Spaten Production / Availability Problems?

Wow, maybe the Germans are still celebrating the World Cup win and there is a shortage for everyone else

 

When importation of Spaten transferred over to the A-B importer Andreas started S&H Brands. I know they're still growing and expanding, but I've already seen more HB beers show up around here -- as well as Andechs. I hope they're very successful in their ventures.

 

First off, he was an importer, not a distributor, but he was in charge of Spaten USA -- which is no longer. But if you find the A-B distro in your area I'd bet they'd be the ones with Spaten.

Been looking for the corporate name of the importer, but I can't track it down. I'll look at a bottle when I get home this afternoon -- unless someone else remembers before.

 

Import Brands Alliance is AB-InBev's importer.

And here's a map/list of their USA distros: http://www.abwholesaler.com/scripts/Map.aspx

 

Please report back any information they may provide. Hate to hear Spaten is going the way of Löwenbräu in the U.S.

 

World class shelf turd.

I cant find one brewed in 2014. I bought a 12er of H-P Ofest instead.

Year old Spaten is a regular happening. Ive been burned enough that I always check date codes on Spaten.

 

Spaten has suffered through poor US distribution going back 20+ years. I once sold Spaten in the early 90s. At first, Spaten kept beer stateside, shipping to all markets. They lost interest with this model and insisted that individual wholesalers buy whole containers. The market dried up more than once. Agreeable wholesalers then shared containers regionally, managing shipping accordingly. The thing is, Spaten (every flavor) sold well here. Is A-B trying to kill this brand by intention or neglect?

 

“The brewery that invented pale lager.” Isn’t that the Pilsner Urquell brewery?

Cheers!

 

I'm going to bet that the 12 packs are only available in the fall, whereas the cases (from which the sixers are pulled) are made available year-round to those distros who want to order it... which doesn't include my area.

I finally started seeing 12 pack and six-pack Oktoberfest bottled in mid-2014 around here... just in time to run out or be pulled from shelves. To that, I also found some bottled in December of 2013 (yeah, I missed that code, but still within the 1 year shelf life usually recommended by import beers) and to tell the truth, I couldn't taste a difference from the beer bottled 7 months later.

 

No need to be sorry

 

In my area spa ten was being distributed by AB and is in the process of switching to Miller coors house. Generally when a producer changes distributors in this case apparently coast to coast. The contract exists for a certain period of time, so AB holds all the product they have left, waits for checks from the other distributor if it was a bought brand, or waits for product from a trade or both. So makes Miller coors lawyers, warehouse managers, and brand managers fill out a whole bunch of paper work and mail/send it back to their lawyers. basically trying to cannibalize the brand they won't have once the contract is completely devolved. Basically its greedy old rich people **** teasing other greedy rich people. normally its when a big brand makes a move.

I don't believe that spaten ofest is year round nation wide though I believe its up to the discretion of regional management. I know we haven't had it in 2 years, and the 20 cases we got last year were from the previous year. We haven't gotten the dunked in years just optimator original and Franz year round in my market.

 

Since Spaten is now imported by AB-InBev, I highly doubt the Miller Coors house will be involved. In fact, The Miller distro in our area had Spaten and had to relinquish distribution to the Bud distro when Import Brands Alliance took over importation. There was a big gap in availability during that time and it's just now trickling back, but it appears the Oktoberfest suffered the lag.

This is pretty much what I learned from Spaten USA before they gave up the importation to AB.

 

“I think you are confusing Pilsners and Pale Lagers.”

No, I am not. A Pilsner is very much a Pale Lager. In the Czech Republic the Czechs only specifically call a beer a Pilsner if it has been brewed in the town of Plzen so only the beers brewed by the Pilsner Urquell Brewery are called Pilsners by the Czech people. The other beers that are brewed in the Czech Republic that are the equivalent of the beer brewed by Pilsner Urquell are called Pale Lagers.

Pale Lagers that are brewed in Germany can be called a labeled a number of beer styles: Munich Helles, German Pilsner, etc.

The bottom line is that the first Pale Lager was brewed in the Czech Republic by the Pilsner Urquell brewery.

Cheers!

 

For what it's worth, when Sedlmayr started brewing more pale beers in Munich the result really was what became the Amber Märzen; a beer much lighter (paler) than the more popular Dunkel. It wasn't until the popularity of Pilsner started to grow that Sedlmayr/Spaten experimented with a much lighter colored beer to compete, which became Munich Helles.