Side Project Brewing (2024)

The Half Acre Generational cans are live on Oznr now

 

HA mentioned that that limit is imposed by Oznr, so it was basically no limits. Still odd given a SP collab.

 

I mentioned this in a post trying to value Double Honey Ann to MJK and was laughed out of the room. They were justifying regular Ann being more 1:1 and it made no sense to me considering how insanely abundant MJK has been, and that DH Ann has so far been a one-off people were waiting for for practically a decade. 375 vs. 750 doesn't really shake out for me with all that in mind, but I don't have any dog in that fight. I just don't see how the MJK side isn't short against either tbh.

 

I was surprised that it didn't sell out more quickly. Felt greedy going after 8 cans, but I get to spread that out amongst F&F.

 

While MJK has been abundant, the amount of bottles actually release to go have not. It’s just been on site all year basically. Not that I’m saying it’s equal to DH Ann. Just that there is probably less than 200 bottles of MJK 2024 in the wild.

 

Is it basically impossible to become an LC member at this point?

 

I think it’s about to become extremely easy to be an LC member. From the sound of this thread, half the population will be letting their membership go.

I remember years ago when people waited overnight for Perennial’s SdC membership and now it sits on Oznr for anyone that wants to purchase. I think that’s where LC is headed.

 

How does SP respond to feedback from their members? Obviously, no one wants someone to tell them how to run their business. Are they the type to listen to their paid members with how they allocate releases? Do they even need the $200+ per member to maintain a loyal customer base.

I'd almost do away with it or just not charge for it all together.

 

With laugh reacts on Facebook

 

Paid memberships are a way for a brewery to get a cheap loan, ie you pay me now, I get that money interest free, and in the future I give you beer. For very new breweries who need the capital investment, they may offer perks in lieu of beer. SP is unique in that they are both a high-cost membership and the beer you get back are the ones no one really cares about. By that I just mean that if a non-LC wants the beers LC gets as part of their membership, they can probably get them at 50-70% of the retail price with essentially zero costs to search.

 

It's not a paid membership. You get beers & LC glass for the price of the fee. And for any local the 200 is no different than the bar tab after 2 SP outings.

They send a survey at the end of each LC year to get feedback. I have personally given feedback that has translated to real change, so kudos to them for listening. I also believe they peruse these forums & Facebook. It's easier nowadays to get realtime feedback from members through social media, but I guess taking it with a grain of salt because the only people who comment are people at extremes - extremely unhappy or extremely happy.

 

BTW, going back to earlier conversation...DH Ann was great. Legit great.

I don't live in St. Louis, but I could probably argue that, if you're local, you can make up a solid portion of the membership fee in food and drink discounts on Sundays throughout the year. I think just in my trips out there to pick up bottles, my Sunday bills had about $55 in savings on to go options, and I live in Pennsylvania. I'm sure one could argue that no local is spending that kind of money consistently, but it certainly adds up.

 

Yeah I think it's safe to say that LC makes sense if you're local, not so much if you're not.

 

I’ve got to go check my bank account since apparently I didn’t pay $246.35 for LC the last two years.

 

Um. I think by definition, if a monetary transaction occurred between yourself and SP for being a part of their membership, it is considered a paid membership. Memberships inherently come with benefits. This one happens to include beer/glassware deemed equivalent in value to the membership fee by SP.

 

I know it is semantics that @Affinity is disagreeing on, but I’d consider any “paid” membership to be one that you literally shell out money in advance of any benefits. The fact that SP gives you beer (albeit the beers no one is joining to get) doesn’t make it not a paid membership. It is, just like P3, Revolution, dimensional, private press, perennial, etc. it’s just that other memberships that give you beer for what you pay typically give you the beer you are joining to get. *shrug* Again, not to say no one drinks those beers, there’s just no reason to join for those bottles. Everyone that joins is joining for the dark beers.

 

Maybe semantics, I just think people are insinuating that the $200 is a fee that they get nothing for in return because they don't drink the sour beers. I just wanted to point out that you get beer for it, so it's not a member fee per se.

And maybe the new folks only join for the dark beers, but for older members the sour beers have been equally exciting. Now you can buy many Side project sour beers for like 5-10% cost on local FB sites.

 

I agree that there is something of value that you're getting in return, but value is in the eyes of both the giver and receiver. My proxy keeps all of my included saisons and he said that they're piling up (he proxies for others too).

I'm one of the many who joined for the dark beers, mainly because it's a small fortune to buy them on secondary.

If someone loves the saisons/farmhouse offerings that they're giving away, then the membership has value and expectations are met. I think you need to look no further to the 15-16 offerings on their site that's ALL saisons/farmhouse, with a couple of exceptions. I don't need to sign up to get those - I can buy them at will.

I signed up to get the dark and harder to get stuff and the expectations/hopes of the membership just aren't there or haven't been met....yet.

That being said, it's not a done deal that I wont sign up again next year. Always been a huge fan of theirs and I think it might be worth sticking it out another year to see if my expectations can be met. I also don't expect the value of the membership to be as good for out of towners as it is for the locals.

 

I'm an out of towner (as stated) and I also don't go into it with the expectation that the membership will be as good for out of towners as it is for those in town - that's fine, and if we're being honest, as it should be.

I think the part I'm struggling with is...is there still value in having access to the dark beers, because if you look at the offerings this year, every one of them has ultimately been offered to the public aside from Derivation Grand Cru and I think Ambiente (I might have missed one, but you get the point). Yes - there are other perks like vintage sales (I did grab Symmetry from that, which I had never had). But ultimately, while you have to buy the package in a public sale, you still get the bottle you want, but you also don't pay $250 up front; I'd say in the past, you were paying an up front fee for access that now, for the most part, everyone has.