2016 BCBS Chicago Release (Black Friday & Beyond)

Not really sure why there is all this hate on here about Binnys Grand...

The beer area was managed by different people in 2012/2013 - so to judge the place by how a previous employe ran the department doesn't seem right to me.

As for how things are run now - its probably about as fair as it can be. As things are released during the week - you walk up and ask if something has come in... if it's available, they hand it to you. Otherwise you move on to one of the other numerous items being released that week.

The limited release items are getting sold out long before they can even be stocked... So I'm not certain there is a better way to handle these items, as it's a complete waste of their time to even attempt to put these items out on the floor.

I say many customers being handed other stuff during the second BCBS release that they didn't even ask for. One of the guys walked out w Hopbutcher and just started asking if anyone need a 4pak. Most people look at this individual w no idea if they wanted the beer - but no one complained about the Prop & Coffee that they got after standing in the nice warm store waiting for it to be delievered.

If you want to focus on the 2 prices for Rare this year - I can understabd that, but most of the complaints on here seem a lot like people taking their anger out on not having the same freedoms as other people.

There are plenty of places with lists & shady sales tactics - I just don't see it at this Binnys location...

 

Keep the crate, and just put in a bottle of regular and remove the label..stash it away, and hey in 2 years time you'll froget that it's Reg and you'll be stoked!

 

Just stopped into the Binny's I frequently stop in to. My normal beer guy wasn't working today, and I noticed an employee go in the back, and come out with a bottle of VR for somebody.

I tracked him down a little later and asked if they were getting any of the BA Prairie Noirs - then asked if they had any BC variants left after the big rush last week. He informed me that only Rare was left and anything else was gone a long time ago. So I asked if the guy who got that VR was just lucky and got the last one. He started walking away and muttered, "Yep. What's out is what I got"...then disappeared into the back.

Oh well. I'll keep searching!

 

^ no, no. you don't need to keep searching, you found him! now smother him with kindness!! hurry before more nice, chatty folks walk in!

 

I can't help, but feel most Binny's employees are dishonest...

Someday I'm just going to walk in the back and go nuts...

 

I more or less feel like they think they are Caesar, and just walk up to every customer who asks about rare bottles with their thumb sideways. Then decide if the customer's hopes and dreams live or die based on how they are feeling.

I go to that Binny's almost every day on lunch, if I go in there looking for something and my "guy" isn't there, it's basically a wasted trip to be honest

 

Completely agree. Remember going in last week hoping to see my guy at LV Binnys and he wasn't there. I knew I was doomed asking the newer beer employees.

 

I don't think that's a fair assessment, although I'm sure that some of them are, as with any other group of hugh-mahns. I think the problem is that they're dealing with an obnoxious problem (wayyyyyy too much demand for wayyyyyy too little supply) and since Binny's doesn't 100% oversee the supply, different employees deal with doling it out different ways.

Unfortunately this is true of plenty of walks of life, too; I know the feeling. You have to remember that if the store has decided to give rare bottles out to "good" customers, the employee isn't going to give them to you if they don't know you (because how can they tell if you've even been there before).

Yeah, I used to know everyone over at WLV, and then one by one they quit or were fired. Suddenly you've got a whole new set of people you have to prove your value as a customer to, and it's extremely frustrating (not to mention the place loses its "feel" if you don't know anyone there anymore). There's a place I've recently started shopping where the owner is only there in the morning, so I make sure to shop then. It's stupidly cynical to have to think "should I drop $100 on bourbon today, if the owner isn't here?" but at the same time, it's a real concern if you're trying to prove you shop there. It's kind of like tipping; you don't want the person to turn away from the tip jar when you tip, do you?

"First come, first served" isn't a great policy, but I can understand why a lot of stores have it, given the above complaints.

 

Finally...we have a Seinfeld reference

 

I do have some sympathy for the employees. They have to put up with all of us and people that are worse. No matter what they do with something like this release, people will be pissed. First come first serve is more fair, but then we'd just complain about how they lasted about 8 minutes.

 

Care to share which one...its always nice to out these people.

 

Or how I shop there a lot and I deserve to have more than some rando walking in for the first time only for beer X.

There is definitely no 'best' answer. The only thing that's for certain is if person X gets the beer they want then that method is good, and person Y is pissed. If person Y gets it, then person X is pissed and sees that method as unfair.

This whole argument over who is getting what and how is really boring.

 

Binny's should just have a machine they load all the whales into and at random intervals it just drops a random whale onto the shelf. You don't know when it will drop, you don't know how many, you don't know what kind and you don't know when it will drop again. If people want to camp out in front of the thing for weeks at a time, great. If not, then at least random passersby have a chance at something rather than truck chasing. Then the Binny's employees can respond "Yes, we have it, it is just in the random release machine. You are welcome to wait for it, but it might take up to a month to drop one out..."

 

I especially love this idea because we'd get to see who is willing to actually live at Binny's.

 

Or they could just announce that they're all going on the shelf at open on Saturday morning. It would be the closest thing to The Hunger Games that we ever see.

 

The Hoarder Games

 

Then you'd even get to add strategy to the mix:

"Do I bring my gf as my mule, and hope the angry neckbeards won't hit a girl, or do I give that huge dude at Xsport $20 to come with me and tear people apart?"

 

Maybe a "Oh, hey I've got some fresh Transient in my car...." or something similar might have worked here.

 

You'd better hope the people you say that to are beer people or you might wind up in jail....

 

I was going to call it The Thirsty Games, but yours is probably more accurate.