When a keg leaves a brewery and is loaded onto a delivery truck, it cannot be pampered like it was when it was inside the building. And since craft beer is based, in large part, on being crafted and crafted well, what happens once the truck starts rumbling away from the brewery cold box is very important.
Unfortunately, the brewery is probably too small or too busy to keep track of each keg, can and bottle and can’t ensure that a keg is connected to a clean line or that product doesn’t sit on a shelf (lookin’ at you BevMo!).
Which is why I am heartened to see that that a business like Craft Quality Solutions is starting. Helmed by Neil Witte a nearly 20 year veteran of Boulevard Brewing they plan to audit and service all three tiers of the distribution.
You can read more about it on the ever excellent Good Beer Hunting and remember to tell beer sellers if they have beer on the shelf that shouldn’t be there. Enlightened customers are the best defense until more people like Witte are up and running across the country.
I think quality control in the beer supply chain is going to be very difficult to address until the asymmetrical power in the relationship between breweries and distributors in some states is addressed. I don’t know about California but, for example, in Oregon it’s difficult and expensive for a brewery to sever a relationship with a distributor.
I have had discussions lately and I think distribution needs to be as local as the beer. Los Angeles is so, fracking spread out that, contracts is less an issue (though still big) than actually selling the beer across the vast territory in a cohesive way. There is some low hanging fruit though, starting with bottle dates on ALL bottles (and cans) that will help. You are right, it is a very difficult problem with no easy solution.