VA Eagle Questions

My understanding is that VA Eagle had the option of getting more regular and no variants or variants with a lesser amount of regular and volume overall. You obviously see what option was chosen.

 

If that's true, then:

Dear VA Eagle, next year do the opposite. Please and thank you!

 

Don't forget that if you don't move the year rounds and mainstays, places aren't likely to get special releases as much. Places that move basic stuff are going to get rewarded.

 

I often wonder where the GI sales at Busch Gardens go into that count. I feel like someone is hiding cases of rare behind Alpengeist.

 

I dont know if this is 100% accurate, but someone had posted on a local Facebook group that Rare and Regal did not pass VA label approval in time. So, it could be an issue that is out of GI and the distributors hands.

 

I think you misread, they said the labels were never even submitted for approval in VA. Probably because they knew they didn't order any.

 

WE WANT RARE! WE WANT RARE!

 

Places I've asked about any varietals have said "they're coming" and then have changed to "we're probably getting screwed" so aside from some BW in SE VA, yeah, nothing makes it here.

Except what might be behind the Festhaus...

 

Regal Rye was VA ABC label approved on 9/15/2015

https://www.abc.virginia.gov/tmtax/...sp?approvalCode=91622&approvalDate=09/15/2015

 

From conversations I had with an owner and manager from a couple of bottle shops that I'm close with: apparently VA Eagle hired a new main purchaser from outside the industry, who did not have a good grasp of what to order. The result was what dsigmon mentioned above, with little to no variants and more regular available.

This appears to be the first year where larger allotments went to the large grocery stores that sell the most amount of regular GI beers over the year. One of the shops I mentioned above only sells the GI specialty releases and got NO BCBS period this year, while Leesburg Wegmans was practically swimming in it. Other small shops got very small amounts, where as a buddy saw a stack at his local Giant of all places.

 

So basically this guy from outside the industry looked at it as, "I can buy more BCBS and generate much more revenue from this than getting less overall quantity from BCBS and the variants." Sounds like a typical business decision was made based on $$. Maybe he should have created his own variant system and ordered both the 14.3 and 13.7 abv. I'm guessing VAE only distributed the 13.7% since that's all I have seen where I am. Or maybe it was just a random draw of who gets what abv I know parts of Richmond had both.

 

I had assumed (I know, shouldn't) that they only got the 13.7 because that's all I saw but now I'd like to know if anyone in VA was able to get the 14.3.

I'd really like to try both - definitely felt like BCBS was way less hot this year than last year but maybe the 14.3 is more like the past couple years?

 

I did see someone post on a local group that Richmond definitely got both. I think the 14.3% was spotted at TW and then many of the bottles shops got 13.7. NOVA also appeared to have both but in neither case did one store get both abvs. I think NOVA Wegman's got 14.3 from what I remember but also appeared NOVA got a lot more 14.3 than the lower. I was also hoping to try both if I could come across them.

 

Sure seems like it, as if the new buyer did not understand this market's high demand for those rarer variants. Now again I can't confirm this is truly the case so take it for what it's worth, I am just regurgitating what those guys said who are obviously a lot closer connected than we are. But one told me that apparently VA got only 14 cases of BCBCS overall and all was distributed in NoVA; but even then save for a couple Total Wines, I never saw/heard of any other places getting some especially out here in Loudoun Co. Even my usual bar spots that I've always been able to count on getting the variants in past years got mostly shut out this time (one got a few bottles of BW but that was it- he was NOT happy about it).

Got a few bottles from Wegmans so I will check which ABV they are when I get home tonight.

 

Sounds like the same story as one of my local shops in Albemarle County. Apparently the buyer was promised months ago that they would get at least BW and Coffee but then found out a couple weeks before Black Friday that he would only be getting regular. He was not very happy either but it does make a little more sense now about a new buyer coming on board and that changed some things that were promised.

 

The thing that sticks out to me is what in the name of holy hell was that sales rep doing offering TWO cases of a variant to a neighborhood bar?????? That allocation list gets very dicey and unless RIC got walloped by like a pallet of coffee, that stuff should have been destined for big off premise movers. Hook the bar up with a sixtel of regular, maybe do a takeover at some point but offering two cases of coffee just doesn't sound right at all.

 

That would make sense then, as the whole idea that only NoVA got BCBCS didn't seem accurate considering practically no places got any. Not surprised to hear that the bar offering GI on tap all year was offered a sweet deal like that; like I mentioned before it seems InBev is now more concerned with allocating BCBS and variants to those accounts that sell the most during the year, regardless if it makes no sense for non-craft locations to get a specialty product that they would have more trouble moving.

Oh well.. love me some BCBCS, it's my favorite beer, but what are you gonna do? Plenty of other beers to drink at the end of the day.