Please do not buy our beers on eBay

It's not legal for Freetail to sell their bottles anywhere outside of Freetail. I believe it's also illegal for alcohol to be shipped in Texas by anyone but a licensed distributor (With a few exceptions of wine I think).

 

I wouldn't buy or sell on ebay. I don't look down on those who would. Until ebay cracks down on it there will be no stopping it. Banning people won't deter someone who really wants to sell Freetail beer online. And if you really want Freetail brews, I have hooked up more than a few Texans who missed out. ($4$ for beer I didn't get in Podunk Ass Corpus)

 

Thank you for this, xpimpx. BA has a huge problem of people jumping on the bandwagon; whether it is people over hyping a beer, out of towners crashing local releases, people at Central Market buying every last bottle of Abyss they can get, and especially mob mentality crucifixions. No one know who this seller is, maybe they are a great BA in a bad spot and has to sell some beer.

 

Not trying to argue with you at all, I understand being desperate or that just being in a really bad spot really sucks. I have been broke as hell the past few months.
My question is how would you feel or react if you were Scott? Would it be all cool since I already made my money or would there be a personal pride issue that this is my beer to sell, not yours? The seller could be the best BA out there but it's Freetail's name on the bottle.
Would love to hear some thoughts.
Cheers!
John

 

What about someone who picks up some extra bottles to sell to friends in other cities for no profit but only to provide your tasty beers to someone who doesn't go through San Antonio ever. Any problems with that?

 

I mean I know for a fact that there are some places that can't trade for the really good beers. I went to little rock to visit family and visited the store everyone listed as the best selection in that state. Literally could count the actual craft beers on both hands, and the only local was a horrible IPA, decent Two Term DIPA and an average Paradise Porter. Those guys have no chance at all.

 

its a never ending debate as long as Ebay sells beer. I just bought a 09 and 11 Dark Lord to complete a mini vertical which I will offer for a vertical tasting soon in this very forum in Austin to share with other folks, am I a dick cheese perhaps but not for buying these beers to share. Anyone have an 06? I think its the guys that go to brewery release only purchases that only go to sell the beers on Ebay that is the problem. I think there will always be an underground way to buy beers, is right or wrong, depends on your position. I see the brewers point, scumbag is trying to make $40 off my shit, very true.

 

I wouldn't do it for beer, but there was a time where I paid 6 people to stand in line for Xbox and 8 people for Playstation. I sold those for almost a grand each and I was standing right there in line with them, just realized I am no better, just more of an alcoholic (would never sell beer that I could drink, only trade it for more)

 

I am guessing Freetail already SOLD said bottle to begin with ...Correct ?
That said if some one else wants to try said beer and cant get to Ol San Antone and THAT person wants to SHELL out 40 dollars plus shipping for the beer .
Well then that to me is the AMERICAN way law of supply and demand. Why be hardheaded about it ?
Respect the fact that others appreciate your product and will do what it takes to try it !!
Rant over....

 

It was very kind of you to pull it off ebay though. Thanks for taking the high road on that one. ;-)

 

I might agree with you... if it was legal for Freetail to sell their beer anywhere they pleased. Since it's not, I have to side with Freetail on this one.

 

Hey, John.

My knee jerk thought to this was to say, "Hey, Scott made his money. This is the reality of the situation." I had to rethink this because UTCengOwl makes a great point in noting that Scott cannot sell his beer online for $50 a piece. I guess I'm a bit torn on the subject in general. The only part of my previous statement I can really stand by is my extreme dislike of the "BA Bandwagon." I really really dislike it. For instance, a few months ago someone on Reddit made a post, "I can get beer XXXX, before all the other vultures can get their hands on it. What do you want to trade me for it?" This really burned me. A pre-trade on a beer that is local and many local beer lovers won't get it because of BA hype. What I saw emerge in this thread was a similarly rooted unthought out blind hatred of this eBay seller. What was nice to see is an honest discussion. Its been months since I've browsed the forms because of this, and I'm really pleased I did today.

I don't personally know Scott. I've been to Freetail a number of times and really enjoyed my experience there. He hires great people, makes great beer and treats the regular customer and BA'er very well. I've even enjoyed his comments on trademarked names. I also agree that eBay reselling is tarnishing craft beer a bit. In the same breath, I'm not certain this post was constructive in its onset, since it was tinged with vitriol and pseudo vigilantism, and especially since it was posted on BA; a place known for mob mentality.

I guess I didn't directly answer your question, and the reason is I'm not totally sure of where my opinion rests.

 

The only reason it's not is because of TABC, and I think that is a bigger problem than an individual on ebay.
With relaxed TABC laws Freetail could actually distribute their beers in Texas, and possibly one day sell them online!

This reminds me a lot of the "drug war"... Over bearing laws leading to individuals making insane profits on an "illegal" product. The demand drives the supply.

 

As i stated before. I am torn between both sides of this argument. I sold an allotment of partridge, two turtle doves and three french hens back last year. I paid $10 a bottle upon release and held on to them for a few years. well at least the partridge i did. they went for a pretty penny6 on ebay. THe demand was their and the need for money was there at the time. being laid off and what not. I did not buy these beers purposely to make a profit. the circumstances just fell right. It's the jackholes that go to these hyped beer releases just to buy beer to sell online. there is really not a way to stop this. as mentioned above a beer will find it's way whether legal or not in to peoples hands. this is why prohibition didnt work.

 

The selling of alcohol on Ebay for the purpose of consumtion is illegal in any State. That is the same everywhere, and not just something big bad TABC does. Alcohol and oil are the two most regulated products in the Country. Without sales taxes, licenses/permits it should not be sold for that purpose. Ebay can get around that by calling it a collectable bottle, but we all know that is BS.

 

I'm definitely ambivalent about eBay sales. While I think they're of dubious legality, I've never actually seen any comment from an actual lawyer saying that they're actually illegal. And even if they were, people break stupid/inconvenient laws all the time. I think the role eBay plays in the worsening of the trading market is hugely overstated by a number of people.

That said, I think that people should respect brewers' wishes. At the same time, I think that all the brewers who complain while doing nothing are doing more harm than good (by publicizing the fact that you can do this without actually providing a disincentive). I really hope Freetail follows up with this and actually brings the force of the law down on whoever did it, because if they just let it die then they become one more in a long line of brewers whose response to eBay is all sound and fury.

For the life of me I don't understand why no one organizes a group dedicated to eradicating this. Sure, some small brewery along can't pay a lawyer to bother state and federal and eBay officials, but 500 of them pooling resources sure as hell can. Is it just a herding cats problem? Still seems solvable.

Anyway, I'm getting a little bit tired of brewers complaining about eBay while not doing anything (or punishing the 99% of customers who don't do anything wrong along with the bad apples), so seeing one who's actually DOING SOMETHING is really nice.

 

I'm afraid you'll only see more and more of your beers end up on eBay. If you haven't looked at the trade forum lately or ever then let me tell you, its a shit storm. You say Ananke is still available on your shelves yet the one or two offers I've seen and asked about have gone nowhere after I say I'm not giving up my Kate the Great for it. Trading is becoming a huge pain in the ass so realistically, if I really wanted a bottle of your beer without giving up more than a fair exchange I'm stuck with trying to buy it on eBay or flying out there to buy it which is way more expensive than eBay. I'm not for eBay or against it and I don't sell beer on eBay but I just don't see your request as feasible especially if your beers keep getting more and more attention. For curiosities sake I've tried to see what it takes to trade for a beer to several people from the trading forum and then what it costs on eBay. More often than not, its cheaper to buy it on eBay with shipping included than give up the beers the other guys want from me without factoring shipping and assuming I got all of it MSRP.

I understand why you guys loathe seeing your beer on eBay but trying to stop it from happening is useless unless by trying, it means all craft breweries actually band together and get the authorities to crack down on it or switch to market pricing based on studies instead of cost plus pricing. Anything besides that including what you're doing probably won't do anything. I know it sucks but with your growing popularity you should get used to it because if you continue to produce awesome beer, you will have the same problem the other brewers do. Now its only one person and you may catch him and ban him from your beers but when you get to the point that you have 50 people doing it you're not gonna catch everyone even if you try. HF is still tiny and the brewer loathes seeing his beer on eBay but that still doesn't stop it from popping up there.

This isn't directed just at you, but every brewer out there...with your increasing level of success comes increasing levels of profiteers and unless you all actually get serious about doing something about it, aka switching to market prices based on studies, you're just gonna have to find a way for your head to not explode when your hyped beers show up on eBay and people buy them.

 

Thanks for your honest level headed thoughts.

 

until Ebay wakes up, all this is moot...

 

Its like downloading MP3's back in the day. New sites would pop up then when threatened then pop up again with a new name. Then when laws are enacted after years of legal battles there would be a profit share with the artist, aka brewers for the sale of their property. In fact this gave me an idea.