If your beer store had a suggestion box what would you put in it? I know they are hard to get but I'd like to see more west coast beers on the shelves here on the east coast. Some more from the midwest would also be great.
I'd write a note saying.....keep a watchful eye on beers' best by/before/bottled-canned on dates and demand that the distributors take back old product. With some exceptions and I'd make them a list.
It all depends on the distribution/distributor for that kind of request. A store can't just "get in" any kind of beer. If you're on the east coast and in places like CT the alcohol laws are a real pain in the ass for breweries as well as distributors and shops so a lot of places won't even distribute here. There are also certain distributors that only sell to certain counties within a state and therefore the whole state cannot obtain the same products. It also depends on the market and potential buyers. Just something to keep in mind. ~Z
Available West Coast or mid-West beers are no "harder to get" than that pallet of Old Milwaukee sitting on the floor - either the brewery has in-state distribution or not. The retailer merely has to order it, just as they order any other beer. (Obviously, beers that are shipped in quantities smaller than demand are an exception - there are retailers who will ask for a "hot" beer like Founder's KBS, even though they do not stock Founder's other beers. Good luck with that). Most retailers will gladly order you a case of any beer carried by the distributors they deal with (no need for the anonymity of a suggestion box) - if you commit to buying it. Given the amount of old/out-of-date beer I see at every retailer I go to, they are probably reluctant to order one more brand of beer if people are merely "ticking" and interested in buying only a single bottle.
You'd think they'd get the idea when I walk in the door, pull out my reading glasses, and go from door to door, stack to stack, looking for something fresh to buy. "Hey, it's that guy again. But I don't think he's shop-lifting..." They watch me put back every beer, sometimes slowly shaking my head - if they're close enough they might even hear me sigh sometimes, in mourning for more good beer gone bad - sitting too long on the floor, unrefrigerated, and exposed to florescent light - long past the brewers' "Best by" dates. And then they watch me walk out the door, empty-handed (again) as I sneer at the new stacks of cases of ciders, fruit flavored-shandies and FMB-like spiced "summer ales"....
This. Every single Stone beer in my go-to store is long expired. There's so many I want to try, but I won't buy a Ruination that reached its best before date in 2012.
I would suggest that keep up with Bottled on dates, especially on IPAs. Also that they would store/display beer in a refrigerated atmosphere. Despite the "Keep Refrigerated" that's typically on the beer lable, I'm walking through isles of beer that are sitting at room temperature.... freshness is the issue, keep em cold and they'll stay fresh longer!
This, kind of. It would be awesome if all the beer could be kept properly. I tend to go for beers that don't have 23 hour freshness time lines (if you've seen the animation I'm referring to, it's great). So if a beer store could keep (almost) all the beer in a refrigerated part with low lighting, and not illuminated when the store's closed, that'd be cool. Then when I buy a year old beer I know it's been kept decently. P.S. I'm lucky that a fair amount of places I go allow mix-sixes (of what is on the mix-six shelf of course).
From a store's perspective, we keep a good amount of our beer in refrigeration. But with the cost of refrigerators and electricity, if a store is to refrigerate all the beer the cost of your beer has to go up to account for that. As for breweries putting keep refrigerated on beers, they all do, but they aren't paying for those refrigerators. If the store moves the beer quick enough, it's not that big of a deal. We do allow mix a six as well.
Singles // Some state alcohol control boards have laws against selling singles (e.g., Pennsylvania). Here in Washington State we can sell singles. At my shop each week we see nearly half-a-dozen "newbie" folks turn and walk out the door rather than letting us pull six-of-a-kind for their six-pack of one kind. Weird how people won't buy a six-pack of one kind if they don't have the original carrier, which they're just going to put in the recycling bin. This always leaves me perplexed. I can say that it's a lot of work, from a retail perspective stocking singles, so the store's gotta have manpower and good rotation processes. Distribution // Unfortunately you can't always get beers from other places. Each state has different laws, but all pretty much have the same requirement that the brewery must have some kind of "distributor" in place (be it self-licensed or third-party, depending on the state's laws). Stores can't just call up a brewery and say, "Hey, send me five cases." It's all got to go through the proper alcohol control board processes. Also, many times the brewery doesn't have sufficient production to meet demand or expand distribution. Bottled dates & expiration // This is something that I'm sure all shops battle with. We sometimes see expired products come in from wholesaler distributors and aren't given the option of "fresh" until we "help" them clear through past-date. I hate it. Sometimes we refuse the cases, other times we do our best to let customers know and put on mark-down. We don't see this too often in American crafts & local brews, mostly in imports, but I can name at least three American breweries (one of which has already been noted in this forum) that we see expired product coming through the supply pipeline a couple times a year. I've seen 20-month-expired beer at some local grocery stores, which makes me wince, especially when I know the supplier sold it to them knowing it should've just been destroyed. With over 1,200 beers to keep track of, I always appreciate it when a customer points out an expiration date that I may have missed; we sample such and then make decision to destroy vs. immediate sale. We have temperature control & UV filters to help promote longer shelf life, but lord knows if the customer is going to drink it right away, pull it up to house temperature, or forget about it for months...
Last time I went to Washington, PA I stopped by a Giant Eagle - they had plenty of singles for sale..?
Singles are easy to get in Pennsylvania. You can get singles even in some grocery stores. There are a few beer specialty stores (House Of 1000 Beers in New Kensingrton) that sell mostly singles.
