Hill Farmstead (2020)

No on-site consumption starting tomorrow:

https://hillfarmstead.com/news/important-announcement-13-march/

 

Is anyone organizing a bus to Friendships and Explorations out of Waterbury like is done for FoFa?

 

Now they may have to start canning Edward and Abner, don’t let it go to waste : )

 

I think the major fear is that the festival will either be cancelled or delayed a few months. I dont think anyone is making plans right now.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/B-K-ddyBqcL/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Hello friends and future visitors to Hill Road,

It is with heavy hearts that we will close our doors today for an indeterminate period of time. Vermont Governor Phil Scott issued an executive order Tuesday evening requesting that all non-essential businesses suspend in-person business effective today, Wednesday 25 March 2020, by 5 p.m. While there may be grey areas to claim exemption and stay open, we acknowledge that we are truly not an essential business in these difficult times.

Our remote location and rural business has become a destination to which many travel from afar. Amidst shelter in place orders, we believe that remaining open for off-premise or curbside sales would encourage movement from outside our community, most of which are also currently under similar statewide directives. This would be counterproductive to the informed request of our Governor, to our town, our local residents, and our staff.

We will continue to investigate legal, sound, and sustainable avenues through which to provide beer to our loyal supporters. At this time, we are focused on respecting the admonition of our State’s leadership and ensuring the safety and well-being of our team and our community.

A few of us will continue to work behind the scenes to navigate the uncertain and constantly shifting landscape ahead while preparing for our relaunch. From time to time, you might explore our website or social media channels for new content.

For a spell, Hill Road will become considerably silent—a solemn silence not experienced since operations commenced 10 years ago. As the dirt roads that lead to our brewery continue to soften and relax in anticipation of Spring’s debut, we remain entranced by the decade behind us and optimistically await the rhythmic unfolding of Summer and beyond.

We wish you all health and perseverance in the days, weeks, and months ahead. Sooner than later, we hope, might these roads once again lead many spirited travelers to our home.

Until that day arrives, be well.
Shaun Hill
Bob Montgomery

 

Hopefully they start distributing to stores. In the past, they had distributed beer to Hunger Mountain Co-Op. That seems like a no-brainer. It would be great to have an avenue to support them during the closure. I REALLY respect the decision.

 

You know, I would happily pay for some Anna, Arthur, Convivial, et al. Farmstead Ales. I'd pay shipping & everything, Shaun.

 

There have been a couple breweries in Ohio that opened up direct to home shipping and we jumped on that right away. Good thing too because they sold out almost instantly.

 

I know their bottles will be fine, but makes you wonder where all the cans and kegs will end up. Hopefully they don't go to waste.

(I wrote this same thing in the Suarez thread, and then learned that Suarez sent cans downstate in NY.)

Shipping directly to consumer seems extremely unlikely.

 

The Beverage Warehouse in Winooski just announced they're selling some HF cans via their curbside sales operation.

 

Yep - these three

 

Cmon..... Brattleboro Coop. I definitely get why they would shut down the retail business given the breadth of their customer base, but there is no reason to stop brewing if the brew house staff are well. Hopefully they can spread the HF goodness!

 

Someone can seem “well” but have the virus and then pass it on to many others. There certainly are reasons to stop.

 

https://www.mychamplainvalley.com/a...utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter_WVNYWFFF

Cool little news piece on Hill Farmstead. Interview with Shaun about the brewery and family history relevance. Also see a Self Reliance: Centennial barrel in there not yet released.

 

I get what you are saying, but a modern brewhouse doesn't require that much staff to function- They are labor intensive on the retail side, not the brew side. Having three guys brew beer to help bring happiness in a dark time is definitely essential in my book and can be done safely. I am not advocating a "F the old people; the economy has to operate mindset", but there is no reason to overreact with total closures. Tell at risk people to stay home and isolate; its up to the rest of us to keep the world going.

 

That...actually is a ""F the old people; the economy has to operate mindset""

...sorry, but true.

It's also the reason why we now have the most cases of COVID-19 in the world despite having some of the worst rates of testing, and being one of the last major countries to get it. We don't have enough leadership that took it seriously, they kept letting everyone go around and do whatever they wanted. The numbers are now spiking unlike any other country, including Italy.

 

Genuinely curious - why do you say we have "some of" the worst rates of testing? Do we have that many undocumented cases? Because we've (allegedly?) tested more people than any other country, albeit not super efficiently. No idea how many people China tested, but if we've actually tested more than any other country then we've tested more people per capita by a large amount. I think it's more we don't have the social construct to contain the spread, and also Americans just don't listen. The "number spiking" I blame more on citizens than government.

All this said, this is a beer forum. I'm having a can of Marie right now and it's delicious.

 

I say it because I see it. Elsewhere reports are that more of those that need tested are getting it, and they are being tracked down and isolated before more damage is done.

Here we are turning people away as much as possible in order to save testing and materials because we don't have near as much tests available to us and are woefully unprepared at hospitals.

If you know anyone that works in a hospital, doctor's office, medical call center, or are unfortunate enough to have needed to go to the hospital yourself or know someone who has, even with severe symptoms, you'll learn this very quickly. Only those that are near death are being admitted, and often they aren't even being tested. The places that do have the most resources don't even have enough.

I'm not sure where you're getting this testing number, unless it's from the executive branch, but it's quite the opposite.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/03/27/coronavirus-testing-us/

American people have little to nothing to do with this problem. We've had no national leadership on the matter. We rolled back national guidelines and preparedness, and had a president who was actively denying the seriousness of this, putting it off, making it sound like it was already going away, and even literally telling people who feel sick it's fine to go to work. Florida didn't do anything about people flocking to the beaches. If you've ever been and ever seen a crackdown there before, they're actually impressively effective at keeping people out and off of beaches if they want. All kinds of failures of leadership on this front. We have a governor in Ohio who has actually done well to set some of the early standards in our region, but when there is no national leadership, you get the worse case scenario any country in the world could conjure up. We are only at the very start of our problems here.

 

Their other reason for shutting down is briefly alluded to: a lot of beer peeps from out of state loyally trek up to HF, and now that our Governor has essentially mandated that all service businesses that tend to attract tourists up here (think ski areas, hotels, restos, retail shops, breweries, bars, brewpubs, etc.) and cannot enforce social distancing by virtue of their retail model, must not encourage more visitors when we need fewer for now. VT is taking "stay safe, stay home" to heart and hoping to flatten the curve, but encouraging local take-out service only to help make that happen. So far, locals are stepping up to help that way. The sooner we fully hunker down, the sooner tourism-centric small businesses can hopefully reopen, rehire & flourish again here.