What drives demand/hype for a beer.

I think that's true to an extent, but not always. There are lots of breweries that put out sub-1,000 bottle releases that no one (aside from locals) cares about since they aren't that good, while there are breweries that put out nearly-nationwide releases that are pretty difficult to track down (Parabola, the latest Hommage release, Hopslam, any Cantillon). Availability has an effect undoubtedly, but taste is definitely an important factor.

 

It's the mentality here and has exploded in the past 2 years. The ideas of looking for beers of a particular style that is your favorite, etc. is long gone. I read an article that said outisde the US the beer is the draw, but in the US, the brewery or limited nature of the beer is the draw. Go to any release now and you will hear non-stop discussion on something akin to a stock ticker. I was at a release fairly recently where one person in line simply read aloud what the most recent ISO posts were for the beer that was being released. Beer is the baseball cards for this generation.

I can remember Raz Eisbock at Kuhnhenn and the ability to go into Kuhnhenn and pick those up nearly a year after they were bottled. I can remember Rare, Vanilla, and others easily obtainable on-line with no mark-up and them being as easy to get as a couple of keystrokes. I am sure many will remember the first Hunah, early Dark Lord Days, etc. Those days are gone. Even Blabaer was not a big deal from what I was told and yes, I can remember a couple of places having Blabaer available on-line as well.

 

It's part the mentality and part of it is the style. Things like bourbon barrel and barrel aged in general are harder to produce and are more limited. The rating system has kind of made beers that were somewhat rare really rare now. I don't know why though certain IPAs get this kind of hype where people stand in line. They don't require the time in barrels and idk I probably will never stand in line for 3 hours for bottles of Exponential Hoppiness anymore.

 

Ding ding ding, we have a winner. There's plenty of great beer being made by breweries The Hype Train™ could give two shits less about - for starters, I'd bet serious money something like this would be closer to a 95 and - if not pull whales - easily pull the Parabolas, KBSes, Zombie Dusts, and Heady Toppers of the world if someone like The Bruery made it (and, while we're at it, put it in their Reserve/Hoarder's series).

"FT: Evolution Fall Migration ISO: HT" = "LOL, nobody cares about your shelf turdz bro, nice try"

"FT: Bruery Reserve Series beers (that might be infected) ISO: HT" = "sure thing bro, Imma organize a tasting and could use a few Bruery beerz, those guys can do no wrong"

PS: Wasn't it The Bruery that sort of kickstarted this whole hype train tomfoolery when they first released Black Tuesday?

PPS: More Evolution 750s for me!

 

You're right about sours and barrel aged being the main culprits in the chase mentality for the reasons you note. To some extent, I an "happy" to not like IPA's so I can cut a whole lot of beers off the list and never consider EVER having to wait in line to have them, buy them, talk about them, etc.

 

I stopped caring about hype or ratings many moons ago. I have been around long enough to know what is worth buying and what isn't. For me, 99 percent of the shit people go insane about is not worth the hassle, and easily replaced with better beer I can buy off the shelf.

 

Im not sure why any of this is a surprise, or even new. This has been going on for years, its just that there are many more people in this "hobby" now.

 

There is absolutely a "grass is always greener on the other side" influence with highly rated beers that one cannot get. Whether its the rarity, lack of distribution, or the insane cost; it all drives demand.

Some breweries have a level of respect where nearly all their limited releases will be hype driven.

The counter to this of course, is that some hyped releases become limited because people purchase them in large quantities which drive the demand. One example is Stone. All the Stone releases are available in my area and not with some lottery or other process to buy a bottle. But certain releases sell out extremely fast because people buy multiple bottles. In this case the "rarity" is not driven because the brewery only shipped a few cases but more that the demand spiked.

 

Only bottle over $10 that I've ever bought two of.

 

What drives demand/hype for a beer is this website...

 

Sure, people want what they can't have, and a pre-perception from the hype can be a very strong force on the human mind. But I'm baffled that no one here has yet stated the obvious. The hype might just possibly be there because the beer is that good! People want it because word-of-mouth has done its job of promoting something worth getting. If 5,000 people rave enough about a beer and you try it and hate it, that doesn't mean you fell for the hype. It means you didn't like that beer. The fact that you know of other, better, more available beer is meaningless to the conversation. There's *always* gonna be that side, no matter what you talk about. Rarity? Dunno about you, but the really fantastic beers that I've tried got their reputations by being awesome, not by being rare. People want it cuz they've heard really good things about it. It just happens that they're hard to get. So, yeah, you could say I want it cuz it's not here, but that's not really a reason to question someone's motives. Are labels and names factors? Could be, but then how did that happen? Not everyone knew who Lawsons was a few years ago, but look what happens when a small brewer hits home-runs time after time. His name has come to represent an excellent product. Nothing wrong with wanting to try his stuff because of that. If you've happened to try a bunch of stinkers based on any of these things, keep trying, dude!

 

There's one other factor involved: Location of the brewery. Odds are, if it was brewed in the Midwest or anywhere near Vermont the local BA's will hype the ever loving shit out of it. Meanwhile, something equally good brewed in Oregon or Washington will often fly under the radar because there's a lot less BA users, traders, or tickers out here drawing attention to the locals.

 

Just make sure you Mother doesn't decide to clean out the cellar and throw them all away.

 

Echoing what has been mentioned: brewery name and availability. Widmer's Upheaval IPA would be in the mid-90's (as opposed to 87) if it were not due to who made it and being widespread distro. There also wouldn't be one of the reviews near the top asking if they used hops or just whatever plants Widmer had laying around.

 

Hype is all about you not the beer. I mean there's good beer. It's here and there and there is no where that it isn't. So hype - is you and not the beer. And when the beer did not live up to the hype was it you or was it the beer?

 

While there's certainly some truth in that it's also a pretty big generalization. While it's certainly true that lack of availability creates perception of quality (And not just in beer, I've seen hardcore gamers get really ticked off when some Japanese video game doesn't get released in the US), people wouldn't want them in the first place if a lot of people didn't think they tasted really good.

Are there easily available beers that are every bit as good as whales? Absolutely. Do people desire the rare ones more because they're rare? Absolutely. But you're overstating the extent of this mindset by quite a bit. I'd love to be able to get Founders KBS but I also somehow doubt I'd like it that much better than some of the beers I can buy whenever I want.

 

I understand where you're coming from. Some hyped brews blew me away, then some of the hyped brews are not worth the praise/score they're given. Case in point. Heady Topper is it good, yeah. Is it the end all of DIPAs, no. Will people be suckered into the hype because it's limited distribution, you betcha! It always comes down to the forbidden fruit. What people can't grab, they hunger for it. Then once you have your forbidden fruit, in the end it's bitter truth. I enjoy another beer better.

 

Can't tell if that's a riddle or a Dr. Seuss quote