Are we spoiled in 2019?

Well, it would be my personal preference that homogenization will not be the case. The examples that you provided like cask beer in the UK will still exist in the future IMO. Maybe the selection of brands will be lesser but I think that cask beer will always be an option in the future (and cheers to CAMRA in this regard).

Cheers!

 

Yes, we are spoiled by an embarassment of riches. Innovation is good, stagnation and uniformity are bad. Enjoy!

 

I would say we definitely have too many options. I just heard Surly will be distributing in St. Louis later this year. I know Cigar City is also coming soon. In recent years we’ve added the following to our distribution footprint: Dogfish Head, Toppling Goliath, The Bruery, Squatters, Ballast Point, Terrapin, Funkwerks, Off Color, and Solemn Oath to name a few.

Add to that local breweries like Narrow Gauge, Side Project, 4 Hands, Schlafly, O’Fallon, 2nd Shift, Civil Life, Modern Brewery, Center Ice, and Heavy Riff to name a few more.

I find myself buying less beer when I travel to bring back with me as a result. Those choices used to overwhelm me. Now it’s the opposite.

Although I might “need” to grab some bottles from the Rare Barrel from Binny’s when I’m in Chicago later this week.

The result of all of this is a diversification of where our beer dollars go. I spend a lot less at my local bottle shop and more with local breweries than I used to. Also I rarely buy 6 packs or any beer in significant quantities. I also a lot more breweries making a beer that they have no intention of brewing again for the sake of having another imperial stout or IPA on the shelf that people like me will buy.

 

Yes. The fact that I can walk into Binny's and know that no matter what beer I choose to buy that something better exists on the shelves is very spoiling.

 

I had joined so I could start reading reviews, as I got interested in beer despite not being able to drink it. I actually didn't start taking beer seriously until December 2017 when (as part of being dumped by my fiancee) I started reevaluating my life and interests. I set out to deeply understand food and drink, so I began seeking out new beers and actually writing down my thoughts.

So far I've had 362 reviews since then and I've drank even more that I haven't reviewed; I'd estimate that the number of unique beers I've had is verging on 400 by now in this time. At my height I was averaging 1 new beer every 2 or 3 days.

I don't think trendiness is going to be as much of a problem as market saturation. As I mentioned, I've had a lot of bourbon barrel-aged stouts. After having enough of them you start to realize how many of them taste the same. Or with lagers and brown ales you start finding beers that come from very small breweries but taste so identical that you'd never pass a blind test. Either the bragging about the ingredients and method is BS or they're clearly not doing something right with them.

So you end up wondering just how to survive. Do you make something that you can pump out en masse and get wide appeal from people who just want the same stuff over and over, or do you find something unique that has enough popularity that you can create a new market niche, like what happened with fruit beers and sours suddenly exploding out of nowhere?

 

Cask ale is in decline. Craft in the UK is on the rise. Nobody is claiming that cask will completely go away anytime soon... that’s an extreme, but the numbers don’t paint a pretty picture.

 

Chris, as I posted and you quoted:

"Maybe the selection of brands will be lesser but I think that cask beer will always be an option in the future (and cheers to CAMRA in this regard)."

As long as cask ale is an option/possibility it seems like "life is good". And maybe it will be the higher quality cask ales that will be the 'survivors'.

Cheers!

 

spoiled beyond belief.

 

My local beer stores shelf space in completely dominated by local brewery options. I’d guess the ratio has flipped vs say 5-6 years ago. The bigger regional and national brewers still do ok I’d guess, but the dates get a bit sketchy. And the price of local beers are about equal to the larger breweries, so there isn’t much of a home team discount. I can’t find Ballast Point on the shelves anymore, Moylans, Alpine, most Victory, there’s a few Stone, Knee Deep is gone. If it doesn’t turn he won’t carry it, but I suspect a lot of these obscure local breweries will suffer the same fate, really there’s literally dozens.

 

That's a bit disappointing. In the future, will we have to leave state lines to get x beer? In Germany, that might be less of an issue, but the US is about the size of China.

 

Hard to say where this trends, this particular beer store used to be slammed after working hours, especially on Fridays, weekends. I can usually look and browse by myself right now so I question the long term health of this business. The big super stores like Total Wine are the opposite they carry mostly regional and national brews, a few locals, but I’d suppose AAL make up a large percentage of their sales. I’d say we started getting spoiled 5-6 years ago, when there was enormous influx of Cali ipas as an example, but the vast volume was unsustainable. Which bring us to now, I have no idea where the market goes, and if I was a retailer I’d be very nervous, the margins in beer are quite small.

 

I think that I an definitely spoiled. I live in Northwest Ohio and have found a brewery in munster Indiana 3 floyds. They make the best ipa beer ever zombie dust and for a,while it was extremely hard to find. For about 2 years I had a lot of trouble finding it because every time it came to toledo, it sold out in like 1 day. I finally found a store that gets it in every Friday so now I call them on Friday and go.pick it up. I feel like I have a drug dealer on speed dial!lol. I finally got my connection. I usually pick up 2 6 packs. That does me for the weekend. Whenever I can't find it there's a Meijer grocery store that carries some of their other brands. It used to be like finding a needle in a haystack, but now I know I can get it every week.

 

What’s the old saying? If they hit the lottery, they’d complain they had to go to the bank.

 

Absolutely, spoiled beyond belief!

I've enjoyed nearly everything I've brought and reviewed on here and my biggest problem is that I can't keep up. There's so much being released in New York and available in stores here in New Jersey that I can't hope to possibly ever keep up. It's an embarrassment of riches and a first world problem, and more importantly, proof that we're in a golden age right now.

I'm just glad that I do my best not to take any of this for granted!

 

One of the theories I've always held is that early 90's hip-hop (ATCQ, Illmatic Nas, et. al) had to be good. Everything about it. Production, lyrics, every scratch had to be perfect. Otherwise, it wouldn't sell and it would just have been a fad. Well, then that led to a bunch of rap that all sounded the same. Executive realized rap can sell regardless of its content. Since that early wave of greatness, we've seen other lasting acts endure (The Roots, Common, Drake, Kendrick, etc.), but otherwise, hip-hop has seen trends come and go.

I see a ton of similarities in the beer world. I remember going to places like AleSmith and Pizza Port in the mid-2000s. Variety of styles, everything had to be perfect for these places to survive. They have. I think there are many other breweries that are here and will thrive in perpetuity, but I'm excited to thin the herd so to say.

 

I hope this is hyperbole, but if your go-to beer store has 51+% beers that are 3 years old or older, you need a new beer store. There has to be a better option.

 

Not hyperbole. Not my go-to either. Only been twice. I don’t even care for the place but I was right by it. There are better options. I am glad I went in though because the beer that I bought was a very nice find. Also - It’s not that a majority of the beers there were 3 years old, but rather, a majority of what I looked at... and my shopping habits probably do not reflect their average customer. Gotta admit I was half tempted to get the single 2016 four pack of Bigfoot though... Perhaps I’ll be back to get it in the future.

 

That would be worth it for sure if it's still around12 bucks. Bonus points if you can convince them you should get a discount on the old(and obviously dated) beer

 

Many beers I would have classified as good before no longer stand out. I'm always thinking that there are too many options to choose from and look up in order to avoid disappointment. But I'm admittedly snobbier now. As the average quality of brews have gone up and great beers get wider distributions, I'm seeking those top marks only when I spend more money for that bottle or 4-pack. I think you hit the nail on the head!

 

in my own case I am ambivalent. I grew up at a time when we were served by three excellent local breweries in lots of lovely pubs , beer was cheap and being on cask each pub put its own stamp on the beers.Also Guinness and Bass were available everywhere of course.
We thought things could never get better but we welcomed the emergence of what we called "micro breweries" about 40 years ago.These are called "craft" by some people these days.We had a greater choice but in the early days quality was often indifferent.
These new brews were interesting but did not add greatly to the pub experience , we had never felt limited when the choice was simply mild or bitter because we could (and did) drink these all day without losing interest. A good session beer gets better the more pints you drink of it.
Now we have around 1 brewery for every 30000 of us with lots of choice of course. But greater enjoyment ? I still love going to the pub but no more than I did as a teenager.
The downside is the price of beer these days. A beautifully brewed pint back then was a few pence , now it costs several pounds.This must be partly responsible for the mass of pub closures , together with the strength of many modern beers.At session strength many drinkers put down one pint after another for the whole session, when beers got stronger people drank less of it.So people spend less time in pubs these days.