Saint Arnold Brewing Co. Finalizes Colorado Launch Plans

Pretty cool. SA's one of those truly "regional" breweries. I never would have figured they'd distribute out here.

 

Love Endeavor!

 

Well having Todd in Denver is really helping keep me up to date and my wallet empty.

Thanks for all the info.


Cheers!

 

Does anyone know if CO is still getting distribution from SA? I really enjoyed the few Bishop's Barrel series beers we got, but haven't seen any in stores since #6 about a year ago...

 

They are no longer distributing to CO at the this time.

 

Goes to show that CO (mainly Denver) isn't the holy grail market brewers sometimes imagine.
We're notorious for 1 and done purchases, full-on ignoring flagship beers, and declaring IPA's "old" if they're dated last month.

 

You can still find year and a half old bottles of Endeavour DIPA sitting on shelves if you really want some SA, I've seen some in the last month or so... I was pretty happy when they started distro here as they are my hometown brewery and they honestly got me in to craft beer way back when... but the truth is, I don't think I bought more than a couple six packs of their stuff when I saw it here. Their core beers are just underwhelming and don't stand out in the CO market since our distro is so amazing... sad, but true.

 

I don't think their situation is a unique one. Lots of legitimately good breweries enter our market and run into the same issues. There isn't much motivation to buy a randomly new pale ale, IPA, red, stout, etc. from another region unless it's especially noteworthy or unique. Especially when there are fresher versions and/or known 5-star examples on the shelf right beside them.
I'm sure most breweries hear (or read on Facebook) the usual "I sure wish I could buy your beer in Denver!" replies. At the same time, talking and buying are VERY different things.

Because of how distribution works I have no idea if this would be feasible - but I think it would be funny if a brewery didn't send us any of their flagships but ONLY sent their rare, barrel aged, fruit infused, numbered bottle, etc. stuff.
In reality, that's what people want. Macro converts and new to craft drinkers aren't going to choose a random pale ale from Deleware and BA's certainly don't care. It might not be profitable or even an option, but it's the only way most regional breweries are going to sell very much out here. I don't care how many transplants from the Midwest you think will buy your flagships - after the first novelty week is over they won't.

 

Please excuse my slaughtering of proper grammar in my earlier post.

People seemed to love the Bishop Barrel stuff since they appeared to fly off the shelf. And Pumpkinator is better than ST Warlock IMHO and people went nutso over that stuff. But like most breweries you can't rely on your specialty beers to pay the bills, you gotta be able to sell rego 6-packs and bombers.

EDIT: What @Domingo said.

 

It's a long process to be able to distribute successfully in CO, a brewery just can't announce "hey, look for our 4pks next week". Like @Domingo says, it'll work for a while. They should start off with on-premise, build some sort of following, then release packaging. It might take a few years, but the shelves are crowded with locals right now. Some won't be around in 5 years--but people will still choose them over "imports" from another state.

Something like this may work, but breweries don't want to alienate their base and send all the rare stuff to someone else. However, maybe a select few bombers that are just the opposite (cheaper) might work better. How many FiftyFifty shelf turds are still around? I think of Epic (ok, kinda local), but they sent out their bombers first at $4.50 and then sixers. It works so far.

 

The one recent example where a brewery entered our market and took it by storm was Firestone Walker. I think they started with a plan similar to this one. We got draft releases for Parabola, Double Jack, etc. at lots of different places and a good support network. Then we would get some of their normal 6'ers and we got all of their boxed/specialty items all over town.
That has continued. We still get all of the specialty beers and they've gradually expanded their whole (distributed) line-up to us. I know that there are still some gripes with older hoppy beers, but it appears like most of their flagships move. The boxed stuff obviously does, too.
Whatever steps they did to enter our market I'd imagine would be wise steps to follow. Having good beer doesn't hurt, but I think they took care of the intangibles very well, too.

 

The Bishops Barrel series has generally been excellent for them. But, yeah, it won't pay the bills...

FW also makes far superior beers than St. Arnold (as well as most other breweries) does IMO (as much as it pains me to admit it)...

 

Even FW seems to sit, IMO.

Not that I wasn't guilty of allowing that to happen. Union Jack is my favorite IPA but I never bought bottles of it because I could never find fresh enough sixers of it around. Nor did I ever find any local store offering them as singles. The youngest Union Jacks I would come across were, when lucky, a month and a half. If I could buy a couple singles of them, I would have (but I couldn't). And I wasn't about to buy a full sixer of it because a) I tend to have a variety of beer in my fridge at all times so getting through a sixer can be a drawn out process, by the time I would get to the last couple beers they would have been a few months old at that point and b) I could always find a sixer of Odell IPA less than a month old at the local store, and Odell IPA was a couple bucks cheaper (plus available as singles). I love Union Jack, but I also love Odell IPA...so I always went for the fresher, cheaper, and just about as good option.

 

Somewhat related to this thread, anyone have any insight as to Jack's Abby Smoke & Dagger being on tap at the Bull & Bush? I haven't run into the Minister to ask.
Any chance we might get more beers from them or was this just the B&B tossing something zany on for the hell of it?

 

Last I saw it on tap was during GABF week, and haven't seen it since, so maybe they just held onto a keg and decided to tap it now?

 

Per the fine folks at JA, that is the case. It's still drinking well, although I can't imagine there's much left in that keg if anyone is eager to try it.

 

It was a special GABF delivery BUT there may be more coming around in the future I hear. I remember around GABF being at Highland Tap and Burger drinking Hoponius Union and Mass Rising. That was awesome....