Looks like the takeover of RateBeer is now complete. SABInBev now fully owns the rating website. Technically ZX Ventures owns them but co-founder Joe Tucker is not in charge any more. Tucker is now in a “community” ambassador role.
And while it may be true that users are up overall, how those new users came to join is probably more due to advertising budget from the parent company.
Which is fine. Spin this as a positive or “road bump” or write them off completely for making this deal. Either way, beer ratings sourced from the masses are never going to be the same force that they were in the early days. I don’t know of people that use the site (or their new-ish app) when making buying decisions. I certainly don’t. I don’t expect people to make those type of choices based on my reviews.
I haven’t used the site since the partial sale because that is the line that I have drawn in the sand but from what I remember, it didn’t have the fun, game aspect that Untappd has unless their app is completely changed.
I believe that at some point, if RateBeer doesn’t make money or doesn’t draw a minimum amount of eyeballs to the site that it will be slowly shut down. Remember the “Beer Necessities”? The ratings may get shunted into another website (possibly October or a new version).
It has been offered up that the data was the draw for the deal but what is ABInBev gonna do with data on thousands of beers that they won’t make themselves? Perhaps the High End might use the information? But I would guess that the breweries themselves already know most of the trending information already. My RateBeer data is now way out of date and probably of little use at all, I know that.
I think this full sale marks a time where we can look forward and dream of what may be the next big thing. Is there a game-changing new app on the horizon?
