Breweries Indirectly Using BA as a Marketing Plan

Dave, I had the pleasure to meet up with Shane Welch when I attended HomebrewCon in Portland (2018). My wife and I met him for a few beers and dinner at a Portland craft beer bar/restaurant. He was a very nice person and I greatly enjoyed meeting him in person and discussing a myriad of topics. He is a very intelligent person and very well versed on a number of topics (i.e., not just beer).

Just like you over the years I have 'jousted' with Shane on the topics you mentioned (and others) but throughout he was always a gentleman in our discussions and I always felt like he listened. One of the topics I discussed numerous times was that Sixpoint should have a canned on date and while it took a few years of 'debate' he did eventually put the canned on dates on the bottom of the cans (along with a best by date).

I too have experienced quality issues with Sixpoint beers (principally on the beers being produced at The Lion Brewery). In private e-mail discussions, over a period of a few years, I consistently lobbied to Shane that he needed to make a change here. Again, it took a while but he did change production from the Lion to having the beers produced at a City Brewing in Memphis, TN. And the quality of those beers was much improved IMO.

I wish Shane well in whatever it is that he is doing now.

Cheers!

 

To me this is how the relationship with BA that OP discusses can work the best, when there is pleasant dialogue, mutual respect, and genuine interest on both sides.

I too wish Shane well, and I too thought the brews improved at City for sure, and I told him so, and changed a review too with the better example(s) he sent to me..

 

I agree with that statement 100%.

We BA's will not always agree but ad homenim posts are counterproductive to discourse.

Cheers!

 

Looks like you're the only one who will

 

Have to ever tried Costco Oatmeal raisin cookies, run right out and buy some of those bad boys. Almost as good as Tasteycakes, I’m an advocate for Jelly or Butterscotch Krimpets. Lol.

 

Have you had Butterscotch Krimpets lately? Not the same as when we were kids, unfortunately.

Non-cheers to cheapening of products!!

 

I haven’t, why mess with perfection, I expect them to make them smaller, but they were the best.

 

I agree that they "were" indeed the best.

Oh well, the only constant is change!?!

Cheers!

 

I am fairly certain that back in the day a certain big box chain liquor store/bottle shop in the southeast US used to have little tabs by highly rated beers indicating their BA ratings. I have no problem with them, and in fact actually like it. Not so much now as I’m a pretty educated consumer, but when I was first getting into craft it was helpful. This is very common for stores selling wine (“Wine Enthusiast rates x”, “James Suckling gives Y points”, etc). Sure it might be a marketing technique but as long as the company isn’t somehow cheating to skew the ratings I have no beef with it. I still use these as starting places when buying wine as I’m much more of a novice.

 

I have a number of times seen these tags where a vintage 201x is discussed but the wines in the bin were of vintage 201y. IMO the store is conducting misrepresentation when they do this.

Cheers!

 

I disagree with that.

 

I love wine as well, Im particularly prone to buy Red Zins. I can tell the difference between a $9 bottle of wine and say a $30 bottle. But I can’t say that’s the case with $15 bottles to those $30. My break point in wines is in that $15 a bottle, because I can’t tell the difference. Total Wine does Wine Enthusiast ratings, and this is Joes favorite wine who’s a store employee. Those store employee recommendations usually if not always are $30-35 bottles of wine, I’d keel over if the store pick was $10. They’re trying to influence you to not only buy the more expensive bottle, but at the worst influence you to slide back into the $15-20 bottle range, they're saying stay away from the cheap shit.

 

At the risk of trying to put words into someone else’s mouth I think the contention that he’s trying to convey is that the guy was disingenuous. More of a salesman than an advocate of beer. Using the website solely for self promotion. The thought being that a true beer advocate who was that involved with the site on a near daily basis would be passionate enough about beer to continue to contribute to the site even if his chance for personal gain from it was over. If that’s the beef I can see that. More of a businessman than a beer lover.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but if people think that’s unique I’d be inclined to strongly disagree. At least nowadays it seems like the majority of people in craft are more profit driven/business minded people then they are die hard, advocating beer lovers. For most people, it seems, it’s a business more than anything. I would say that even holds true for many (perhaps most) of these “ah shucks, i’m just here with my little craft brewery trying to survive, help me out and support local” folks. Perhaps that just the jaded vet in me who hasn’t exactly loved the way the scene has evolved over the past decade or so.

 

C’mon feel the noise!!

 

Dale, have you considered the Total Wine top 20 wines of 2020 list:

https://www.totalwine.com/top-20-wines-of-2020

There are three wines there that are less than 10 bucks (9.99).

Are you keeled over right now!?!

Cheers!

 

I can’t get the link to open, if thats Red Zins, I’d bet the Zen of Zins is on the list.


Try Oak Ridge the non Reserve one, at 2x the cost the reserve is about the same for me. Red Zin from Lodi Ca, maybe $13 it’s a staple here, reserve maybe $27. After these fires I bet the prices will skyrocket.

 

The only Zinfandel that made the top 20 list is:

DOUBLE BLACK ZINFANDEL PASO ROBLES, 2018

14 bucks a bottle.

And there is Sierra Nevada Dankful IPA at my 'local' Total Wine & More store.

Cheers!

 

I’ve had Double Black before, it’s good. Still prefer Oak Ridge.

 

The only oatmeal I like is in a porter or stout. And my latest sugar over-indulgence is Keebler Deluxe Grahams.