Local beer festivals; anyone still go?

I realize that my specific case is somewhat of an outlier, but I'm pretty well over them as well. There are many reasons, including the fact that my friend group tends to want to stay overnight, making it into at least a day-and-a-half thing. A few already have room reservations near the Fathers Day Fest. That's one I might go to, if we were doing a day trip.

Another factor for me, that won't apply to most other folks, is having worked, poured and volunteered at dozens, if not over a hundred, of them, they really no longer have any charm for me. Even as a 'civilian' now, they're often just too peopley for me. The music is often bad (please, just find a decent DJ, and give the shitty cover bands a rest), food options are hit or miss, and locations can kind of be a PITA for ingress/egress (that venue where winter beer fest has been, the old plane hanger place, I'm looking at you).

In short, it's a combo of event burnout and increasing curmudgeonness. Am considering Yakima FH fest this year though.

 

I regularly attended the annual Brews for New Avenues (and the Oysters & Geuze event the day before), but that festival is sadly no more. De Garde also puts on a great anniversary fest every year, though I haven't made it to the past two. I might make a return next year.

Other than that, I'll go to smaller, less "official" fests like Cask Fest at Away Days or some of the random "fests" Beermongers puts on throughout the year, but I'm not seeking out the bigger ones like I used to.

 

Picking up where @BBThunderbolt left off, beer fests have never really appealed to me, so my answer is no. I was born a curmudgeon and don’t enjoy crowds, lines, or most other aspects of what I imagine a typical beer fest to entail. I don’t even really like going out to drink (you may have noticed that 99% of my WNWBAYDN posts feature the same 6 square inches of my kitchen counter). The following statement may be considered heresy on this site, and especially on this regional forum, but for me beer has always been something that enhances/complements whatever else I happen to be doing, and is seldom the destination in and of itself. So it would take a lot to motivate me to attend one of these events. I hope they keep happening for folks who enjoy them though. Given the younger generations’ aversion to alcohol in general and beer in particular, I could see these fests getting smaller and less frequent going forward. C’est la vie.

 

Yeah, I see that, and sorta feel that way sometimes. But, often, beer is the spark that starts a get-together. Like our annual BW share, or bottleshares in general. Giving folks a hard time, date, and place is often the nudge folks need. I see some former coworkers, and friends who are a bit more out of the orbit these days at stuff like this. For example, this past Saturday, took a couple buses down to Everett to go to a beer thing with friends. Probably wouldn't have just gone down there to pet the dog and chit-chat for a couple hours.

 

I haven't gone to any fests for quite a few years. Like @Orca just about 100% of my drinking is done at home because as I've gotten older I've become more aware of what one drink does to me physically. Some of that is age and a decreasing tolerance, and some of that is just listening to my body more (in related, my wife used to enjoy fruity wild ales but not anymore, so I'm the only drinker). I'm also the driver in the house and have zero desire to Uber/Lyft just so I can drink, so all that combined makes it so if it's not canned or bottled I'm probably not drinking it.

 

I have basically stopped going. I always enjoyed them, but it was always a hot afternoon in the middle of the summer and it was too crowded, and I too quickly got drunk
So I decided there are other ways I like to try beers - just visiting brew pubs, where I can sit in the cool and savor my beers.

 

For me and my social circle it’s kind of the opposite. Most of my friends don’t drink much or at all, and those who do tend not to drink beer or aren’t as enthusiastic about it as I am. My wife, who would be my most natural drinking buddy under other circumstances, doesn’t drink at all. The bottle shares I’ve been invited to through folks on here have never worked with my schedule. But kind of like what I said above, pretty much all of my friendships have formed around some other foundation—old college friends, people who were going through early parenthood the same time we were, etc.—and beer has always served as a backdrop and not the main event.

I could see, if you’ve worked in the industry (as I know you have), friendships would naturally form with folks you work with and encounter in the brewing world. To me, as a civilian, it seems about as likely that I’d start hanging out with other beer lovers as I would with people who also happen to like chili or football or something. Again, I’m a born curmudgeon.

 

So, back in the day, Strangebrew in Port Townsend was where you'd go for 'different' beers; wacky, off-the-wall beers made with cereal, or booze, or pastries, or spices, or whatever, in them. That's just a random taplist these days.

Us nerds want beers at a fest that we can't find just anywhere, or at least we want new-to-us breweries. The casual beer consumer likes going to events like Fathers Day Fest, because they can try a bunch of different beers that they might like well enough to grab at the grocery store. The breweries are in the middle: they want to bring flagships that the casual consumer might grab a sixer of or order at the neighborhood bar, but, they also want us more in-depth consumers to stop by their booth, so need to bring something to attract us. But, can they brew a whole 10 bbl (or whatever) batch of a special beer for us, that then might just sit in kegs for a length of time?

I cannot tell you the number of times when I was pouring for Boundary that I would get this 2-sided coin of a question: how come you didn't bring Scotch Ale (insert their favorite), that's my jam, and the next person would ask, why'd you bring Scotch Ale, I can get that anywhere. It's a fine line for the breweries.

Pre-COVID, we were going to at least one fest a weekend, and often more (sometimes multiple on the same day) every weekend, May-September. Who is supposed to staff that many events? The sales/delivery/brewery folks who are already working 5 day weeks? They know the beer the best, but they have lives. Do you take your best bartenders/servers on busy summer weekends, and ask them to give up those good paying shifts? Volunteers/friends of the brewery? That's how I got in, but I had more overall beer knowledge than an average patron, and could read the tasting notes and have a chat with the brewers, and so could answer most basic questions reasonably well. But other folks sometimes struggled with that aspect.

Add in our friends at LCB running stings and giving organizers more and more hoops to jump through, and it became a question of looking at where the scale of value things balanced out for a fest. We would do all the Brewers Guild events, and eventually just had to be pickier about which ones we went to. I wonder what value breweries are seeing in fests these days. Structures doesn't do fests, even the local ones, they just send Max Higbee Center a check instead of pouring at April Brews Day in town. They have no trouble selling their beer, why deal with the headaches?

 

I live in a rural area that only manages one genuine beer festival locally each year. It's a fundraiser for the local homebrew club + a local charity they designate each year. I've been a few times and its...fine. The local brewers, a couple regional ones (usually one's that are trying to get better sales in our market) and some big corporate one's that i assume just have a regional sales team with a "outreach/brew fest" line item that they need to fill.

Anymore, drinking a bunch of beers I can get anytime in a park with some local music isn't something I'm going to go out of my way for. I can do that at basically all of the local summer events that go on.

There's a couple that I'd still like to hit like the Firestone Walker Invitational, the Bistro DIPA Competition, Zwanze Day, FoBAB, and a Fresh Hop Fest. But I'm not that motivated to chase even those.

 

I think the only issue is getting the ticket and getting to Paso. The 3 big hotels are all about a quarter mile from the venue.

But traveling and the tickets and hotels and all that is definitely an expense.

That's the real kicker with the good festivals (and I don't think this applies to just beer fests), the cost is so high that you're quickly into a tier where you could do many other things with that money.

For me, I could drive to Paso in a day and make some stops to see various friends on the way home. But if you're having to fly into the area to begin with its almost got to be one piece of a larger trip to the area to make sense.

 

I’m just as interested in local fests as I’ve always been, but now I care more about the details of the venue (water stations, bathrooms, shaded areas, etc.). Bend Brewfest became a little too much in the later years, but beer events here have always felt pretty relaxed and remain so.

 

Yeah, I still like the smaller/newer fests. There was one in Sedro-Wooley the September before COVID. Only 12-14 breweries, and we all knew each other, and we'd take turns watching each others tables while floating around and socializing. Add in that it was all Sedro locals, dressed for Saturday night at 3pm (cowboy hats, tight jeans with rhinestones on the pockets, etc), and that the beers were notably stronger than Curz Lite, on a hot, sunny day, and by the end of the event some attendees were, uh, in distress.

Good times.

 

I mostly stopped going a couple years ago when I moved out to the southern fringes of Spokanistan, far from the local.beer scene. I did go to Grainmaker last year but made a point of sticking to public transportation, which was something of a hassle. Now, with my newfound health issues, I don't see a scenario where I can drink enough beer in one day to offset the price of entree enough to make it worthwhile.

 

Local? We may make a small beer festival once a year usually tied to a sporting event or fundraiser.

Overall, we usually only go to one's in Denver where my son and his wife "drag" my wife and I. Over the past five years, we have been to Collaboration Fest, GABF, and one other small one.

With my wife and I getting older, it's a little too much for us. Still, I would like to get back to FW Invitational one more time (been twice) and I'm going to look at going to Dark Lord Day next year.

I do love the Seattle beer scene. Over the last three years, we were up their at least 2-3 times a year to visit my son and his family. However, they just moved in with us. So, no more visiting Seattle for a while!

 

been following DLD for years, went maybe 4 times prior to 2010. wanted to check it out again too. making it about death metal bands definitely curbed my excitement, but for the first time in a while they are easing up on rules/lines/etc. this year.. probably means popularity is waning which means i wouldn't wait too long, but you're probably in a sweet spot of post-hype DLD

 

My IPA-loving wife and I are going to the Lupulin Ecstasy Festival at Fort George in June. They always have a fantastic selection of IPAs (and a few not-IPAs when you need to reset your lupulin threshold). Other plusses: short lines, not too many people, free Lüp hop water, and they usually have really good bands. Plus: baby goats!

We're thinking about making this one a day trip. We can catch the morning Point bus to Astoria right up the street from Vurt Manor, and the late afternoon bus home from Astoria will drop us at the same spot around 9 that night.