Westbrook Mexican Cake

If he didn't want to give it away, why even post about it was my point. People love to post about their honey holes and humble brag, but forget the idea of being an advocate and sharing.

 

Seemed like the right thread??

 

Advocacy is the site's nominal goal, kinda like a Star Trek style Federation thing... In actuality, the forums have always been about hyping, bragging, thread shitting and opportunism with random (and welcome) outbreaks of civility. You are, after all, on the internet son.

 

No. When a single case of bombers comes in and 9 of the bottles go to staff, there is a problem. If they are there to sell beer, then siphoning off the most in demand beers isn't a "perk."

 

i actually would say that it is. you cant win em all. while i dont work at a bottle shop, i think that it just one of the benefits of working there. by purchasing the beer, that makes them customers as well ya know

 

Most of the folks that work at bottle shops are bigger beer geeks than I am. How bad would it suck to not be able to purchase an allocated beer from the store in which you are a dedicated employee?

 

It is if it is a perk.

 

Shelton Brothers handled that whole debacle poorly. We're all saddened by that, but the arrangement they made was technically illegal anyway, so it was no surprise that they caught heat and did what they did.

What's funny is with breweries like Westbrook, who are still somewhat new to GA, there's no outlined footprint from anyone yet. Retailers can't prove past sales volume with their products because they haven't been selling them long enough, so the allotments are based on total volume for everything that distributor carries. 99% of Westbrook products move no matter where they land, so everyone is a top seller. Obviously larger stores are going to order more beer than smaller stores and the distributor doesn't keep up with what's still sitting on the shelf, they sold it so technically it's considered gone to them even though a store may have a dozen cases still languishing somewhere in the back. That's irritating because they'll get more of X beer based on buying more of Y beer, while Y beer sits and rots away. The smaller store moves both X and Y, but they can't show that on paper. Meanwhile the new store has never sold any of Y beer, but demands they get X beer because everyone else is getting it. It's a mess no matter how you look at it.

 

No, they aren't customers. They're employees. They are there to sell beer. It has nothing to do with "winning them all." I don't buy every limited beer that comes along, and I don't get bent out of shape if I miss one. But to give a shop steady business and have the employees pick over "the good stuff" before I get a shot at it is bad practice.

 

so you really think, that working at a bottle shop shouldnt permit you the right to have first dibs on any bottle release? cant tell if serious

 

If I owned a shop, I certainly wouldn't allow my employees to have first dibs on the limited and highly sought after stuff.

If my employees bought it all up, how would I get more regular customers to come in when they know all my employees buy it up before it hits the POS system.

Obviously this would be dependent on the beers and allocation, but generally, no.. it's for the customers. If you aren't working that day, then come on in and buy one.

 

As a beer department buyer I'll say that some of the people who work with me are also some of my best customers. They absolutely deserve a shot at whatever comes around, and infinitely more so than the random guy who only comes in a few times a year to cherry pick KBS/Hopslam/Mexican Cake/whatever. He does me absolutely no good, but the coworker who buys a 6 pack or a bomber every couple of days actually contributes to our sales and helps us get allocations for those items. Not to mention that they do a lot of free marketing for us by telling their friends where they get their beer from.

I will say that I usually do put some additional restriction on limited beers for employees (either a lower bottle limit or a time limit of a day or something before they are allowed to buy it). I also make sure regardless that around 75% of whatever we get does go to customers. It's a tough balancing act to be sure, but to say that employees can't also be customers is just flat out wrong.

 

Buying it l up and having first dibs to buy a single bottle are a cherry different category. As I said before, just one of the perks of making next to nothing and working at a bottle shop. Otherwise, why the fuck is the point?

 

It's funny, this type of hype was surrounding Gose when it first came out. Now you can find mountains of it everywhere. It'll blow over.

 

Allowing employees to buy limited beer after its been on the shelf for an amount of time (say 24 hours, as you mentioned above) is very different from allowing them to grab bottles before they ever hit shelves. In that case, they are not being treated like customers - they are being given reasonable guidelines by which actual customers can be taken care of.

Getting a paycheck is the point. Not making enough? Develop yourself and get a better job. A perk of working at a bottle shop is an employee discount. It shouldn't be eating up all the stock of limited beer.

Let's put it a different way. Let's say you've been a regular at a shop for fifteen years. In that time you've supported the shop and seen them be able to pull in more and more limited beer based on the sustained patronage of people like you. You're saying that now some 21 year old shelf stocker should get priority when random cases of interesting beer come in??

 

That may be true in South Carolina, but it's sold out in the city of Atlanta. I'm sure the shops will get another large shipment, but it will sell out quickly again. It's become a lot more sought after and harder to track down compared to last fall.

 

If that 21 year old does a good job for thier employer and has a passion for craft beer, I think that person should be just as entitled, if not more, than the long term customers. They all play a roll in the succes of the shop. Just as chefkevlar stated earlier, the employees are some of the shops best customers. Most of the dedicated employees who work at bottle shops were regular customers before they started working there. I dont know of any bottle shops that have employees that arent just as passionate about beer as I am. To say that they aren't as deserving is saying that you are better than them.

 

So I stopped through Charleston yesterday and went by cbx to pick up some stuff. They recommended a nearby bar called The Griffon. So I go in there and guess what's on tap?

Guess I got lucky?

 

Definitely agree with the demand going nuts this year, it was hard to find here for the first wave. They are brewing it and shipping it out until October, I believe. That's still a lot of a Gose that should be coming your way. If you must have it now, the ATL isn't that far from Columbia or Charleston. I just did that drive the past two weekends in a row.

 

I grabbed some at Greens on Buford Thursday so it's still around.