Beer in the new era

new holland/night tripper imperial stout - boooooooze. this is fantastic tbh, i like bitter boozey ashy imperial stouts and this one also nails the right mouthfeel.

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, April 23, 2014 10:01 PM (10 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

a delightful byproduct of new holland distributing here is that 4-packs of this beer just showed up. best non-ba imperial stout i've had.

― call all destroyer, Sunday, March 1, 2015 8:23 PM (five years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Throwback to five or six years ago, I am visiting my parents home in Michigan while they are not home and found my dad has a bottle of 2014 Night Tripper. Well, had. It's very good!

oh man, great find. i should see if this is still around anywhere although the distribution landscape of 2015 feels like a million years ago.

Dear BitNE readers,

What is your favorite Winter Warmer?

(...or is that style too "old era"?)

Literally the only Christmasy winter beer I've ever wanted more than one of is Alpha Klaus, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't count.

Phase Three here is introducing a "winter IPA," which I guess is their take on a winter ale or "winter warmer," which I did not even know was a thing but

https://tbn.ethershaft.engineering/what-is-a-winter-ale/

man i don't even know if i could go to a store and buy a winter warmer these days

Fremont (Seattle) releases an absolute beast annually named Bourbon Abonimable (aka B-bomb) and I've had some killer vintage ones from Capt. Lawrence (Hudson Valley, NY) & Kuhnhenn (Detroit, MI) this winter.

One of my locals made a winter warmer that I reluctantly bought a 4-pack of and I'm really enjoying it. Feels like I'm going against the grain for reals lol.

i always get some of the boulevard nutcracker ale and really enjoy it, but i am not a winter warmer connoisseur.

My first was an Anchor Christmas ale maybe 20 years ago, and loved it that first time. But as I buy it nowadays, usually every year around this time, it is less and less a great thing.

Years ago a friend of mine brought an entire case of Mad Elf (Tröegs' holiday belgian-style ale that's 11-12%) to a holiday party that was going on for hours and kept wondering why no one wanted to go near the stuff.

Oof, 3 Floyds is permanently closing its Indiana taproom, though it doesn’t seem to affect their beer production.

I'm not even sure what "closed permanently" means anymore. Basically "closed until further notice," I guess, because there's nothing to stop them from reopening once the pandemic passes, right? Anyway, there are murmurings that as one might expect more was going on than just the pandemic. They recently did a massive expansion, too, didn't they? Or had planned to? Hopefully this allows them to focus entirely on the beer and build the coffers back up until they figure out the next move.

Aw, damn. I guess that explains the context for this tweet...

Not sure who needs to hear this, but when a brewery announces it is closing, and you feel it necessary to say how “their beer sucks anyways” - you, person sharing this thought with the world in this very particular moment, are the one that sucks. ✌️

— ABV Chicago (@ABVChicago) December 16, 2020

3 floyds starting to distribute to new markets isn't an amazing sign for them

FWIW I’ve noticed their stuff finally seems to be in stock locally, even Zombie Dust

xp so them spreading out is more like a desperate move?

I had Upper Hands' BA stout tonight, it was slightly basic but also really good, much better than say dragon's milk

i think entering a super-saturated new england market is a way to get a one-time bump but is not very sustainable. 3 floyds, toppling goliath, bells, founders, pipeworks, and one or two more largish brands now fight for like 1-2 fridge doors in the largest beer store near me. how's that going to go long term?

*largish midwestern brands

xp makes sense

@CAD the last few years in February we have been getting The Alchemist in distro (Heady Topper & Focal Banger).

I don't know how it works, but I get the impression sometimes it's as simple as a small brewery just taking a road trip and dropping stuff off, sort of an informal distribution. That's how I figure stuff like, say, Other Half makes it out here once in a while, or stuff like Hop Butcher here making it to other places. And these guys are, by and large, pretty small potatoes. Like, Pipeworks? How big can Pipeworks be? They do produce a lot of varieties of beer, but that's its own strategy: keep pumping out new stuff weekly lest you lose that coveted spot on the shelf.

Why not just come out with a Barf Flavored IPA?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EpdZEt2W4AUBtsS?format=jpg&name=large

lol I would actually try one of these. But yeah.

3 floyds starting to distribute to new markets isn't an amazing sign for them

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, December 16, 2020 8:04 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

really? i have been happy to have zombie dust in the nyc area

sad to read on this thread they had to close their taproom. hopefully they open one day.

i came here to post about pills mafia by thin man brewing company in buffalo. the pilsner is a humble style, but when done right there is nothing crisper. this is so much better than a pilsner urquell but it hits the same notes, without the weird aftertaste of that one.

xp it's great for you, the out of market consumer. it might not be great for them, business struggling to stay afloat.

@CAD you'd be surprised at what's starting to get national distribution these days.

lol i very much doubt it. tough times out there.

mikkeller closed down their new york city spot at citi field. i was crushed. one of my favorite summer spots

I’m still struggling to understand how Three Floyds expanding their distribution is supposed to be a sign that they are about to go under. If this was some new brewery with their reach exceeding their grasp, I’d get it. But they’ve been around long enough and pretty slow to get to this point, so I have to imagine they have a little bit of a clue what they are doing. They’ve been expanding their facilities a lot on the last five years, so I feel like this has been the goal anyway.

- noted brewery spends years selling at capacity to their midwestern market to the point where at one time their regular production beers were desirable in trades
- brewery expands, creates taproom, embarks on various other growth projects
- pandemic hits
- brewery closes taproom, lays off employees
- concurrently, brewery enters new, highly saturated markets with old-ish stock of regular production beers
- brewery enjoys cash flow from novelty purchasers who if they are anything like me bought one six-pack of zombie dust when it entered distribution and haven't really considered buying their beer since
- hmmm does this sound like a sustainable model?

They closed their brewpub, not their giant brewing facility, afaik. I mean, there were cases of 3 Floyds in Costco last time I went, I assume they are doing OK making beer, just maybe not as well making burgers and pulled pork sandwiches.

i'll check in with you guys later but the only reason in 2020 for a brewery of their size to drastically expand distribution is because it has excess stock and needs to try and move it.

i saw this exact thing play out with smuttynose who was brewing at capacity and expanding to the midwest, until they weren't, got sold, and barely survived as a brand

I suspect the same thing is going on with Toppling Goliath, which is now in California.

I posted this in the TJ's thread but is v. topical:

Toppling Goliath has been in California for a while, I mean they are even in Japan. I had a reasonably fresh Pseudo Sue can in Tokyo last autumn... for ~$10 though.

― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Sunday, December 6, 2020 12:25 AM (one month ago)

I hadn't seen them in SoCal until a couple months ago.

I tried the Pompeii IPA first, good but not superlative. Bought some Pseudo Sue after and I get the reputation, though tbh, I think there are as good beers out there.

I don't know shit about 3Floyds other than it was a name 4 years ago and now no one gives a shit. So I trust cad's take.

there were cases of 3 Floyds in Costco last time I went, I assume they are doing OK making beer,

Having stock sitting around in big box stores is a bad sign, not a good sign.

Not sitting around, recently added, afaict. I'd never seen it there before. But, like, most craft or craft-ish beer "sits around" on shelves, doesn't it? Anecdotally, the only stuff I see moving in noticeable numbers is the usual Bud/Miller/Coors stuff. However, my wife works with one of the big beer companies, and as I understand it beer sales are way down for everyone, for a variety of reasons, so I assume that's extra hard for the large craft breweries. But I have no idea.

But, like, most craft or craft-ish beer "sits around" on shelves, doesn't it?

No, not ideally. Part of cad's point is their stuff previously sold out instantly; now, not so much.

FYI, I've bought less than a case of beer in the last three years from a distributor/retail store. Everything is direct from a brewery these days.

In my very limited experience, the only 3 Floyds stuff that ever sold out instantly was Zombie Dust, or at least locally that's the only one that was ever hard(er) to find. It's only the small or very limited stuff from any brewery that seems to vanish overnight. If there's a beer that I can literally always find on the shelves, then I assume to some extent it's been sitting around, if only compared to the stuff that *doesn't* sit around. But yeah, Zombie Dust was the only one that ever flew off shelves or was tougher to get, as far as I ever noticed, which seems more an exception than the rule. Bourbon County Stout (for example) used to fly off the shelves, too, but now it sits around as well, for months, and I don't think that's a sign that Goose Island is struggling. At the same time, like I said, all beer is struggling, so sure, it's possible 3 Floyds will go under or implode, like Ballast Point did.

FFF and other "metal" beers seem passé at this point. Like I was at the store and saw their \m/WAR PIGS\m/ brand and wondered who was buying it these days.

FYI, I've bought less than a case of beer in the last three years from a distributor/retail store. Everything is direct from a brewery these days.

― Jimi Buffett (PBKR), Thursday, January 14, 2021 9:52 AM (twenty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah, this is a paradigm shift and it's bad news for a lot of the bigger craft breweries

Idk, anecdotal, obviously, but the two retail stores I hit up around me both say beer is flying off the shelves. They both do curbside pickup, delivery and a system where they list everything on the windows and do transactions from the door. Every time I've been there or walked past, there almost always is a line of 3-4 people waiting, even during weekday lunchtimes.

My local hype brewery has gone from extremely long lines at their remote brewery location (100 minute drive outside of my city) to overnight delivery plus limited distribution of cans/bottles to various specialty beer shops in my neighborhood.

Yeah, local craft delivery has been amazing. I always went at off hours and didn't sweat not getting every new hyped release, but not having to drive into NYC has been sweet.

Hill Farmstead (probably the best brewery in the USA), has expanded their delivery area to Vermont, Pennsylvania and Virginia.