Category: Beer Industry

my occasional rants and raves about what is going on in the industry.

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Stylin’ 2019

So the annual revision of “styles” is out from the Brewers Association and this year I have a couple of questions…

Rotbier? Breslau-Style and Dark Schoeps? Those are some really deep cuts. Maybe it is just housekeeping but I do not think that beer geeks were clamoring for obscure European wheat beers to be consolidated. And speaking of the obscure, Rotbier? Yes, that is the second time I have put a question mark on it. I cannot think of any beers available in that style to me here in SoCal. And I don’t think it is something you can readily pick-up in any beer store around the country. Is it the next new thing? Is it hazy?

The Twitter Machine will probably make hay with the Ice Lager removal for days but it and its brethren the malt liquor were really out of favor with the sometimes pop-up of ironic releases. I would be more concerned that there were not MORE consolidations and removals.

What will the effect be on the GABF awards? Minimal. I don’t see a rush to enter into those (4) new styles since the hazy strong will probably steal entries from the other two hazy categories, Gueuze might grow in later years but has too few current practitioners in the US. IPL’s like regular lagers are the Houston Rockets of the beer world, threatening to take over but then don’t and complains about it afterwards.

Now where is my DDH Rotbier?

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Money, money

Money.  You need it to grow and to pay off how big you have grown.  Two California beer brands have taken different paths in many different ways and have done so again when it comes to raising cash in 2019.

Cerveceria Calidad who I have interviewed in the past have one beer, they contract brew and they are in the starting phase of getting their beer out into distribution.  They have gone the investor route.  Bringing in 20+ new people from former Dodgers to restaurant founders to an internet underwear CEO to bring in money to increase production and fund more sales and marketing.

On the other side is San Diego’s (Anaheim, Portland and LA’s) Modern Times which has turned to crowdfunding to raise more than $1 million.  Expansion to multiple locations probably being one reason for looking to the internet and fans for funding.  The money received would be earmarked for operations, “minor efficiency projects” and equipment purchases.

I am on record as saying that crowdfunding has lust the luster.  It was fun in the beginning to get a shirt or pint glass for a small donation but then I heard that some of the funding was done as a form of advertising (as well as operational money).  And as a growing niche, craft beer needed to get moving by all sorts of financial means.  But craft beer is grown up now, it is not easy but raising the cash for your brewery can be done via the traditional route of banks, or financial partners (silent or loud). 

Finding an equity partner for a secondary, tertiary round of funding may not have the ESOP cache for Modern Times but it would have brought much less scrutiny from the internet for sure.

Calidad has always been a puzzle to me.  It seems to be a piece of a beverage company profile but it seems built for the Fyre / Coachella influencer set as opposed to beer geeks.  Personally, I think the beer is good enough to be set in front of beer geeks but now more marketing seems to be where the money is going even though for a well branded beer, a tap room or bar would seem the play to make.  Putting them next to the Alfred coffee shops might be one idea.

How this money gathering plays out is part of the fascinating economic portrait being drawn.

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For the Price of 1

It seems like once a year, I advocate for a shared taproom.  Kind of like a food hall but with beer.  Now comes news from Chicago about a 3-Way agreement that is new to their city.

One brewery, with two co-tenants.  They each get 10 taps and can stay as big or as small as they need to, to make their economics work.  I can think of a newly free space in DTLA that would be perfect for a situation like this (minus the self-pour, still not sold on that). 

Call it an incubator or co-working space or contract but the point being that this can (if the breweries involved communicate well) be a great way to lower the entry cost and maximize the marketing.  In big cities where rent is high it can really work.  And if the barrier to leave is at a reasonable spot, it allows for new blood to be added on a rotating basis.

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Let’s Do the 2018 Numbers

Let’s break this into (2) parts….

The two numbers that most people are going to obsess over are the big 4% and the 7% (Slightly more hidden) but since Bart Watson and the Brewers Association put a number at the top of the graphic, I wanted to focus on the .1 2016 to 2017 was .5% share of the market and 2017 to 2018 was .6% If you are looking for a silver lining then that is the big one. In a down market for beer overall, craft is still picking up share of mind.

The number that I find most important are the opens vs closes in this section of the graphic. We need to follow this number and see when column A dips below 1K and when Column B goes up and over the 500 mark. I won’t guess at what is the perfect number of breweries for the US but if pressed, I would say around 7K seems good with some churn still going on.

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Seek the Seal, Simply

Don’t know if I missed this or it is new but the above handy Google-esque tool can be just the thing to send to your friends that don’t know who owns who. Just start typing the name and you will have an answer in seconds. Check out this tool HERE.

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2018 Fast

The Brewers Association releases their annual, Fastest Growing Breweries List.  I went down the list with us Angelenos in mind and found two breweries at the tail end of the top 50.

Frogtown Brewery which is tucked down side streets just off of Fletcher near the 5 Freeway landed at 43 and then right behind it is a Long Beach brewery, but not the one that I or you probably expected.  Dutch’s BrewHouse. 

I have visited Frogtown a couple of times and they can their blonde and IPA’s but I did not peg them for having had a big growth spurt but then again, I had not heard of most of the breweries on the list which probably speaks to the fact that the really small are enjoying the biggest gains in the current low growth time.

I guess I will need to add Dutch to my list in addition to Ambitious Ales for my next Long Beach visit and see what they are doing right.

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Buy 4 – Recycle 1

When these started to become ubiquitous….

…but hopefully, the haze sellers will also start to add themselves to the PakTech list of places where these little holders can be recycled. Maybe even have a punch card for each set that is returned so it can be re-used.

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Summit Education in Long Beach

For those who haven’t heard the exciting news, the California Craft Beer Summit will be held in Long Beach this year. The most outward facing portion of the Summit is the festival featuring breweries from all over the state but, even more fun than that, at least for me, are the seminars.

And over the weekend the schedule was released, HERE. You can get tickets for one day or both or both + festival. But if you want to take your beer journey a little deeper, this is a good start. Tickets on sale in May.

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Siri, Check Keg

I have seen some bars adopt the real-time keg levels on their beer menu boards but now a brewer (albeit a large one that rhymes with Snarlsberg) is sending out their smart beer kegs.  A tablet and (I assume an app) are all that is needed to monitor a keg.  From when a beer is poured to when it is getting near empty and probably send the data to Facebook too.

These kegs will be in Europe to start and if they catch on might be used across the network.  Maybe even by Lagunitas.

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Lotus

The hop formerly known as X06297 is now known as Lotus.  Going back into the whole Biblical begat thing, Lotus has strains of Eastern Gold which is a Japanese variety of hop along with Apollo and Cascade and some Neomexicanus as well.

Per Hopsteiner, this variety boasts “waves of orange and vanilla followed by notes of candied grape and tropical fruit aromas.”  I have not seen the hop promoted in any beers around Los Angeles but if I do, I will take a note and follow up on the blog.  The fact that this hop got this far is an accomplishment, it remains to be seen if it will take off in the marketplace of IPAs.