Are there issues with our distributors?

I think it is a delibrate decision by the companies due to the competitiveness of our market. We have so many choices and nothing undermines a sense of urgency that you must buy like stuff sitting on the shelf. They like the threads about cases of Abyss and BCBS flying off the shelf in hours. They act like they hate them but they love truck chasers. They are focusing on locations where it will fly off the shelf and limiting us to the amount that will be gone within hours.

 

Did it not fly off the shelves here? I seem to remember 95% of all stores in Mpls selling out in under 24 hours while many other states had it sitting for months. KBS was a ghost here and all over in places like NC.
I'm guessing it's our homerism. When we aren't drinking the limited releases, MN people tend to drink local. This hurts our allotments of out of state beers. I would say people need to drink more founders GI and whatever else it takes but I don't even have the will power to do it myself.

 

But you are getting some..

 

I've been saying the same thing myself. Years ago there was never an issue finding at least the standard sitting on shelves for a couple days, even weeks. Now it sounds like we'll be lucky to even find any on the shelves. And if we do, we'd be lucky to find 4 packs NOT split up.

I guess I'm happy to have built up a nice stockpile to cellar over the years. Helps to have vintages to fall back on when the current pickings are slim. But if this keeps up there will no longer be a cellar to fall back on.

 

Did I miss something?
You say the only way you're going get some BCBS is by trading.
Aren't you being a little premature with your presumption of being shut out?
Last I checked, MN stores hadn't received their shipments yet.

Yeah, it's going to be tough - I get that.

Also, I've heard numerous reports that we're getting more Abyss than last year.

 

I passed up BCBS about a dozen times last year at stores that weren't the most visitied craft spots because I got my case from Herritage. It flew off the shelf at the "craft specialty" places but I saw it for at least a month in other places. KBS was dificult to get, I grant you, but BCBS was easier to get last year than Backwoods this year.

 

BCBS did land in Duluth and Superior on Friday. I know someone who scored a few 4 packs and a couple bottles of Coffee.

 

Why did Iowa, South Dakota, and every other state on the east coast that has Deschutes get Abyss more than 2 weeks ago? Yet its still not here yet?

Something HAS to be going on regarding the distribution channels here. Either someone is constantly dropping the ball or ?

 

CHRIST people! The beer is coming... it is in the state and will be released this week. All of this entitled BS is plain childish. With on of the busiest weeks of the year this week, do you think that the distributor are a bit busy doing their normal routs. I know that sticking an extra 30 cases of beer on a truck may not be a big deal, but that takes up space from beer that the store ran out of. Insert your "they could have excuses here".

After speaking to stores throughout many years of buying beer, many hate these releases. 1,000 phone calls from people who probably will never step in their store again; or at least until the next "special" release. The beer will be there, at best a few hours and most only buy that one release. Spend some of that money on some MN beers.

Just think of the shit show if we did have a Black Friday release event and every store put it out when they opened. I would love to see the bitching about how someone got screwed because the store they were at only got 2 cases and everyone got just one bottle.

Rant over.

 

We're getting less BCBS this year, but there was a lot of it last year, and it did linger on shelves and a lot of mom and pops had it. It doesn't make sense to do that again this year when GI is expanding to new markets. And it's not the new markets are swimming in it, it sounds like a few major stores get deliveries and it sells out pretty quick.

 

Lets just wait til bcbs and abyss actually hit shelves before we trade away cellars. If I've learned anything the last three weeks it would be liquor stores and distributors don't seem to really know/want to tell us the truth until the products are in stores.

 

Sounds like good advice. Just like people making trades when they don't have the beer, stores don't want to say what they are getting because they MIGHT not get what they were told.

 

Where is LifeOfBrian when you need him.

 

This is from a perspective of someone who moved to Minneapolis recently from metro Detroit

Specialty releases literally fly off the shelves in metro Detroit. I have found things like backwoods bastard, devil dancer, many stone specialty releases (although overpriced) sitting on the shelves weeks after release whereas if I was still in metro Detroit I'd have to go the day the stores received it or I was out of luck.

What I'm trying to say is that there is a very passionate craft beer community in the twin cities but it is no where near as large as it is in many other communities. This could be a reason why when breweries like GI who make very limited quantities of their BCBS releases, send less to the twin cities.

 

I wish I knew where these mom and pop stores were where all of this BCBS was apparently lingering. All the places I look are out in no time flat, and yes, I do try stores that are off the beaten path.

I think I'm most irritated by the BCBS situation because I (naively) understood the sale of Goose Island to Anheiser Busch would increase the production capacity of the brewery, increasing the amount of BCBS available. I get that it takes a long time to make and locks up a lot of barrel space, but I have to say, my patience with GI and BCBS is pretty much shot. I love this beer. It's my favorite beer. Clearly there's a demand for more to go to the craft beer places in the Twin Cities metro, and I shouldn't have to run over to the Ale Jail or Heritage or Cellars within 15 minutes of their making it available in the middle of a workday to get some. Just give them a freaking larger allotment already. BCBS used to be available all the time, but that hasn't been the case for several years now. I'm sick of the excuses. I'm tired of having to figure out how to navigate whatever distribution or logistical wrinkles are preventing it from being available. Poop to you, Goose Island.

(I know, I know... first world problems. But it is pretty annoying.)

 

Please read this. Maybe next year will be better for all the truck chasers...

http://chicagoist.com/2012/04/16/the_honk_heard_round_the_world_goos.php#photo-1

 

mmm...year round BCBS...Yes please.

Sounds like ABI didnt **** GI of its crafty spirit. Having access to a gas chromatograph olfactory mass spectromer is pretty cool. I wonder if sour beer has ever been studied scientifically on this level before. Lets just hope this makes GI a bunch of money off their BA beers so ABI keeps dumping money into the expansion of their barrel programs Because sometimes I feel like a BCBS in the middle of July damnit