2017 FOBAB

$100 per beer. Definitely a big ask.

 

Agree, and I'm not even on the brewer side of it. As far as I know, they don't pay the breweries for any of the donated beer. $100 per beer on top of hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars of actual product seems an absurd cost of entry

 

Has anyone gotten any clarification on why the price skyrocketed? I am a little concerned especially after hearing the brewer entry fee has also gone up. I don't want to spend $145 on a beer festival that won't be at the same standard as the year before.

 

Why won't the standard be the same as last year?

 

You saw one brewer @Spider889 comment about the $100 entry vs. $25 entry for the brewers to enter a beer. I'm concerned others are going to echo his sentiment and send fewer beers.

 

It will be interesting to see if there are ramifications. I think the hype and prestige from this event are worth far more than $100 in marketing costs to any brewer who makes good stuff, and those who don't at least get to put their brand in front of beer folks who otherwise might not try their stuff...

 

First Wingfest charged way too much and I had to throw in the towel on them, looks like FOBAB is following suit. Such a shame.

 

Honestly the money isn't that huge of a deterrent on it's own. And it is a small price for the recognition (potentially) but that is also arguable. I know several people I spoke to last year discovered us for the first time there, but many others lined up for 20 minutes or more to sample another brewery with a more hyped brand of the same style and completely overlooked us.

The biggest deterrent last year and this to me is the beer donation. A half barrel of Barrel Aged Stout could yield $1500+ in bottle sales at my brewery. Add in travel costs, registration costs, etc and eventually something has to give, at least for a smaller brewery.

We're going again this year, but it's a very tough call each time. Increases don't help at all.

 

which brewery are you from?

 

Wolf's Ridge Brewing. I sometimes forget that it's not common knowledge outside of the Ohio threads.

 

awesome! I figured it was something I was missing I don't frequent the OH threads....

 

@Spider889 already mentioned it, but I'll echo it:

It's not about the $75 increase, it's about the $75 increase on top of the lost sales of liquid. Add into that a brewer like him that doesn't reap any tangible benefit from the ILCBG lobby.......it's a real fair question to ask.

Entirely possible their (ILCBG/event) costs went up this year, but I kinda doubt it. At least not enough to need that big of a hike.

 

It's their choice. $75 is 5% of the $1,500 lost liquid sale, if 5% is the deal breaker they shouldn't show to Fo. And the liquid isn't really lost, it is a marketing expense. You can either sell the $1,500 of liquid and find another avenue to spend $1500 on marketing or do Fobab for the wash. For someone with great product like Weldworks out in the boonies of Denver, it was a no brainer for Chicago exposure. For someone who can't generate hype, maybe they are better off staying home and building up the local market until they have a buzz worthy product to bring....anyone attending has judged the risk to be acceptable...and if you are the lucky Cinderella to medal, your table is going to be packed on day 2....

 

Or just send $100 worth of beer to dontdrinkbeers and have him generate hype for your brewery

 

I'm starting to think FOBAB is a major cash cow for the promoters. Some rough maths:

300 beers x $100 = $30k
2500 attendees x $85 = $212k
500 Imbibe Memberships x $50 =25k
Total $267,000

To rent out that event is maybe $30k? And the labor is almost all volunteers.

 

Is the event really that great of a marketing opportunity though?

Hell, as a volunteer, I poured the beer that won best in show, and couldn't tell you what that brewery was, and it was my "job" that night to know about the beer. I do remember I liked the cinnamon variant better than the winner though.

 

Chickow?

 

It's not.

Every brewery has their reasons for attending, but I'm willing to bet strong on "marketing" not being high on several of their lists.

If you're going to sell every drop of it anyway, there's really nothing to market.

 

The real shame imo is the number of people who ignore most of the great beer there while waiting in line for some of these ultra hyped ones. The BCBS line looked to be 30-45 minutes most of the time I was around. In 3 sessions I couldn't try everything so there's no way someone attending one or two could - especially if they spent half their time waiting on a few beers.

Don't get me wrong - a short wait for the best stuff is certainly warrented but there were some real gems from well known breweries getting ignored because Twitter told people they had to stand in the BCBS line.

As for my own beer, we sold out every session which the majority of beers could not claim, so I'm not complaining so much for my own beer than about the general practice so many seemed to take.

Hell, first night last year everyone was so hung up on Wicked Weed Jester King Spon had zero wait most of the time. I probably walked right up ten different times for a pour of arguably the best beer there.

The fest has potential to open a lot of eyes to lesser known breweries but only if people are willing to do a fair amount of sampling alongside the ticking.

 

And that is where a more strategic set-up might make sense. Put the lesser known places along the GI line so people waiting 30 minutes for a BCBS pour can sample the unknowns along the way. I'd randomly lean over and ask for pours of whatever was close while I waited in that line and discovered some gems I wouldn't have bothered to try if I wasn't trying to maintain a spot in a line.