Tag: Opinion

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The Firkin for August 2018


Why are some beer topics such lightning rods? And why do these topics create groans of “Here we go again” from some social media commenters. My feeling is that because these topics are never really satisfactorily resolved is part of the problem and they are not being resolved because an actual discourse is never started.

Take kids at taprooms for instance. Stop your moaning first of all. I forget where I read it, but the one good comment that I saw explained that no one has gone into depth about it. The first thing you usually read or hear is “As long as they are well-behaved, then I am fine.” It shuts down any further talking points really, other than, shut up kid haters or shut up your kids.

We need to talk about the finer points. About parents who have higher tolerance levels for noise and don’t move fast enough to quiet their children. About people who expect kids to not be kids and to behave better than adults. About not going to a kid populated tap room if you are not in the mood. About not kidding yourself that having a child’s birthday party at a brewery isn’t solely for the parents and not for your precious precocious four-year old future president. Sorry. My I don’t like being around kids is showing.

The same with beer styles. There is very little actual reasons why someone hates a style. There is a lot of “back in my day” or that is “against the rules” but how about talking about the brewing reasons why you refuse to drink a milkshake IPA or a glitter beer or label a beer style a fad. There is just a knee-jerk reaction to an ingredient.

What happened to being excited about a new style, trying a few and determining whether you like it or not. I have tasted a few Brut IPA’s. One was really good but the rest just taste like super dry pilsners and I want to have a “wet” beer afterward to re-set my palate. So right now, I am not a fan. But if I see one that other people are raving about, I just might try it myself.

Here is what I would like to see: don’t wave off discussion as been there, done that. Ask for actual opinions and reasons why. If none is given, well, then that person has waived their right to complain until they can provide debate points. Maybe a golden nugget of wisdom will be found this way by forcing people to think about what is behind their tweets or posts.

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The Firkin for April 2018


This post is brought to you by my wife. I was back home talking about that nights beer event and she wondered aloud as to why there was a lack of creativity with beer swag.

She has a point. Glassware is cool but eventually you need a storage unit for all the branded goblets and taster glasses. And not a small one either.

Bottle openers are cool and they do break but, again it is such an inside the box gift as are can koozies.

Here are some ideas for breweries to steal from me (and her):

Socks – My wife likes socks. Comfy socks. A lot. This would differentiate your brand from the t-shirt pack.

Posters – NBA teams like my team, Portland, have gameday posters for select home games. Why not create posters that celebrate that summer beer release? Or is a blown-up version of that hazy IPA can label?

Brewer Bobblehead – Who wouldn’t want a Matt Brynildson bobblehead? This would be a great way to “memorialize” your creative brewmaster.

Balloons – Put your logo on a balloon. Who doesn’t smile when seeing a balloon.

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The Firkin for December 2017


Instead of ranting or bloviating about a topic that has me ticked off or riled up, I would like to offer up some suggestions for getting the most out of beer in 2018.

And this isn’t some, get the proper glassware tutorial or beer thesaurus for using to describe your beers on Untappd or any of the hundred not so useful beer gadgets that pop up.

Just enjoy your beer. Seems simple, but it can be hard. It starts with when you choose a beer. Don’t feel like you have to chase a style trend if what you want to drink at that moment is just a Vienna lager (that wasn’t dry-hopped). Drink what you feel like drinking. Just the other day, I saw a pilsner on draft and thought that I should order it since they tend to get overlooked. It was also from a brewery that I hadn’t tried. Both seemingly good reasons but they ignored what I was actually in the mood for. It’s the holidays and the name of a new beer from Figueroa Mountain was Feliz Navi-Dank. Stupid hop pun the Christmas edition. So I ordered that because that is what struck me.

I am not advocating that you base all your decisions on beer names obviously and having new beers and breweries is important but beer drinking is not some chore, not a box to tick as completed. I will visit that other brewery when the time is right and I will have plenty of pilsners when the L.A. weather turns back to 80 and 90, probably in February.

Now that you have beer in hand, don’t sweat the other stuff. You can put your beer into a glass that maximizes the aroma but if you are just home from work and tired, you don’t have to. You don’t have to mentally review each and every beer. You can finish a beer and not remember each and every little aspect of it aside from good or bad. You can also pour out a beer if it is bad or let your friends finish it. Stay engaged and stay a beer geek but don’t lecture people over their choices. You can tell that friend who drinks Bud that it’s corn pop water but add that it’s his life and that it leaves more good beer for you.

Despite all of the horrible stuff in the world, #independent beer is an oasis of choice. There is no right answer and don’t let protocols stand in the way of just enjoying a great beer.

Thanks for reading and have an excellent 2018!!

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The Firkin for August 2017


This country seems to be taking a page from the Flaming Cheeto in the Oval Office when it comes to being defensive. And the world of beer is not immune to getting defensive and then becoming offensive quickly thereafter.

The most recent kerfuffle involves the Georgia brewery, Scofflaw which posted about their own consistency issues and then seemed to get angry when people posted that, yes, they thought the brewery was inconsistent. You can read a good blow by blow HERE.

It illustrates a certain posture that I find a bit distressing. It seems to say that any feedback will lead to a snowball fight. One pull quote from the piece says it all:

They might as well be saying “If you’re not going to compliment us, then we don’t want to hear anything you have to say.”

It can be easy in this day of instant trolling to hunker down and then lash out but, I believe, the better tactic is to kill with kindness and humor and honesty.

Trolls and haters breathe in defensiveness like oxygen. It shows that a bruise has been pushed. If a brewery gets a comment or even un-constructive criticism, the best thing to do is to accept it and then explain your position and then leave it alone.

In the case of Scofflaw, (unless this was an elaborate marketing gimmick) would be to explain their malt and hop supply, explain that their beers are being constantly tweaked in an attempt to improve them and that, in the end, their mission isn’t to be 100% consistent but rather, 100% interesting. (Or something funnier)

We all need to (including myself) not let criticism bring us low. Grow a bit more Teflon. I hate to say this, but be more like SCROTUS, don’t let comments stop you from being who you are.

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The Firkin for July 2017


Beer people may be thinking forward to the next beer style that will take the taps by storm but what about the next tap room activity.

For years, it seemed that breweries would toss a few games out and leave it at that. But then every other brewery seemed to have food truck schedules, bike rides were popular for a time as well. To get rid of the calories ingested from the food trucks.

Over the last year, yoga seems to be the rage that has not faded. Something to draw people in at non-peak hours. Now it seems that painting classes have become the “next” though I am seeing comedy nights multiplying as well, especially in Los Angeles where there is a surfeit of talent with a lack of performance opportunities.

But, as with food trucks, everybody seems to be following suit. The next breakthrough in drawing people to tap rooms will need to be something that can’t be that easily replicated.

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Beating a Dead ….

America is great at a great number of things they should not be. Putting things (and people into boxes), memes, reality shows. [Insert your own list here.]

But we, with the help of social media, have truly mastered the art of the backlash and the reverse backlash. Nowhere is that on display more than when SABInBev makes either a purchase or dunderheaded marketing miscue.

It doesn’t take Karnack the Great to guess what will transpire:

1. Announcement of Sale
2. Cut and paste, “We are not going to change” defense from brewery / blog or business.
3. Heat of 1,000 suns hatred from all corners.
4. But we’re still craft comeback from the purchased.
5. The “No you aren’t” response
6. A rational look at the problem (hopefully, this is where I am)

This is where the reverse backlash starts. Bloggers and social media types attack the people who are attacking SABInBev for bringing an Us or Them mentality to the table.

Which is true. The spectrum has been lost. The color grey is no longer in the Crayola box. The Pros and Cons of Heineken buying a craft brewery vs. MillerCoors cannot even be discussed. Certainly not on Twitter or Facebook. And I am not the only one who thinks that is a loss. Read THIS.

Instead of adopting a political stance, how about listening first and processing the information and then, the next day, responding. How about explaining where you stand instead of just asking for people to be “nice” and not talk about it. Or worse deciding that you are right and that anyone who disagrees is wrong.

Let’s discuss the topic. I’ll start. I prefer local and #independent beer. I am concerned when a company not in the beer or alcoholic beverages sector buys a majority stake in a brewery but a minority stake doesn’t trouble me as much. Big doesn’t mean bad to me and small doesn’t equate with great. I firmly believe that SABInBev would like craft beer to disappear from the face of the earth but cannot fathom the whole concept of a small brewery and thus cannot combat it. I believe there is so much good craft beer out there that you can boycott a brewery based on your personal code and not the quality of the beer and not have either the quantity or quality of beer consumed fall.

The goal should be to IMprove not just prove that you are right.

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The Firkin for February 2017


This month I want to rant about something that will certainly not go viral. Something so mundane that it can be an afterthought as a taproom is designed. The menu board.

It can be fully computerized, it can be hand chalked by an employee, it can be a sheet of paper but I have some requests to make life easier for your customers as they walk into your establishment.

After a trip to the new Ballast Point in Long Beach where I needed the beer menu explained to me as I tried to order a beer that was only available at one of the three bars on the premises, I was prompted to write my needs down.

1. Make it readable. I have seen crazy fonts. I have seen small fonts. A computer monitor that is far away from where you order. Boards that reflect sunlight. Boards that just say: cask or nitro. Signs with no prices. If customers are mispronouncing the beer name or worse, not even ordering it, then you may have created a problem for yourself.

2. Have paper menu’s at tables and the bar and at the entrance in addition to whatever artistic way you advertise the beers behind the bar. That way you don’t create a line with people squinting and not able to see what is on offer. It doesn’t hurt to have an updated beer list online too so people can make decisions before they even head to your location.

3. Don’t assume that people know the terminology. On Deck means squat all to someone new to craft beer. You can have a coming soon section but keep it separate so people don’t assume that they it is something that can be ordered.

Basically, your sign for each beer should have these basics: Beer Name, style, ABV and price. I love it when some descriptors are also there. Like oaky, piney, tart. But that isn’t really needed and is probably better told by the staff who can describe each beer with more gusto and heart. The key is to get the beer into the hands of the people.

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The Firkin for July 2016

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Who should lead the Smithsonian’s Craft Beer History Department? Most of the buzzfeedy posts about this job are of the “bro, you should apply to this job to drink beer variety”. Easy to dismiss sorta-humor. But the real question is who?

And can the job become something more than just a historian and become a non-partial craft beer ambassador/arbitrator?

And a follow up to the follow up: Will the Smithsonian be creating a beer cellar?

OK, that last question is a bit much. Though a mega-bottle share at the Museum would be cool. But to answer my second question, I hope the position does evolve into something more. This is the point where I throw out names like possible vice-presidential picks.

Be it someone more in the mold of Ron Pattinson with a focus on the brewing history and recipes and pushing the lies away to show the actual history underneath.

Maybe an author like Tom Acitelli, who has already got book research and contacts under his belt from which to build upon to create, basically, an evolving book about craft beer.

The Cicerone group might also be a place to turn for encyclopedic beer knowledge with an emphasis on the actual practice of serving and tasting beer.

Whoever does ascend to the top job will need to be supremely organized and will need to balance craft beer to home brewers to business people and be able to create relationships so that future papers and documents and brewery history can be sent to the Smithsonian. Creating a future stream of historical papers (and e-mails, Instagrams and Twitter feeds) that will become a timeline of the industry.

But I do hope whoever the person is, can be out and about and interviewing and tasting beer and become that person that any craft beer convention needs to have as a guest speaker.

Which leads me to someone who I think might fit the bill, Julia Herz from the Brewer’s Association.

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The Firkin for May 2016

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To be upfront, I have no qualm with a brewery evolving. Styles and tastes do change in brewers as well as customers.

If an English-style mild is being outsold by an IPA, then it makes prudent business sense to make more IPA and to make the mild a specialty to drive up interest. I also understand that a Belgian-style brewery will eventually head into IPA country. I saw the crowds that were drawn in by it. Again just solid business sense.

Where I start to get queasy is when the diversity starts vanishing like Marty McFly’s siblings. As a snapshot, two weeks ago my drinking list included 4 IPA’s, 1 DIPA, a hemp ale, 2 Belgian blondes, 3 Saisons, a milk stout, an imperial wit, wine barrel aged Saison and a craft pilsner. Now that is still heavily weighted to hops but that is partially because the marketplace is heavily driven by IPA’s.

So when I see that eateries like Laurel Tavern (which I like and haven’t been to in a long time) and Forman’s (which I have not visited) and their overarching restaurant group have teamed up with MacLeod’s for a beer that is described as an “English inspired, west coast driven pale ale they named Tasty Cold Beer.” I cringe a little because I want to see a drive towards more truer English styles, more cask ales and not away from it.

Nothing against MacLeod’s or their new brewer Josiah. And maybe it is just the name of the beer and the shortened TCB moniker that rankles me. I will be tasting it before passing any final judgement. I mean, it is still Yorkshire yeast and just Mt. Hood and Crystal hops, and certainly not a West Coast hop bomb at 31 IBU’s but I guess I sorta don’t need more hoppy pales or hoppy pilsners or hoppy Belgians or hoppy ciders. The underlying styles are being dosed too liberally with hops (and then the hops with fruit, but that is another rant).

I don’t mean to sound too much like the cranky grandpa, other beer writers have that doomy & gloomy beat covered, but I guess I wish there was business room for a brewery to thrive brewing the styles that are often overlooked and under bought. Or maybe I need to lead by example and take the dive into a hopless month or a hopless week each month.

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The Firkin for April 2016

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I entitled a pair of posts this months, “Just Stop”. That continues here with other miscellaneous bothersome beer things that can I am so done with, as of yesterday.

Beer bets between cities in major sports – Whatever the local delicacy, it seems Mayors love to make bets and put out a press release about it. Maybe as a dodge or deflection from real political isues? I don’t know but somehow beer got roped in and seems a big part of the bets nowadays. I am all for themed sports beers, especially when it comes to Portland’s Trailblazers or Timbers but these bets don’t add much to craft beer.

Game of Thrones – I am sure to be in the minority here but I have grown weary of the annual themed beer from Ommegang and the inevitable variety pack that will soon follow. Last season’s beers are still a’molding on the shelf in a couple stores and Seven Kingdoms did nothing for me. Now I don’t hate them as much as Ian McShane hates the show but I have grown weary of the branding being cooler than the beer.

Not time stamping your bottles/cans – I know that I can’t trust BevMo or CostPlus to rotate out the old let alone a corner store and I would rather not have to be wary upon entering a beer shoppe so do us a favor and time stamp the shit out of any beer that even remotely would be better fresh. It is the easy way to protect your reputation and help out the consumer.

Hating a Hater – I still don’t understand why some people out in the beer interweb world get wound up when someone says they don’t like a beer or a brewery. I say, Great! More beer for me at the end of the day if it is a brewery that I like. I guess some people prefer typing out swear words instead of having a beer. Not to mention that the chance that the person is trolling the fans is probably close to 90% means that you are basically wasting your time.

Rebranding – Full Sail, Fort Collins, AleSmith, Bell’s and a bevy of others have been re-branding lately. Was there a memo telling everybody to hit the refresh button. I long for a re-brand like Stone where the recipe was freshened up as well.

It feels good to get that off of my chest.