Fernseh-Pils-a-thon 2013

Just how much "craft" is a big company that deems it necessary to extend its operations onto another continent?

 

Wondering as well how this "ongoing revolution" speak will go over in the former DDR....

 

The definition of “craft” as it relates to beer has been hotly debated on the Beer Talk forum many times. If you are interested in reading those threads a simple search should get you there.

I personally do not associate the term “craft beer” with size, either the aspect of “big company” or the metric of beer volume (barrels produced per year). Stone Brewing can get as big as it wants (multiple breweries, lots of barrels per year, etc.) and I will always consider Stone to be a craft brewery.

Cheers!

 

Because "yellow fizzy beer is for wussies"?

I'll definitely be watching closely. I think the Ost part of the equation is very interesting. Wonder if Greg Koch knows how many "national befreite Zonen" there are in that part of the country? I can see their beers making a splash for sure. Not sure how things will look in the long run after the initial curiosity. We will see I suppose. I am also (more than) a bit skeptical about the "freedom of choice" selling point. When I started teaching at the University of Erfurt right after the Wall came down, we had an American instructor on staff who opened her very first lecture with "This semester, I hope to teach you about the joys of free-market economies!" Needless to say, she was met with less enthusiasm than expected....

 

As I posted previously it is my understanding that Stone's Berlin Brewery will serve the European Market. While the brewery will be located in Germany it really should be viewed from a broader perspective. Even if the German beer drinkers choose to not purchase Stone beers in large quantities this brewery could still be a HUGE success in serving the larger European beer drinking market.

Cheers!

 

Right. But in your post you said

I think the beers will initially find (potentially solid) purchase in Berlin. If they are priced the way Stone beers are here in the U.S. ($7.99 for 22 oz. of Enjoy By), I think most Germans may have a problem buying them in any considerable quantity, however. (But at those prices, maybe they don't need to to make the venture a success.) Where alcohol is generally more expensive in general anyway (Scandanavia, e.g.), I suspect they could do quite well.

Regardless, we will see. Germany is an odd market; Walmart came in a couple decades ago to try and fill a (very real) void in good customer service at grocery stores. They were basically "run out of town" after a couple of years. Among the customer complaints was that the employees actually touched your food when putting it into bags for you. Also many were put off by all the smiles and questions about "how can we help you?" Sounds crazy to Americans, but it makes complete sense to Germans.

As for the "greater freedom of choice" piece, my wife actually hates this about shopping in the U.S. Can't tell you how many times she has inadvertently come home with some sort of "lower sodium/fat" or "flavor blasted" version of a product when all she wanted was a simple yogurt/cracker. Man, does that piss her off (and guess who gets to return the items...)

 

Agree. The great thing I found about places like Prenzlauer Berg and the other "hipster" areas of Berlin was that there was cheap food and beer to be had almost everywhere. I remember grabbing a couple of Doener for EUR1.50 and heading over to a small "street pub" (building was scaffolded and there were just a few Biergarten tables and benches set up on the crumbling cobblestone sidewalk) where we got half liters of fresh, unpasteurized Urquell for EUR2.50. granted this was a number of years ago, but I find it hard to see people repeatedly opting for a 5-7EUR 12 oz. IPA...but I could be (very) wrong.

 

I guess you know already, but talking of prices, most parts of Berlin are not representative for the rest of Germany (just as Berlin is kind of alien to most of Germany anyway). The last time I was there (two years ago), I was also astounded just how cheap simple things like Döners, beers from a Kiosk, even beers in bars/pubs, other small snacks, etc. were in districts like Kreuzberg, Prenzlberg. If you are used to the prices from areas like Rhein-Main, Munich, Hamburg, Düsseldorf/Köln, then Berlin is a dream. I know it even gets better in rural areas.

@JackHorzempa I didn't mean to start a new discussion over the meaning of "craft". I've been following these since I've been here on BA. In my interpretation, Stone's move to Europe (and a couple of other American "craft beer" companies) have nothing to do with "craft" anymore. I'm sure they are producing excellent beers, just like many industrially producing breweries are able to produce great beers, but "craft" is just another definition for me.

 

Why would a German Kellnerin say "Your cheeseburger, sir."

 

Yea, that was more or less what I was trying to communicate. Closest thing I can think from the U.S. to compare would be Indian food in the LES of New York. Wondering (out loud) how Stone is going to fit in, given that this would seem to be one of its main target demographics.

 

mmm... Döner sure doesn't cost 1.5€ any more, try 4.5€. When was that, 10+ years ago? Too bad fresh, unpasteurized Urquell doesn't exist any more, either. You're memories are of the past, I'm afraid. Yes, the huge prices that Stone and other craft brewers in America is outrageous, and I agree with Matt, the price point will be tricky. But there isn't a problem with charging prices higher than Fernsehbiere. 1st case in point: look at all the beers sold online at premium prices . Are they selling like hotcakes? No, but there's the market for beer that tastes better than Einheitsplörre. Camba sells, etc.2nd case in point: Braustil in FfM. They sell a 0.3L bottle in the 3€ to 4€ range, and a 0.75L bottle of beer in the 4.5€ to 5.5€. They sell out a 500L batch in 3 weeks on average. They've gotten a lot of free media coverage for what they're doing, and people are really excited about it around here,... and the price was never a part of the coverage. Good beer, high quality costs more and that's what they tell their new customers who come in. And the ones who don't want to pay this high price are happy with Warsteiner, Becks or Oettinger. So yeah, it'll be harder to charge more, but I don't doubt for a minute they won't be successful in Germany. Did Stone make huge cash when they first started out in the 1996? Doubt it, but like back then, they'll have to educate their buying public in Germany. But they're also doing this exactly at the right time. The term Craft Beer is slowly seeping into German consciousness, and 2 years, which will be when they open, it'll be even more widely excepted.

 

According to top10berlin, most of the Top 10 are around 2,90-3EUR still.

http://www.top10berlin.de/de/cat/essen-267/doenerbuden-1331/doener-turm

There are cheaper places all around the neighborhoods I mentioned. But, as danfue mentioned, these are not representative of the city as a whole, much less the rest of Germany. Getting way off topic now, though, so...

 

Having sold anglo-saxon and "foreign" beers (Fosters, Newcastle Brown, Strongbow, Beamish, etc) in Germany for a few years, I could probably write a discourse on the topic. Maybe I already have. At least in the German market a number of factors will play a large role. Route to market, pricing, aging product on warm shelves and in warm warehouses, barriers to market in both on- and off-premise including pay-to-play and the fact that almost every pub & restaurant has already been "tied" into brewery contracts, etc will all be harder (speak: costly and time consuming) tasks than one might imagine. The UK market is again quite different because the breweries actually own the pubs, thereby dictating what goes on tap - neither the publican nor the consumer has a say in what is offered.

As some have stated, this may play out better for Stone in other European markets (Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Italy, etc.) but I question the possibility of success at least in the German market. Time will tell, it's possible that the time is "ripe" for this to happen, but most who have approached this in any similar manner have failed over time.

 

Doug,

Do you have any knowledge on how successful BrewDog is with selling beer in Europe (including Germany)? Are they doing anything different or unique with their Marketing & Sales approach? I would guess that BrewDog might be a good ‘case study’ on how Stone could potentially market and sell their beers to the overall European beer market.

Cheers!