Sierra Nevada - Summerfest 2014

Hail yes. Summer seasonals are my favorite. This one is top notch every year.

 

Everyone knows last year's was better.

 

You have obviously some kind of outdated idea about what IPA means or IPL or any India whatever. Nowadays it means anything with even any amount of hops and what the marketing gurus of any brewery says it is. IPA whatever sells, IBUs' fergitaboutit

 

Just saw some Bigfoot today at a store near me...it was in the seasonal section.

 

To me (also living where it's predicted to snow at the end of this week) it's not as easy as that. I'd gladly wait for the warmer weather to buy SN Summer, just as I'd gladly wait until the middle of September to buy Capital Oktoberfest -- but when they come out so far askew of the season (and no matter what the thermometer says, it's still spring in Texas), by the time it is the right season the shelves are empty!

The marketing arms of the breweries have taken control.

I was gonna bring that up too: ISO Aussie Summer Beer.

 

Why would you even think this? Summerfest is a pils through and through, not an IPL.

 

Believe me, you can watch the sales of summer beers die come August 1st. Happens every year, even when it's 105F in Chico.

 

I've written about this on BA in the past.
"Seasonals" by-and-large are sort of a misnomer. Today, they are more a quarterly release than it is a true seasonal beer. This has more to do with the selling window than it does with Marketing of anything. Much of this has to do with getting the beer to market. Stores (specifically in the grocery channel) have "resets" where they determine what the rotating products in the beer cooler will be for that season will be. If you don't have your beer ready for placement by the time those resets go up, you don't get that beer in the section. This is a very bad thing.

Also, I understand that this is irksome to many (and to me too, to be perfectly honest) but the fact is, tfs8271 above is right. You see a meteoric plunge in seasonal sales past a certain date. An Oktoberfest on November 1 sinks like a stone. A Christmas themed beer on New Years Day seems like it's ages old. There is a shift with consumers too... People drink ahead of the season. Sad but true.

-B

 

Then why is "Summer" right on the label?

But isn't this also something jump-started by the marketing department(s)?

Don't you think that's a result of the "seasonal" beers showing up "out of season?" The rush to get something new? I say that because I see it around here all the time -- Gotta get that new one before anyone else! I think it's a vicious circle that feeds on itself. Not to mention all of the breweries (or their marketing teams) trying to one-up each other.

I can remember the days when Oktoberfests came out in September and Maibocks came out in April or May. Now I see Maibocks in February -- WTH? People may "drink ahead of the season" these days, but I have to feel it's a result of what's been slowly evolving with competition.

 

Long live Tumbler! So bummed when I found out that was on the way out.

 

I happily anticipate the arrival of this year's Sierra Nevada Secondquarterfest.

 

The marketing departments don't see the beer the distributers do. Really it's more an issue with distributors and the buyers (grocery/liquor stores, bottle shops) then it is with the berweries. They only do that because of sales. Looking at it that way it's really the consumers who are to blame since they sell when people will buy.

 

They could call Summerfest an India Pale Pilsner IPP.
Whenever I drink Summerfest I start to wish Sierra Nevada brewed more lagers.

 

When I made marketing department(s) plural above I was trying to encompass them all in my vicious circle; breweries, chain stores, et al. But the breweries still have to brew the beers and make them available to the distros and on down.

Sure the consumers will buy them -- they're buying the hype.

 

This is from an article about seasonal beers being released early.
In it there is a quote from Geirger Powell of Cigar City on Facebook.
"one of the main reasons is since these beers are treated like such a season staple, that when that season ends, people stop buying the beer. however they have proven they will still buy the beer *before* the season starts. in other words, why risk having bottles sitting on the shelves after Thanksgiving (when people immediately stop buying fall beers) or Christmas (when people immediately stop buying Christmas beers) when people will buy them long before the season ends? it's pretty cut and dry."

A few other artciles touch on the same theme as sierranevadabill has. It just makes buisness sense to do so. It's not the hype (and really very little of seasonal craft beers sold have any hype or marketing what so ever), it's just people's buying habbits. Sadly that means it probably wont change.

So what good reason is there to only release beer when the season starts?

 

But my point is that it wasn't always this way, and it wasn't the consumer who clamored to have their Oktoberfest beer in July (well, at least until the modern beer geek started wanting their cake and eating it too, "Why do we need seasonals? I want my beer now! Or I'll whine on BA").

Other than greed? How about better planning and production -- I know, easy for me not being in a "manufacturing" business, but I have been involved with advertising and marketing for over 30 years -- I've seen that mind in action.

So what good reason is there to only release beer when the season starts? How about the idea that it's a seasonal? Honestly, if it's not going to follow the season it's named for, let's bow to the modern beer geek and drop the idea all together.

 

It is 90 in late March/early April, actually.

 

26° where I'm at right now, with a winter weather warning in effect for tonight. Lightweight.

 

I am from Washington, Ill originally and would take the 26 degrees anyday over 90, sir.

 

But it's a dry heat, right?