Do you mind when breweries refuse to grow or expand?

I hear people complain constantly about Kern River not expanding. What people dont realize, is that by expanding they are going directly against their business model. They are a small mountain brewery with brewers who are brewing because they LOVE to. The locals are their bread and butter. Expanding would require them to leave their current location and come out of the mountain due to water and access to sewers; they are currently on septic.
Has the thought that some breweries just like to be small ever occur to you?

 

There's a staggering amount of beer geek entitlement from the OP. Pretty much every response has been in line with what you said.

 

Personally I love that NG doesn't distribute to IL. It makes my trips up there that much more special. Also agree with every intelligent person here, breweries not expanding doesn't make them selfish. Half Acre only distributes to a small portion of NE Illinois and Hill Farmstead doesnt distribute outside their brewery. I'd be hardpressed to find someone who hates either of those breweries

 

-Nope.

-I think about what Bill Watterson said when defending his descision not to market any Calvin and Hobbes merchandise beyond the comics themselves (anything you see otherwise is bootleg). He got into to create something, not to run a company. If people are fine making whatever amount of beer they want to and don't feel the need to get tangled up in a larger business model, or feel the quality may change, and are financially stable, then so what?

 

Are there beers that I would love to have better access? Absolutely!
Am I upset that some brewers aren't extending their financial necks out to supply that beer? No.

 

It wasn't just one word that supplied the tone of this thread.

 

I agree with this. One of my favorite parts of traveling is finding good beer that I don't have access to here in Indiana.

 

I am hoping the OP kinda had a gut feeling that his thread would turn out like this. If not, I think it might have been a rash decision to post this. Everyone brought up great points about money, time, effort, markets and saturation. Some people dont want to get big "Deb" and are perfectly fine with it.

Maybe the OP should travel more or change careers to a "Brewery Consulatant" and do all the research and raise all the capital for every brewery he wants to expand. So when the "project" doesnt go as planned, its not their fault but his.

Cheers!

 

That's something lost on far too many BAs/beer geeks.

 

Absolutely, it was the OP's tone and statements along the what that crated the overall tone of the thread

 

"The craft beer movement is all about small, local brewers who have a passion for their work and do not always adhere to the capitalist notion that bigger is better."

Seems to me that craft brewers are the epitome of capitalism: finding and developing a market, starting a business from the ground up, not depending on government funding, creating their own brand on their own terms, employing local labor at decent wages, doing what they love, making a profit for themselves (OMG!) and others in their chain, etc etc

As to the OP, what has happened in the last few decades that so many people in this country think a business is "selfish" if it doesn't cater to the whims of someone with a grievance? The term "free enterprise" comes to mind. Until the government tells breweries how much they have to produce (along with all the other regulations put on breweries) seems to me the brewer is free to produce whatever amount he deems appropriate. It's still the owner's business.

 

Actually, they've decided to invest $175 million over the next 7 years.

 

Not everyone has the freedom to travel around the country/world. It's great if you do, but your post implies that some people are just choosing not to avail themselves of this opportunity.

 

I have been lucky to travel a few times. I have scrimped and saved my money to do it. I read all the time on these threads about how much people are spending on beer a month and could only wish to be able to spend half of it on beer. I'll also bring up the recent Founders release Frangelic Mountain Brown as an example. Most people are saying that this retails for around 12 bucks and I've read that many are buying 2 minimum. That's a lot of money for two bottles of a brown ale, imo. Simply put, I am implying that some people choose not to avail themselves of the opportunity by buying tons of what I consider to be over-priced bottles of beer out there.

 

Source?

 

By the same token, if Founders, Goose Island, or Firestone Walker decides they want to expand their brand, they aren't really obligated in any way to saturate their local markets, something that a lot of beer geeks seem to overlook. Just because BCBS doesn't sit around the shelves for months and months (maybe years) anymore doesn't mean their expansion is a bad thing for beer geeks.

 

Are they really choosing not to expand though? I mean have these breweries stated this as a fact?

 

mmmmmhhhh, ahhhhhhh, nothing like the smell of II IPA!

 

I couldn't agree more. People will fly into a rage when an occasionally hard-to-find local release becomes available in other states, as if a brewery has a categorical imperative to personally reach out to every single in-state BA to double-check if they've had a sufficient amount before sending it elsewhere.

 

Yeah, this is a part of beer advocacy that is often overshadowed here; and when people do travel, more often than not it seems to be for some massive beer festival or special bottle release. Personally, I think visiting a distant beer scene on any old day, drinking with locals, getting a sense of the brewing culture, and drinking whatever happens to be on tap is a far more rewarding way to go.

Of course, I understand that not everyone has the financial or scheduling freedom to beer travel. But if I had a choice between expending the same amount of money on either an entire year's worth of whale/limited release trading or taking even the most modest of beercations, I'd choose traveling any day.