Wasnt the last untappd beer festival a disaster?

[kungfoodude]

11 hours ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Peak craft beer = 500 guys who think they are brewmasters because they used their home brewing kit from Amazon to make a decent batch of the paint by numbers version of beer, an IPA.

Sounda like someone who hasn't paid much attention to the craft beer trends.

[Harbingers]

3 minutes ago, kungfoodude said:

The market is flooded with choices and that isn't a bad thing. The beer scene is extremely diverse and there is pretty much something for everyone. The mediocre breweries will get clipped, which isn't a bad thing.

The choices can be overwhelming but once you learn the breweries you kind of know who to generally trust.

Maine lunch. 

[kungfoodude]

11 hours ago, Wes21 said:

My wife used to work for a distributor and she was in charge of half of the beer tents at the local brewfest.  I would get to tag along and in exchange for taking out trash and moving a few cases as needed, I was able to slide into the back of any tent (of hers) I wanted and get a quick pour.  I remember her boss and I went to the other half of the venue to try some other vendor's beers and had to wait in line.  The entire time I'm standing there chit chatting with him thinking "OMG people stand in line for hours like this over and over again for a few ounces of beer?"  No thank Jeff.  I had a delicious IPA called "Ghost in the Machine" from Parish Brewing, and I had no intention of standing in line again for another sip. LOL

What was really cool was that any of the leftover beers that had already been unpacked were thrown into coolers and the staff got to take them home.  We would bring home 2-3 coolers full of beer each year.

DDH Ghost In The Machine sells out routinely at Parrish. People waited in line to get it for hours at the brewery until they switched to an online ticketing system.

[kungfoodude]

11 hours ago, Khyber53 said:

I used to do the write-ups for new breweries in the Triad for one of the free weeklies. And while I loved the job, it was: how do you retell the story of another 40-year old guy with a bit of extra weight on him, a goatee and a love of obscure hoppy farmhouse brews?

Hey I'm all for craftsmanship and artisan products, but it hit the saturation point pretty early on in the process. Working on a statewide guide just did me in for writing about it. It was like covering all the jam bands that popped up from 1990-1998 -- after a while you listen to people explaining the tiniest nuances of an overplayed product that you realize you aren't dealing with enthusiasts but actual dyed-in-the-wool fetishists.

(It probably didn't help that I'm allergic to hops and unable to sample the wares -- but a paying gig is a paying gig.)

 

LMAO. You wrote articles about products you couldn't even use???

[kungfoodude]

9 hours ago, raz said:

beer sales may be down, but sparkly party water sales are through the roof and if you just add corn liquor to flavored fizzy water like the big boys do its cheap as hell to produce.

and i've heard charlotte has decent beer now.  hard for me to believe.  it was sooooo late to the party

CLT is the king of NC beer at the moment. 

[kungfoodude]

6 minutes ago, Harbingers said:

Maine lunch. 

Something people used to trade EVERYTHING for which is now available in so many states. 

Try the Dinner, which is now getting the occasional drop in NC. Awesome beer.

[Khyber53]

4 minutes ago, kungfoodude said:

LMAO. You wrote articles about products you couldn't even use???

Sure, happens all the time. I wasn't reviewing the beers, just talking about the brewery, the people who were opening it, why they did it, how and what would make them stand out. 

You'd be amazed how much you can learn about beer without drinking it, just by listening intently (and soberly) to those who do and those who make it. My job was never to tell you if the beer was any good, it was just to make you think, "Hey, I might want to swing by that place one evening after work." Seemed to have done a pretty good job of it.

[therealmjl]

13 minutes ago, Harbingers said:

Maine lunch. 

Another One

Peeper

[kungfoodude]

29 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

Sure, happens all the time. I wasn't reviewing the beers, just talking about the brewery, the people who were opening it, why they did it, how and what would make them stand out. 

You'd be amazed how much you can learn about beer without drinking it, just by listening intently (and soberly) to those who do and those who make it. My job was never to tell you if the beer was any good, it was just to make you think, "Hey, I might want to swing by that place one evening after work." Seemed to have done a pretty good job of it.

Yeah, that is true. But you can't really speak to the craft of what they are doing. I have heard a few brewers talk a good game and then tasted the complete garbage they actually made. Woof.

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

I remember reading that they ran out of cups

As in the thing the beer gets poured in

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

The original UnTappd gameday thread.  It's a fun one:

 

[Wes21]

18 hours ago, Anybodyhome said:

Good number of farmers in eastern NC now growing hops instead of tobacco- more stable commodity and not prone to trade war price fluctuations. And the small breweries don't have the money to be sourcing hops all over the place. 

I remember going out to dinner with one of the executives of NOLA Brewing.  In conversation we started talking about things he never thought about until he was actually in the business of making beer on a large scale.  He said "I never knew I needed to be a commodity futures trader."  Then he talked about the need to "declare your hops position" in advance to be competitive in the marketplace.  He said that was the biggest advantage that huge macro beers have because they can obtain mass quantities of hops with discounts and have some certainty on what their sales numbers are going to be.  With a "newer" brewery that's trying to get its footing, your sales could be unpredictable.  I won't go into more detail than that, but he did.  It was a really interesting conversation, but it showed why the biggest breweries that mass produce have such an advantage, and it extends beyond cash flow and efficiency.

10 hours ago, kungfoodude said:

DDH Ghost In The Machine sells out routinely at Parrish. People waited in line to get it for hours at the brewery until they switched to an online ticketing system.

Yeah, her boss' eyes got big when he saw that little keg of GITM (it was a pony keg).  He ended up standing in line again while I went off to do something else.  It really was one of the best beers I've had, but I wasn't willing to wait another X minutes to get a few more ounces of it when I can just go get another IPA instantly from my wife's vendor tents (and pour more than just a few ounces).

17 hours ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Yeah all those old people waiting to die in Florida drive up every year to get poo faced and look at leaves.

Seriously how fuging bored do you have to be to drive 2 states away to look at LEAVES?

At least you helped give them something to drink once they get here.

Florida and some place like Asheville are going to be completely different vibes.  What else would you like for them to do?  Sit on the couch and watch CSI?  I mean, you have to spend your time doing SOMETHING, right?

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

17 hours ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Yeah all those old people waiting to die in Florida drive up every year to get poo faced and look at leaves.

Seriously how fuging bored do you have to be to drive 2 states away to look at LEAVES?

At least you helped give them something to drink once they get here.

It's not on the same scale as Asheville of course but the minute a leaf fell in Boone that town was swarmed with Florida license plates

[1of10Charnatives]

32 minutes ago, The NFL Shield At Midfield said:

It's not on the same scale as Asheville of course but the minute a leaf fell in Boone that town was swarmed with Florida license plates

Yeah I’m a 3rd generation ASU grad. When I used to bartend in Blowing Rock it was a 15 minute drive to work except in October, when it was a 30 minute drive to work because of the Floridiots.