great beer was mass-produced and widely available for less money; I've just never seen it before.

Cheers,
Rocks

don, are you saying that the quality of beer available in America (let's say American-produced beer) has been subject to a "decades-long . . . decline in quality?" that's quite an astonishing claim in the face of the craft boom and indeed bubble in my eyes. in decades, we've gone from true beer die-hards who made trips to Colorado to try Coors, because that's as far east as it went, and Bud or Miller on tap everywhere to a DC Brau IPA and a couple other local beers on tap even at bland places or places not thought to care about their beer selection like dive bars and hotels.

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12 hours ago, franch said:

don, are you saying that the quality of beer available in America (let's say American-produced beer) has been subject to a "decades-long . . . decline in quality?" that's quite an astonishing claim in the face of the craft boom and indeed bubble in my eyes. in decades, we've gone from true beer die-hards who made trips to Colorado to try Coors, because that's as far east as it went, and Bud or Miller on tap everywhere to a DC Brau IPA and a couple other local beers on tap even at bland places or places not thought to care about their beer selection like dive bars and hotels.

No, I'm saying that individual brands have suffered the decline you're referring to. For example, Pilsner Urquell. I'm sure there are individual beers that have gotten better; I just don't know of any.

The game these days seems to come out with a brand that "craft" beer lovers like, sell it to a larger brewery, and then either participate in its decline, or get the hell out of Dodge.

It's no different than with restaurants - come out with something popular, then start to clone it, and watch the quality go downhill, and hope you get rich before people realize it wasn't even all that great to start with (although sometimes it was). By the time it completely sucks, you'll be so rich you won't care.

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2 hours ago, DonRocks said:

The game these days seems to come out with a brand that "craft" beer lovers like, sell it to a larger brewery, and then either participate in its decline, or get the hell out of Dodge.

Is this a prediction?  

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5 hours ago, DonRocks said:

No, I'm saying that individual brands have suffered the decline you're referring to. For example, Pilsner Urquell. I'm sure there are individual beers that have gotten better; I just don't know of any.

Don, in your contributions to this discussion I'm seeing a lot of references to "anecdotal evidence" and "perception" of the decline of these brews.  When it comes to evaluation of quality, the expectation of what you are going to be tasting is a powerful, powerful drug.  If you expect that breweries taken over by larger conglomerates will produce crappier beer it's going to be almost impossible to disentangle that from what your brain perceives from your tongue.  It's healthy to acknowledge that influence (and nobody is immune to this, no matter how much they would like to believe!).  I'm not as comfortable as you assigning a strict, linear correlation between quality and production volume; this thread has several examples of breweries that have grown and maintained their quality.  Although I'm with you on Urquell, it is a shadow of what was once maybe the world's greatest pilsener.

I'll offer up one more personal (anecdotal ;)) example to illustrate the point: Lagunitas 'A Little Sumpin' Sumpin'' (god, how that name has grown to annoy me ...).  This one came on the market towards the beginning of the Belgian pale ale or IPA boom, where primarily West Coast brewers started using Belgian yeast strains for wheat or sour beers in their IPA and IIPA recipes.  I thought the results were stunning.  This one, along with Green Flash's 'Le Freak', were my go to beers for a period of time.  Both have now grown to be bi-coastal operations (I wouldn't be surprised if Lagunitas has 10x the production volume now).  I still taste and enjoy Sumpin' fairly regularly, but something is ... just not the same.  However, I can't pin down what.  Has it actually changed as they shifted production to the East Coast?  Has my knowledge that Safeway now stocks 3-4 different Lagunitas styles seeped into the reptilian portion of my beer snob brain and exerted some unconscious influence?  Have I just had it often enough that the novelty has worn off, and been inundated with more beers of the same style?  In other words, has the perceptual space for Belgian IPAs grown so much that this beer has shifted to another place in my memory?  I don't know, and there is no way for me to really figure it out.  The brewers could probably show me chemical analysis of this beer today and from 7 years ago., but even if they were identical it wouldn't change my perceived shift in it's quality.

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On ‎8‎/‎26‎/‎2016 at 5:24 AM, DonRocks said:

No, I'm saying that individual brands have suffered the decline you're referring to. For example, Pilsner Urquell. I'm sure there are individual beers that have gotten better; I just don't know of any.

The game these days seems to come out with a brand that "craft" beer lovers like, sell it to a larger brewery, and then either participate in its decline, or get the hell out of Dodge.

It's no different than with restaurants - come out with something popular, then start to clone it, and watch the quality go downhill, and hope you get rich before people realize it wasn't even all that great to start with (although sometimes it was). By the time it completely sucks, you'll be so rich you won't care.

i'll take the decline in Pilsner Urquell and some other brands in exchange for having several great to world-class breweries within 40 minutes of DC and having at the bare minimum a quality IPA on tap in literally every bar in DC I have been to that serves beer.

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On August 26, 2016 at 5:24 AM, DonRocks said:

The game these days seems to come out with a brand that "craft" beer lovers like, sell it to a larger brewery, and then either participate in its decline, or get the hell out of Dodge.

Don, this is a pretty cynical view of the industry.  In my experience craft brewers get into the business because they love beer and are actually passionate about the product they create.  Most if not all of them were home brewers who caught the bug. This isn't Silicon Valley where everybody's raison d'être is to develop some niche market app for the sole purpose of selling to the highest bidder once they've gained enough market share.  Are there brewers that have "sold out"?  Sure, just like in every industry.  There are three choices:

1) Work to expand production while maintaining independence, keep innovation going in a small scale while letting your flagship beers bring in the necessary capital and market like hell to differentiate (call this the Dogfish Model)

2) Find yourself in a situation where you have a product whose demand outstrips your ability to keep up or expand, or you just don't want to invest the capital for whatever reason.  Risk stagnation and brand dilution, or outsource your best sellers to free up in-house production for smaller volume beers you want to continue growing (the Flying Dog/FX Matt Model, or on a larger scale Goose Island)

3) Say "Fuck it, I'm out!" and cash the biggest paycheck you can negotiate, or hand over the brand to a conglomerate in return for creative control.  This seems to be the model under the most scrutiny in this thread, but I actually think it's the least common of the three in the U.S, and much more common maybe back in the 90s/early 00s when selling out was the only proven option for nationwide distribution.  Now you have Dogfish/Lagunitas/Green Flash/Flying Dog/Deschutes/et al.  They have shown that the tide has turned on the Big 3 (well, Big International Two at this point) and they can't use sheer force of distribution rights to bully smaller brewers.  Interestingly, I find the beers that this accusation is lobbed at were originally the least notable.  You had to come up with something really special to draw the attention of InBev, and that something really special is usually a relatively bland beer with enough "craft"-y mass appeal that moved a ton of product and had a marketable story behind it.  I think the space has grown beyond that market pressure, though.  There is just SO much out there to choose from.

This thread has reminded me that I've become way to insular in my beer purchases recently (hell, I'm in a rut).  Off to go research some beers I remember from 20+ years ago and see what is still operating as an independent concern!

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On 8/15/2016 at 2:37 PM, reedm said:

Well Harumph...

"Amid Deal with Anheuser-Busch, Craft Brewery Gets Kicked Out of Its Own Festival" by Fritz Hahn on washingtonpost.com

I find myself at Devil's Backbone a lot.  My mother-in-law lives at Wintergreen, so one could call this place my home-away-from-my-home-away-from-my-home (wow that made me sound like an ass).  My wife and I headed up to the house for a getaway on our first anniversary of dating, too many years ago.  It was late, I was grumpy/tired/hungry/thirsty.  We turned the corner from 151 and I saw the giant copper tanks and my mood changed in a hurry.  I'm a mug club guy.  

What I'm saying is I like the place.  While I don't know Steve Crandall, I've gotten to know some of the bartenders over the years - all good people from what I can tell.

Now, Devil's Backbone is no longer a craft brewer.  There are clear definitions of craft brewery, and they no longer meet those definitions.  But good God, the reaction...  from customers.  From the craft brewers association and some of their member breweries.  From some in the media.  Whenever someone mentions A/B you can see the staff visibly withdraw - having been the subject of so much verbal abuse over the last few months based on a decision they had nothing to do with.

All of this against a company that did a great deal of good for their industry.  The Backbone always participated in collaboration projects with other breweries - often times breweries that were far less successful and needed DB more than DB needed them.  Hosting events at their facility, participating as board members, etc.  Even after all that happened this year, someone mentioned that Crandall still hosted the brewers dinner the night before the event.

A/B didn't buy them because they liked Nelson County, or because they liked the venue.  They bought them because DB brews several specific, quality beers that fit well into A/B's portfolio of offerings.  They didn't buy Wild Wolf or Blue Mountain.  Devil's Backbone's beer is better (again, in my opinion, but sales and production seem to back this up).

So let's take A/B out of the picture for a moment.  Two weeks ago I was there on a random Saturday afternoon.  I stopped by for an early lunch, then again on my way back up the mountain before dinner.  There were easily 500+ people there at any given time throughout the day.  There is zero chance they had less than $100,000 in sales that day, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was three times that.  They had an offsite production facility brewing large quantities of product for regional distribution.  They had moved beyond the days of having supply chain and distribution challenges already.

So what has changed?  When the truck pulls up to their Lexington production facility, the side of it says Budweiser.  They are still brewing a lot of small batch, experimental beers - almost all of which are quite good.  They are still employing hundreds of people in an area of the state that needs more jobs.

I don't like the fact that they sold to A/B.  But local company makes it big, puts out good product, employs a lot of good people, gets bought out, and still offers solid, innovative beers...  Would the people at the CBA have turned down the check?  It smells a little of sour hops to me (sorry, I couldn't resist).

P.s. They are opening a distillery on site at the Basecamp, appears to be branded as Devil's Backbone.  I would love to see the contractual gymnastics that had to be performed for A/B to sign off on allowing a distillery into their portfolio, with the same branding as one of their beers

P.s.s. The ironic thing is I actually find the Vienna to be one of their least solid offerings.  

P.s.s.s. If you haven't visited the 151 trail, its beautiful this time of year.  Find a chair next to the fire pit at the Basecamp and breathe - craft beer isn't dying, more will come along.

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On ‎8‎/‎25‎/‎2016 at 8:19 AM, pras said:

 A local brewer recently moved production of their number 1 seller offsite to be brewed by FX Matt in Utica.  They had to work over a period of several months so that FX Matt could dial it in and get it right.  Once they got it right, in a blind taste test, they thought the product brewed offsite by a big industrial brewer actually tasted better than what they brewed in their brewery.  

Yeah!  Let's hear it for FX Matt*!  This brewery is in my hometown and craft beer craze pretty much saved them from going under years ago.  They brew a ton of "hometown" beers there including Sam Adams, and Old Heiruch (is that still around) and a ton of others. 

They have a great facility and give a good tour that's worth a stop if you happen to be in central NY

* From the commercials in the 80s "The F stands for fussy and the X stands for extra fussy"

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As a recent resident of Asheville, which brands itself as "Beer City USA," this is an interesting argument.

Asheville claims to have more breweries per capita than any city in the country (from what I understand, it's between here and Bend, OR, home of Deschutes). We have breweries popping up in every part of the city. From downtown where a lot of old warehouses have been converted to breweries, to the town center area called Biltmore Park near where I live (think Reston Town Center) to even the small pizza place near us in a small building behind a fire station where the owner is a passionate home brewer and is looking to up his game.

If a restaurant is not attached to a brewery, you can believe they have a great tap selection of local offerings and craft beer from around the country.

Several of the names here are, in my opinion, brewing some world class beer: namely Burial and Wicked Weed. The latter’s Funkatorium facility produces some remarkable barrel aged beers and sours.

Then you have the big two national brands who have built their East Coast production facilities here: Sierra Nevada and New Belgium. This seems to be the new trend for West Coast breweries, and I think these two started it. Now Oskar Blues is nearby in Brevard, Stone is in Richmond, Deschutes is going to Roanoke (which Asheville thought they were sure to get, and it’s a sore subject around here) and Ballast Point in the Tidewater. Wouldn’t be surprised if more are on the way.

I work right across the river from Sierra, and can see their tanks from my desk. Their facility is unbelievable; it’s as if Willy Wonka opened a brewery. When you drive in you feel like you’re approaching a mountain resort. Everything is shimmering in chrome and copper and brick and wood. They have a fantastic restaurant with innovative small plates, much different from your typical brewpub food – though they have good pizzas, burgers and wings, too. There’s a giant back yard with a concert stage, fire pits, sitting areas among the trees and dogs and kids everywhere. As for the beer they’re offering, they have a lot of unique beers native just to the brewpub, in addition to their national brands like their pale ale, Celebration and more. I just returned from Finland, and my hotel in the city of Tampere two hours north of Helsinki had Sierra beers. It’s remarkable what they’re able to do. And they’re employing a lot of people and bringing in a lot of people to enjoy their food and beers.

I’ve not been to New Belgium, but from what I understand, they are almost exclusively focused on production with just a small taproom on site. No restaurant or anything like that.

These breweries are all independent, but clearly have the capital to expand like they have. I asked someone at one of the smaller local breweries what the local breweries think of them. She said it was mixed, that it’s given Asheville more national recognition, but for her brewery, they have lost employees to the big boys because they have better pay and benefits. And the big breweries are getting well trained employees.

I’ve found that breweries are some of the few businesses that embrace competition because they know that you’re not going to be set in your ways and drink one beer for the rest of your life. It’s not like the old days where you were a Bud man or a Miller man.

The beer bubble will probably one day burst, as there are plenty more breweries on the way in Asheville. I don’t know if any of our local brands will sell out, but for now there seems to be the attitude that they will not. But it’s hard to turn down the money and potential to expand your brand.

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4 hours ago, ol_ironstomach said:

And yet right now, thanks to growing awareness of its desirability, traditional mezcal is under threat of house-style industrialization by large commercial interests, mainly the large tequila conglomerates.  And worse, as measures have been introduced to use government regulation to hijack the name and prohibit its traditional use.

This is the brief golden age of mezcal, its availability here on the rise, and before it's completely ruined.  This is the moment American whiskey enthusiasts enjoyed 12-15 years ago before Wall Street moved in.  I probably would have missed it too, if not for our own Jake Parrott.

Sounds kind of like "Craft Beer." ;)

I think the FDA should require annual production figures on every single beer sold in this country.

(Great post, btw. This is also the moment Burgundy enthusiasts enjoyed 20-30 years ago before the world market moved in, and upped prices by such unbelievable multiples that I know people who have *retired* from owning it - speaking of which, I suspect Bill Thomas isn't exactly hurting. The way you look at Mezcal now is *exactly* the way I was looking at Bourbon 10 years ago; unfortunately, I missed out on it.) :(

The *huge* advantage distilled beverages have is that they don't get heat-damaged. However, companies need to begin investing *big money* in counterfeit-proof labeling RIGHT NOW if they haven't already. Learn from what happened to wine - lots of people lost lots of money from counterfeiters.

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On ‎7‎/‎7‎/‎2016 at 1:47 PM, DonRocks said:

Lipstick on a pig. This isn't craft beer; it's crap beer. You can go through the whole list of 7-11 beers: Fat Tire, Yuengling, Sam Adams, Lagunitas, Bell's, Deschutes, Brooklyn, Oskar Blues, Anchor Steam, even the once-excellent Great Lakes ... it's *all crap* or quickly turning into crap. Some of these were good, honest beers at one time in the past - and some still may be while they "establish themselves as 7-11-Level Craft Beers," but if any remain that haven't totally gone to shit, they will within the next 5-10 years: Bet on it.

(Emphasis added.)  Historic Anchor Steam Brewery Purchased by Sapporo, by Ellen Fort, Aug 3, 2017, 9:28am PDT, on sf.eater.com.

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On 7/7/2016 at 1:47 PM, DonRocks said:

Lipstick on a pig. This isn't craft beer; it's crap beer. You can go through the whole list of 7-11 beers: Fat Tire, Yuengling, Sam Adams, Lagunitas, Bell's, Deschutes, Brooklyn, Oskar Blues, Anchor Steam, even the once-excellent Great Lakes ... it's *all crap* or quickly turning into crap. Some of these were good, honest beers at one time in the past - and some still may be while they "establish themselves as 7-11-Level Craft Beers," but if any remain that haven't totally gone to shit, they will within the next 5-10 years: Bet on it.

23 minutes ago, dcs said:

(Emphasis added.)  Historic Anchor Steam Brewery Purchased by Sapporo, by Ellen Fort, Aug 3, 2017, 9:28am PDT, on sf.eater.com.

(Emphasis also added.) 

May 4, 2017 - "Major Craft Brewer Lagunitas Sold to Heineken" by Erin DeJesus on eater.com

I don't *want* to be cynical; I can't help it.

I still mostly like Great Lakes, but I believe it's "shelf life" is going to be limited:

Jul 24, 2017 - "Great Lakes Brewing Company Quenches Increased Demand with Manufacturing Analytics Solution by Rockwell Automation"

I personally prefer malt over bitter hops (which you often find in east-coast beers) - Fat Tire was one of the few good, craft beers with a malty flavor profile; it has since acquired a weird, almost "sandy" component (that's not a very good descriptor, but I know what I'm trying to say). Bell's is not what it was five years ago - it was very good, but it's really becoming insipid.

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Lagunitas had already sold half of itself to Heineken in 2015 and Anchor was sold in 2010. I'm not sure what inference to draw from Great Lakes buying quality control equipment but your original post is more misinformed than prescient.

Also Oskar Blues sold itself to PE and New Belgium is now employee owned.

I haven't noticed a quality change in Bells at all either.

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On 8/24/2016 at 5:44 PM, pras said:

This article confirms what I have been saying all along.  That being purchased allows the breweries to focus on making new and interesting beers and making them in larger quantities.

I suppose this could be good or bad depending on one's point of view.  I was at Devil's Backbone over the weekend, and they're definitely experimenting with 'new', albeit less 'interesting' to me.  I've never really gotten into the recent craze of smoked beers - this is a charity contribution for firefighters so the tie-in makes sense, I just don't care for the flavor.  They have a sour IPA on tap - again, I understand that sours are all the rage these days (they had two sours and a gose on this weekend), but a sour IPA?  Not my thing.  A spruce IPA in August.  An apricot dunkel.  

I'm sure some beer enthusiasts enjoy this variety of the new and trendy.  I used to go to DB and have a hard time picking the few I could try because so many were appealing.  Now I find myself ordering the Striped Bass or Eight Point every time and enjoying the setting more than the selection.

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3 hours ago, genericeric said:

I suppose this could be good or bad depending on one's point of view.  I was at Devil's Backbone over the weekend, and they're definitely experimenting with 'new', albeit less 'interesting' to me.  I've never really gotten into the recent craze of smoked beers - this is a charity contribution for firefighters so the tie-in makes sense, I just don't care for the flavor.  They have a sour IPA on tap - again, I understand that sours are all the rage these days (they had two sours and a gose on this weekend), but a sour IPA?  Not my thing.  A spruce IPA in August.  An apricot dunkel.  

I'm sure some beer enthusiasts enjoy this variety of the new and trendy.  I used to go to DB and have a hard time picking the few I could try because so many were appealing.  Now I find myself ordering the Striped Bass or Eight Point every time and enjoying the setting more than the selection.

Truth to that... lot of silly business, and that's just because they can. People forgetting to stick to the roots, and just making great versions of great products. But, a low ABV sour IPA .. it tastes kinda refreshing in the backyard on a hot DC day, right?

I think the new big trend is the Hazy IPA, that's soft and dank. It's a trend I can get behind. Veil in Richmond and Dancing Gnome in Pittsburgh have great versions. Wonder who will mainstream it first. 

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On 8/15/2017 at 1:56 PM, Simul Parikh said:

Truth to that... lot of silly business, and that's just because they can. People forgetting to stick to the roots, and just making great versions of great products. But, a low ABV sour IPA .. it tastes kinda refreshing in the backyard on a hot DC day, right?

I think the new big trend is the Hazy IPA, that's soft and dank. It's a trend I can get behind. Veil in Richmond and Dancing Gnome in Pittsburgh have great versions. Wonder who will mainstream it first. 

Hazy IPA is tough to mainstream because freshness is very important for the style.

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