I already have plenty, but I saw it on the shelf today so I might as well say something. The Ken's Market on Queen Anne in Seattle has at least 10 bottles or so in the refrigerated section for $20 each.
Plenty down here in Eugene as well. Price is still in the $16 range, and this being Oregon, there's no tax on your purchase.
That is strange, but frankly if you're in Bend why not just go to the pub or production facility and buy it straight from the source? When we were there last week they had a couple dozen cases stacked up in the tasting room at the main brewery. On a semi-related note, The Specialist (their new barrel-aged Imperial ESB thing) is friggin awesome. I suspect it'll be a brewery-only kind of beer, but snag a bottle or two if you see it.
I've heard that all Deschutes beer makes a trip to Portland before it hits Bend's shelves, possibly explaining why our prices are not the lowest in the land, but obviously a cheaper price in Alaska means some manipulation is going on at the distributor level too. Not a complaint, just another data point suggesting that retail pricing is sometimes counter-intuitive for the same beer across different markets. The Specialist is indeed a pub/brewery only beer; I'm pleased that the 6th largest craft brewer still does delicious small projects like that for locals.
See... much as I love Alaska, that's why Oregon is superior to the land of the midnight sun. People live her voluntarily... no one has to pay us to live here.
