4000 Breweries = Stale beer on shelves?

The stores will have to learn how to rotate stock and offer up the soon-to-be old beer on specials designed to get it out of the store. Hopefully it happens sooner rather than later, but for now these guys seem to be stuck in the old mindset of "it'll eventually sell, and at full markup."

 

BeerCraft in Rohnert Park Ca has already started to do this. They have a 22 oz on sale everyday for half price. This way older beers leave the shelves. They also dont have a huge selection so beers dont stay on the shelves too long. Nothing worse than picking up an IPA that has been sitting on a shelf over a year.

 

Well...buying it would be worse .

 

and how about drinking it?

 

Even at the small shop where I work we put stuff on sale if it's been sitting too long. It gives us a chance to get new stuff!

You'd be surprised how many breweries don't want to deal with old stock. A few come through sometimes tho.

 

I would think stores not only have to do a better job of rotating and having sale prices but also observing the data of how long it takes to sell the inventory of each brewery. They should order that beer based on those numbers similar to how a grocery store wouldn't order 1 years worth of milk expecting it to sell eventually, they would purchase it based on sales.

 

Around here there's a depressing lack of awareness. BudMillerCoors reps keep that stock rotated, but Craft brands are allowed to sit because those sales make up less than 5% of the trade and so far the customers aren't complaining.

 

I mostly buy seasonals and local beer now. I ran into the same problem at a popular store in MA. I went through option after option as I came across old beer. They're good guys at this store as far as I know too, so I don't feel they're trying to screw anyone over. I think it's just par for the course when you have a larger store these days.

I spoke with my local beer guy recently asking how he stocks beer with so many options. He said he stocks as much of the local beer as the breweries will give him (typically some of these are smaller breweries and quite popular). Then for regional beers (Troegs, Victory...etc.) he'll keep a few six packs of whatever is seasonal/popular. Of course there's way more formats and types than this (imports, bombers, 750s), but this is what we discussed in our brief conversation.

If someone asks for something specific he may buy a limited amount. Then of course you have the distributor possibly sending out old stock too...

@hudsonvalleyslim where in MA are you?

 

I feel like living in Pennsylvania with our wide selection of distribution I see this years ahead of different states that just got breweries we have had for years and then the new up an coming local ones also. I'm not exactly sure how it is will all play out but I've been saying it's at capacity for years now. I like to watch nature take it's course.

 

@AlcahueteJ hit in on the head. This is where places have to decide on how much of what to carry instead of trying to carry every single thing from everyone--i.e. an identity. I really don't care that my store runs out of a favorite--there is another I like and rarely is anything not pretty darn fresh. I find it silly to think that a shop should carry most everything they could and have it <1 month old, oh and yes from 3000 miles away on the whim that someone may want it that week maybe to not get it again for a year. That is the level that some beer geeks want and just not sustainable.

I favor the small guy anyway but the Total Wine near me is an old beer graveyard.
Seasonal and local now win for me.

 

yeh, here in Australia,
we pay through the nose for yankee imports that are 6-12 weeks old by the time we get them,
and then they often sit around fro months, often not refrigerated, there are huge big box type shop,
with palates of stale IPA sitting in the floorspace, it really is buyer beware

 

I get Other Half and Grimm IPA's at (almost) every release. I'll shoot out to Finback and Transmitter when my schedule allows. I've hit OEC, Tree House and Trillium twice in two months. The last year has seen a dramatic turn in my purchase of beer. I buy less (except when I went to Trill, TH and OEC), but I know what I'm getting when I do make a purchase.

I have three stores I used to shop at regularly within 10 blocks of me. They have Stone "drink by" from April; Maine Beer Co. from Winter 2015; Lagunitas with a layer of dust on it. It goes on. I just got tired of it.

 

If the requirement is fresh beer then this is the answer right here.

Or homebrewing.

Cheers!

 

I like seasonal stouts. Stouts age well, and seasonals are often not around long.

 

What if you stumble across a nice beer that can be aged?

 

I made the realization that a few have a while ago, at or about the time of the thread "could a brewery survive on seasonals alone?" - edit, I think this is it: Should breweries offer seasonal releases only?

But as many have mentioned, I generally go for seasonals in a big beer store. Of course, some beers can survive a little age, but generally, it's the new beer displays and seasonal section.

I also realized that what I like about my local small store is that I can go in once a week and find something new in stock, and know it's fresh. Not always are these new offerings, and I try to buy some staples to help them "pay the dues" to get some special offerings. Even then, they have some things sitting a while, also, but at least they throw some on sale.

So overall, I think it is an issue in that staples are needed for breweries to help them pay for the "special stuff." These are the things some of us overlook, at least in part due to the wide variety of offerings: good, bad, and new. Overlooking can lead to old stock. So I think I basically agree with the OP's premise, huge variety of selection does sonewhat hurt the ability for fresh beer, at least in the bigger beer stores.

 

Or travel...

 

Is it the fault of there being 4000+ breweries or is it the fact that the market isn't growing as fast enough? There's plenty of people to drink that beer before it gets stale.

 

The couple of years I have bought most of my beer from a local gas station that has a cooler with a small, well thought out, constantly rotating selection. I got tired of going to the other local, who has a much bigger selection, and having to sort through what's fresh and what's been sitting there two years.