Let’s talk economics. Specifically, supply & demand. And lets start with the supply side before trickling down to demand. I fear (from comments on blogs) that craft beer consumers and bloggers tend to think that this is an easily solved problem. If only there was more of Beer A brewed, then an equilibrium will be reached. And the craziness that surrounds some of these special release beers would diminish.
But supply cannot be magically increased to demand. There are no Keebler beer elves. It requires capital expenditures for mash tuns and ingredients and more brewing space. And it also requires more time. Either from the brewer already there or from new employees. Or you could stop brewing the other beers in the line-up and just pump out gallon after gallon of the famous beer. Option 1 is a hard business choice to make and Option 2 is, in my opinion, incredibly stupid because our whole craft beer revolution is based on choice from a wide selection. And both options will probably make the beer snobs feel that the beer isn’t special anymore because it now comes from a “large” (read:evil) brewery and it is now being drunk by the masses which lowers the “cool” factor.
And I am not even going to go into the issue of whether or not a brewery is looking for that special release exposure and wouldn’t make more if they could because again I do not dare care to stifle the creative impulse because that is what got us into this fine (and delicious) mess.
But since supply is perpetually intertwined with demand, is there a way to dim the fervor and acquisitional frenzy without damaging the brand name? I think that would be even harder to accomplish then brewing around the clock. You can’t tell someone not to want to have Special Beer B or C. They are great beers and beer lovers everywhere should be free to be fans of whatever beers they want to be. (Short of buying illegally on E-Bay. Justify it all you want, it is doubly illegal)
So really, the only solution that I see and I am hopeful that it can happen, is to have more and more breweries, brewing more and more beers. So that people in any city will be so awash in craft beer that the special releases will have cachet but there will be so many choices that if you miss one this week, the next week(s) will bring another fantastic beer. Maybe we can get to a point where there are hundreds of uber-special, BeerAdvocate praised, Beer snob desired beers.
Or we could all not get so worked up over one beer when there are SO MANY to drink.
