Central Waters 15th Anniversary Party

Are you moving to WP?

 

exactly this. bums me out that people come and complain that it sucks... this is not just a house party with 20 friends.. this is a huge event put on by a small team.

there are going to be "imperfections".

what it is is a good time, with great beer, good music and tons of friendly people. it has expanded and changed every year i've been there.. for the better to accomodate the increasing popularity.

a crystal ball and unlimited time + funding to make this the perfect event for everyone would be awesome. unfortunately, that's not reality.

keep doing what you guys are doing. it was a great time. the heated tent was great, the separate bars were smart, the food truck was great.. the beer was incredible. thanks for opening up your workspace and second home to us and letting us trash the place.

 

There were maybe 30-40 people that showed up 2-3 hours early (I was there at 2pm - 1 hour early). If you would have gotten there 30 minutes earlier you would have gotten 15, so that's on you not people that showed up a little early.

By ruining this for locals (assuming your a local then), I would think you would have been in with the VIP's like most of the rest of the locals (and retailers, distributors, etc.).

 

i'm sure they immediately went home to complain about the brewery failing them and missing out on their deserved allotment

OH THE TRAGEDY OF IT ALL

those people will come back and support the brewery.. just as they always have.. they aren't going to bitch to their closest iFriends that the brewery is shit and to stop patronizing it because of missing out on one beer. one. beer. not a life saving heart transplant.. a single beer.

 

I got shut out of bottles maybe 20 people back when they ran out (also didn't get any BA night train at O'so). I got shut out at the tap line maybe 30 people back and I still had an AWESOME time. The other beers on tap (Exodus practically all night? Rye bourbon stout?) were incredible and the crazy music going on was enough to make me happy. Sure I was bummed and a little disappointed they didn't change the bottle limit when they were running low, but it didn't deter me from having a great time. I'll go again, regardless of bottle sales.

 

Well, this thread has definitely taken a turn for the worse since Saturday....I kinda felt that was going to happen, since the 2nd post-

In summary: This sense of entitlement is lame. People bitching about Central Waters, after they threw a free party w/ a ridiculous tap list and had FREE shuttles, all night, are lame. All this bitching is lame.

When I throw parties at my house (free, no shuttle and no amazeballs taplist) and I hear people bitching about my food, or my beverages, or the way I have it setup....I simply do one thing the next time I throw a party.....don't invite those douche bags. So, I guess next year people will be complaining that it's a ticketed event and "they didn't get THEIR ticket" or "how come they didn't do things the way I want them to" or just complaining about whatever CW does to make their event better next year. It's kind of a no win situation for the brewery as people are always going to bitch.

Cheers to CW for throwing what sounds like one hell of a bash, I will make sure to not miss it next year!!!

p.s. It's Fifteen people, not 1515!!!

 

i got there at 3 after having lunch and spending time shooting the breeze with friends at O'so. we all wanted 15. none of us was crestfallen to have missed it.. mostly because i got to drink Peruvian Morning, Rye Bourbon Stout, BBBW, BBS, Coffee Stout, etc. on tap.

what's not to like about that?

and i'm not local. not even close. also, i go there well more than once a year for the anniv party.

 

What the fuck is right...I think you need to look in the mirror as far as entitlement goes. "The sense of entitlement" that you should have your own space on YOUR day because you met your buddies there, etc, etc, is as staggeringly blind as the beer "nerd" that barely missed out on 15 and may have made a comment or two about being bummed and you took as being "cranky" and "sniping".
IMO, the reason breweries brew beers like Dark Lord, 15, BA Plead the 5th, is for the "nerds" as you say.

It seems to me, you have a great solution, and I think it's a good one. If you want to not deal with the "hysteria", and you want to drink Honey Blonde, then don't come until later in the evening after it calms down. You can still drink as much Honey Blonde as you want that day, or the next week, or the week after that, just as I can. CW is a great brewery, and they are part of an enormously fast growing culture. 1414 winning gold medal firmly placed them in the forefront of every beer centric person from Minneapolis to Detroit...and that's alot of beer people.

There isn't much you can do about it. You seem like you had a good time after all, then why such a negative attitude on the forum? I don't think either one of your lengthy posts as been productive, rather very destructive, and you are only going to make these "nerds" show up earlier, just to spite curmudgeons like yourself.

Cheers man.

 

A lot of the above can be summarized as "wah wah wah wah wah wah"

I had fun. Anyone complaining they got shut out on the taps for 15 and 1414:
a) Didn't plan ahead, and that's your own fault for feeling entitled for some and not waiting in line when there was clearly a huge line forming for the taps at least 30 mins prior to tapping

b) is being narrow minded. This year's peruvian morning, coffee stout are amazing. Exodus was also drinking sublimely. You coulda just drank those 3 all night

^^^ this is the right attitude.

 

No man, someone in a kia soul rented all the apartments

 

I dont know. I heard St. Louis is no longer drinking any beer because one guy got 7 bottles.

 

I was concerned about my property value

 

!!!!!

 

Wow, just stumbled in here. How about we alleviate these issues and make everything ticketed from now on to avoid this stuff. Remember people used to camp out for Aerosmith tickets outside for days/hours, then ticketmaster moved to a lottery system for tickets at their outlets and eventually everything was an online ticket. I know it sucks and only a certain amount of people will get tickets but its gonna make it easier and have far less bitchin. Its gonna kill the great line hangs & sharings (and meeting a ton of you nice folks) but maybe we can monthly rent out the back of some place and do that on our own (or for chicago'ans go to WLV). Three Floyds did it, Founders did it, and it looks like now everyone should do it. (((Full Disclosure, I'm an idiot & am just blabbering. I just wish that BA was full of less complaining but then again this event looks like it went pretty bad.)))

 

Cheers!

 

I missed out on Fifteen as well, but was immediately consoled by the extra BBBW and PM I was able to buy. My only complaint, however, are the guys who have the balls to head straight to the back of the line and try to scalp bottles. Can we come up with a non-violent and/or violent way to deal with these pricks?

 

For those who got shut out of Fifteen and will be going to Hunahpu Day in March or DLD in April, shoot me a BM as we get closer to each event. I'll be outside both events with a tasting table set up and we'll do a side-by-side with Fourteen Fourteen and Fifteen. I'm going to assume I won't be the only one with these bottles, so if you got shut out, I encourage those to just mingle with other BAs at these and other events coming up. I guarantee you'll have several opportunities to try this and many more beers with a smile and an empty tasting glass.

Cheers!

 

Just wanted to put a last quick post up regarding this event and me calling out Mista. Throughout the VIP party, while I and many others were in line, we did see people sneek in as VIPs. I actually had a few people admit so much to me as they were putting the beer they had just bought in their car. That being said, I have no such proof and, therefore should not have made an accusation, that Mista was one of the people that did in fact sneak in.

I guess what it comes down to is that I felt that certain people took advantage of the trust CW put in its patrons and, on Saturday night, I felt that Mista was one of those people. If I was wrong about that, I apologize.

I would also just like to say thank you to CW. While there were certainly some negatives to the night due to the amount of people that showed up and the fact that they might not have been fully prepared for such a turnout, the intentions CW had in throwing this party were in the right place. They opened up their business and facilitities to a bunch of beer nerds and we should thank them for that. They sold us a beer that took them 26 months to produce for $15 a bomber bottle. As far as them not having the necessary protections in place to make sure some people didn't take advantage of the system is concerned, this is likely due to the fact that in past years, the overwhelming majority of the people that attended their parties were trustworthy and fair. Now that they know that will probably never be the case again, they'll have to put the necessary protections in place for future parties.

 

Are you sure they snuck in to buy beer? I needed to use the restroom, so I walked in, gave the bouncer my wallet, and was back out a minute or two later.

 

Overall, a great event. Like others have mentioned, even though some jag bags jobbed the system, if still I only have to get there a half hour before doors open to get bottles, it doesn't seem so bad. Most people that didn't get bottles assumed based on last year it would be easy. If CW had assumed everything would have been as easy as the 1414 sales, no one in line would have gotten any bottles. They worked with the info they had. Next year will be better organized, but I'm sure new problems will arise. That's what happens.

To everyone who wishes this was more like Darkness Day, have fun camping out in Amherst in late January. Its apples to oranges, especially with the city's open container ordinances (making bottle shares illegal). Keep in mind that bottle count for Darkness is 8 times more and that they are operating almost exclusively with their staff, whereas many releases in larger cities have a volunteer crew that doubles, triples, quadruples, whatever, their workforce.

To put it in perspective, here were last year's biggest problems:
-Too crowded
-Getting the rare taps was difficult to impossible
-BA room was way to packed
-Bathrooms were few and far between
-Not enough food

What did CW do?
-Added a tented section to accomidate more people and move some of the sales out of high traffic areas
-Made a separate bar for rare taps
-Moved the BA room to a larger area, yet kept the BA bathroom accessible
-Added port-a-potties to the tent
-Brought in a food truck with excellent food; some awesome, fantastic, marvelous, sensational BA made some great cupcakes for the Jensen Center booth.

Have faith that this event will be even better next year, and be constructive in your criticisms, because Paul and the guys do listen and will work to make as many of the malcontents happy as humanly possible.

Brad