Old IPAs on store shelves

I don't really care if its something i want I buy it my store still has cases of stone 17th anniversary and grab a bottle every now and then. Its not like the shit is undrinkable after the date.

 

The

Time to get a new mom.

Only kidding. It was great of her to try.

 

This guy knows what hea talking about, most of the smaller stores hang on to their unsold bottles for a while, but bevmo and total wine always have a good selection of fresh ipa's. never more than a week or two old

 

Some hold up well, but I always do wonder what they were like fresh (heaven or boozey mess?)...

 

Hell the celebration I picked up in T-Town was already 6 weeks old, brand new to the market

 

DIPAs are a minefield, even at craft beer stores, so I tend to avoid them. Nothing worse than a sugary mess of a huge malt bomb with stale hop flavor that you paid extra for.

p.s.

lemme guess, half the posts in this thread are calling OP an idiot because all those old DIPAs turned into the best barleywines ever with age. lol

 

The thing I always try to remember when I'm beer hunting, now: Bring my damn glasses, so I can find & see the damn date, if there & or discernible

 

This IS the issue. Everyone makes IPAs and some inevitably sit on shelves. I've seen old Hop Stoopid, Sculpin, Mission, Caldera, a varying host of items from various distributors. Let's just say that the necessary cooperation between brewery, wholesaler, and retailer is not always working together smoothly to prevent IPA "archiving". It's certainly not just with IPAs. Some retailers know how to dish product off in a timely fashion (these are also generally the ones that know how to buy properly to start with); there are wholesalers that just don't go for the "big" sales and manage to help retailers keep beer fresh, and there are breweries that care about freshness and help wholesalers with costs for returned goods. There are also wholesalers, retailers, and brewers that turn their eyes on aging product. It's a mixed bag and consumers just have to pay attention and be smart.

 

Welcome to the club. My arms are shorter or my eyes are worse! I keep reading glasses everywhere.

 

I try to keep a back up pair in every car, but some how they grow legs...

 

Yep. I found a missing pair in the woods today when walking the dogs. Lucky find!

 

Just found a bottle of great divide oak aged double IPA bottled in March 2011 on the shelf of a local store. Almost curious enough to shell out the $8 to see what direction it went. Never had a fresh one to compare it to though. Prob be the oldest IPA I've ever had. What do u think?

 

It happens all the time unfortunately. Just don't buy them if you know they are old.

 

How about when a brewery releases 5 month old cases of a DIPA to distribution because it was just "sitting around" and not selling at the brewery?

 

Seems like not that much demand/anticipation to begin with?

 

This brewery seems to turn out 2-3 bottled limited releases a month (met with extremely high demand) but apparently this was for some special event. I bought some there over the summer (couple months old) and it was still really good. When I saw it at a local bottle shop I assumed they did a new run of it until I got home and saw the date code. It was still drinkable but had lost a lot of the citrus hoppiness (Citra hops, I believe) over time. Seems like it would have made more sense to ship it out to distributors when it was fresher than have people buy it at retailers 5 months later and think to themselves that its an "OK" beer at best?

 

Warehouse blues. I guess it happens, but seems a shame.

 

i know. there is a grocery store in my that has the dipa's on the shlef for over a year ( look at the dust on the bottles). The only good thing about these stores is that they usally have well aged high abv beers instock. I buy all off my Ten Fidy 4 packs from the store (no one else does). I made a deal with the store manager to buy his "old" beers at a good discount.

 

Beer antiquing? Good idea!

 

Exactly! Mine were bottled on October 11th, and I picked them up last Monday. I don't think you could even pick up Celebration in Oklahoma until the Thursday before last.