how did your Vanilla distro compare to Backyard?

Oddly enough, I've only gotten one bottle of Vanilla, and I got three bottles of backyard. Still, as much as I'd like to trade my bottle of vanilla the tasting group won't let me, because it was decided by everyone else that even though I got the fewest bottles in the group, mine would be the one that gets opened.

 

This year was very weird. I'm probably going to go on a rant but here goes. I know for a fact that the distributors for AB met with shop owners to discuss allocation. Last year my LBS got 20 cases of BCBS and variants. it included 2-3 cases of backyard. This year they cut his allocation down to 3. He got 2 cases of regular and 1 case of vanilla. He only got the case of vanilla because he was able to plead a strong case. They told him that if he wanted more then that he would have to sign a contract guaranteeing that he has at least one AB tap handle for the entire year, or put up a GI display case. He told them to shove it. This happened at numerous places not just in Vegas.

So what happened is 3 bars around town got bottles. They were selling vanilla for $45 and $50. Because they knew it was scarce. 1 Total wine got no vanilla and 1 case of coffee/ and the other Total got 1 case of vanilla and 1 coffee. Whole foods, as far as I'm aware got no vanilla, but most got a case of each variant.

This is what some people had predicted would happen. AB basically strong arming local businesses to make up their profit margins.

 

At the end of the day, if AB really is pulling all these strings, will it even matter? How many of us are rushing out to buy 312 stuff? They can try to "reward" certain locations w/ allocations, and push them to sell more GI core brands, but the fact remains that there's a ton of demand for the Bourbon County series and little demand for the other stuff (the Belgian offerings somewhat excluded). I highly doubt attempts to reward certain retailers will actually result in higher sales. What's more likely to happen is that people will show up any time Bourbon County offerings pop up, then go back to their usual buying habits.

 

Denver got a moderate amount of Backyard. Denver got zero cases of Vanilla. Zero. None. Nada.

 

AND ZERO COFFEE. AND BARELY ANY BARLEYWINE!

So glad we have B&B Legend of Liquid Brain and Avery's Uncle Jacob's & Tweak.... screw this overhyped BCBS crap.

 

KC also bent over on Vanilla. We got nothing at all after having several cases of Backyard last year. We got blanked on coffee as well. Only a few cases of barleywine.