Darkness 14' Chicago Distribution

That's exactly what they want to happen. Seriously. I have one or two stores that I'm a "regular" at because it's the only places I shop. The only places. They know it. If I need a case of wine for the holidays or a keg for the block party, that's where I'm going. They both get limited release stuff but if someone calls on the phone they will tell them they don't get any. There's probably less that 20 people that know the treasures they have hiding behind the counter. They have both told me (paraphrasing) "we think we've successfully weeded out the truck chasers". They both have also told me that these special releases are a major pain in the ass (see Vav's post above about actual cost) and it's the part of the business they hate, and the only reason they put up with it is for the sake of a select group of people that give them a lot of business. It's just a different form of a customer reward program.

And regarding begin a "regular" (SeanBond this is not directed at you) it's really not about how often you frequent a store. Unless it's a huge store, they know how much money you spend there on a regular basis. If you pop in every other week, like clockwork, you're not a regular if all you buys is a 12 of MGD. It's about the amount of business you give them. If you walked in once per month, but ordered 5 kegs every time, guess what, you're a regular. I find it funny that the people that say "if they sold me a whale maybe I'd become a regular" are often the same people that are trying to get 3 bottles from 3 different stores, and then get upset they can't get even more. Really, you're going to be "regular" at every store you chase a truck to?!?! (and, yes, I know in the case of Darkness most people are just trying to find 1 bottle)

 

The definition of a regular is like the supreme court's definition of pornography. I can't always define'em, but i know'em when I see'em.

 

Cracked mine open. Pretty disappointed. Darkness used to be pretty unique, it really did not taste like anything else. And was one of my favorite beers. Now it's a mediocre ba stout. Closest I can think of is central waters ba stout. Which is a decent beer but not for this effort and $1 an oz.

 

I know not all of that is directed towards me, but I figured I'd clarify. I can see where my phrasing made it sound like I was just "bottle chasing" at these places, but that's not the case. These are places I've bought beer from plenty of times, along with hard liquor, and in all cases they weren't "whalez."

I understand not wanting bottle chaser business, but my basic point was more along the lines of: If they make their hard-to-find beer available only to their "best" or favorite customers, I'm not inclined to go out of my way to give them patronage, because they may still arbitrarily decide I'm not a good enough customer for better treatment, and I'd rather go to a place that will act like they value my business. To me, it's an issue of integrity; as Vav said earlier in the thread, you should treat every customer like they're a good customer. I'm not asking for complete equality, but treating non-regulars like second citizens probably isn't the best route, either. (To be clear, I'm talking about places that literally lie to customers about having/getting in a beer. That's a bit much.)

 

And probably some times just as creepy. (and, no, I don't know if I mean **** or the supreme court . . .)

I get that this is whole thing drives people nuts on both sides of the equation, but a Customer Rewards Program is the best analogy I can think of. United Airlines is in the business of selling air miles, but they give them away (in varying levels) to their best customers. And the best customers can get other perks, too, like club access. It seems to me like that's all that's going on here with beer. But you don't get to tell United (or Amoco or Jewel, or . . .) "give me preferential treatment and then I'll buy more product from you". The preferential treatment is alway saved for the top customers. Sometimes it's a "club", but often times joining the club is free. ("I don't have time or money to fly 100K per year, and I shouldn't be expected to in order to get into the executive lounge." ???)

I get the frustration (I have it myself), but I just don't see anything wrong with stores only releasing stuff to specific customers. It's done in all sorts of businesses as a loyalty program, why not liquor stores?

 

I like my store option best.. Make them buy more stuff if you want the good stuff

 

I think it's fine as a loyalty program, but you need to have some sort of control over it. For example, I can only control when I go to a store, I can't control who is working there at the time. What if there are different people around every time? What if sometimes I go, sometimes my girlfriend goes, and sometimes we go together? If I owned a shop, and I worked 3 out of 6 days it was open, a guy could come in, buy beer 3 days a week, and it's possible that I'd literally never see the guy once, and the first time I did, I wouldn't consider him a "regular." Also, I was mostly complaining about when stores lie about their stock; if you tell me "no, I have no idea when I'm getting that beer in," and you got it 3 days ago, that's just shady. Telling me you sold out or whatever is much better (I'm okay with some of it being held for good customers), at least as far as I'm concerned.

I'm actually not super frustrated about this sort of situation; I'm just arguing that there should be a better way. To use your analogy, the Customer Rewards Program would actually work really well at most places, because then the system would at least know that you're a loyal customer.

I didn't mean to hijack this thread and debate this sort of thing, though; I think in general the system works pretty well, and I think it's cool that guys in the business will go out of the way for people they know. I just think it could be even better.

 

If you're a big enough buyer, you can negotiate terms with just about any vendor. Or do you think Enterprise pays MSRP for cars, Google pays list price for computer equipment, or any large company pays rack rate for hotel rooms?

Hint: Companies have employees use preferred hotels and airlines for a reason...

 

A formal rewards program where doing X (volume, dollar amount, whatever) gets you a shot at Y releases could work. Something like for every $50 you spend, you get 1 "dibs" on a limited release, or something. More popular releases cost more dibs.

Problem becomes that allocations are generally unknown until things show up, so it's hard to set dibs correctly.

This problem probably won't matter in 3-5 years anyway when everyone's chasing craft rum or cigars or whatever the next craze is going to be.

 

Yeah I know. I haven't been yet, but this place Beermiscuous in Chicago lets customers rack up points, and then bid them on stuff, which I think is an interesting idea. But yeah, I hope you're right about people moving on from beer. I don't have to chase everything, but I like what I like, and it sucks how hard it has become to get it.

 

Had regular darkness on cask at darkness day dry hopped with a couple different hops and it was effin sublime. Better than BA

 

The barrel kills the hoppiness which helped make Darkness unique in my opinion.

 

It also seems to have thined it out. Had a 13 last Sunday and it had body and felt thick. Drinking a 14 now and it feels thinner.

I miss the non barrel aged version, hope to get it on tap this year. I hope they go back to just good old regular Darkness next year.

 

That's what I love about it too. Too bad to hear that.

 

Any sightings in the southwest burbs?

 

I'm not sure most stores would risk doing that.

 

Heres a good start. Might get lucky with one of the smaller stores.

 

I seriously have no idea how people can buy that much beer in a given week where they're considered a "regular." It has to be borderline unhealthy if they're actually drinking that much. So in that sense, I guess I'm actually OK with not being a "regular."

 

By the way, what did everyone pay for this? I was shocked when I bought one at a Whole Foods and the price was only $21.99.

 

Really? I didn't care for the cask Darkness as all.