beer date question

I was wondering how long it could take to go cross-country like that. It would have to take at least 2-3 days by truck, given rules for driver rest, etc. Might have to be transferred along the way and might sit for a while. Could take 7-10 days altogether.

BTW - we encounter people thinking South Dakota must be in the deep South someplace, because hey it's in the name!

 

I was honestly sitting here thinking that out, with 2-3 days being what I estimated for the initial trucking as well. I have a friend who works for a beer distributor, I'll ask him how long from the time beer arrives until it reaches the retailer and get back to you. I will admit two weeks does seem like a quick turnaround, not from point A to point B, but factoring in how long sit sits and how many times it's handled before it hits the shelf. I see Jesskidden's point about conditioning time as a factor in my month old comment, however I'm basing it on time from boxed and dated to shelf.

 

No assurances which will be fresher - so keep checking dates.

As far as being messier - both cans and bottles are recyclable, though there are places to take cans and get money for the aluminum. Glass is good for recycling if your garbage service picks up recyclables, as is required in many areas. Here, we have a big wheeled recycling bin we just throw cans, bottles, cardboard, newspapers, etc in and no sorting.

 

Dave, I have the same situation in my area (SEPA). Lots of 'old' Sierra Nevada beers on my local beer retailers shelves.

Cheers!

 

What do you mean by "you people"

 

Sorta weird, isn't it? Kinda difficult to get from Chico, CA or Mills River, NC via truck to Maine without going through PA, NJ and/or NY (well, I guess they could go through Canada or maybe it's transported via ocean-going container ship?) so all that fresh SN is going right by us...

 

JK, kinda funny in that I had a long conversation with the manager of one of my local beer distributors yesterday. One of the topics of conversation was why is there so much 'old' Firestone Walker beers around our area. I went on to suggest that I think it is because of the Wholesale Distributor (Origlio) that handles FW in our area. It just so happens that Origlio is also the Wholesale Distributor that handles Sierra Nevada.

I have zero insight into how Origlio conducts their business but I have a theory that they order big shipments (to obtain bulk discounts?) and then just let these beers 'sit' at their HUGE warehouse and slowly release these beer to their retail accounts over an extended period of time.

Maybe @Troutbeerbum lives in an area where his local Wholesale Distributor conducts business differently? Maybe his Wholesale Distributor doesn't have the space to warehouse pallet upon pallet upon pallet of beers and instead orders the beer on an as needed basis?

Who knows?

Cheers!

 

I still hold the brewery accountable. It is their product. They are not blind and see this practice going on. Honestly I feel they need to stop it. I see this crap going on a lot. Guys buy loads of beer and trickle it out as their accounts call for more. Only issue is when they restock its with old beer. Anymore I just stop buying from any brewery that sees this and cares more about money than their end product and consumer. I talk to local guys and they hate their beer sitting and even send out less so the stock is used up fast. Seems like some care and some really don't. In the end people still buy because most don't even know beer has a date. LOL
Cheers

 

Don't get me wrong I see "old" SN often, maybe I just hit it right to find some that is only dated a month out, but it seems to be the norm to find SN reasonably fresh. Then again, I don't buy beer at gas stations either, for the very reason this thread was started.
Now, at the same grocery store, they have regional locals that are dated in August and left out on the shelves so who knows.

 

I agree, usually I see SN about 2 mos out. Some days its a little fresher others little older. But as a whole if I look at the better stores I can get it fresh. Most times the small stores that sell a few beers are the issue, they get last dibs on distro and usually its the left over crap. They buy it up and their customers are not worried about dates.

 

Okay just heard back from my friend who delivers beer for one of the major distributors here in Maine. My question was, How long from the time beer arrives until it is delivered to the retailer?
His reply: "All depends on how popular it is and if we have any on hand, if we don't have any on hand it goes out the next day"

So, theoretically, giving 14 days for conditioning, (I'm speculating here, but let's say 3 days for packaging, handling,loading etc.) 2-4 days for shipment, 1-2 days at the distributor, 1 day from retailer to shelf, you could realistically be purchasing beer 24 days from the time it was bottled. Of course this is only estimating, and I could be way off, but it's possible.

 

So a distributor buy's loads of stuff from the brewery and a retailer buys lots of stuff from the distributor and that's the brewery's fault? So what would you recommend a brewery do to solve the problem? After all distributors and retailers are adult decision makers who supposedly know their own local business better than a brewery several hundred miles away.

 

I would suggest the brewery take some of their hard earned cash and make a trip to the stores and look at all their old garbage sitting on shelves. Then they can drive/fly to the distributor and look and their inventory and how they move it. At that time they can make a business decision on how much they will allow a distributor to buy. If they are buying a lot of beer to cut costs then sitting on it and screwing the end user it is a problem? Making an excuse for the brewery is a joke, oh those poor souls they don't have time to monitor their product is a cop out. That is called being cheap and lazy, and its apparent by their crap sitting on shelves gathering dust. If you are in a business then you need to monitor your product from tank to shelf and then keep it fresh as intended, not hard.
I see this stuff happening all the time. I speak to a brewery and they tell me we ship up to you every two weeks. Then I go to the store and see 3 month old beer sitting there and when replaced it is with 2 mos old beer. Meanwhile I know they are getting new stuff bi-weekly. So that is crap, they are sitting on new stuff and tossing old garbage out.
Anyway not starting an argument but I don't care how far a brewery is from their end user, they made the decision to sell it there then they need to be proactive and watch their product.

 

Very interesting perspective.

 

Nah, too busy posting the latest round of metal band themed brewery merch on Insta and booking only the crunchiest of hipster food trucks for the brewery's parking lot after the local 5k/bike race slash rollerderby, which will start immediately following our weekly kegs and eggs premier league viewing party which will also have a crowdsourced yet fully sustainable doughnut hole food truck and cold brew on cask with vaporized bourbon from heaven hill and all organic yet unionized cigar rolling direct from newly liberated Cuba. We don't have time to see if the beers are selling or even drinkable.

 

I guess all I am saying is that a company should be aware of what they sell. We all know the companies that usually do well, these breweries take an extra interest in making sure their products are as fresh as possible, others well they really don't care. I just get upset when companies get a pass. They are in the business of selling a product with spoilage and they should have the proper controls in place to ensure things are as they should be.
Sure they have Distro/Retail down the chain, but they need to control them better. If they know piles of beer are purchased and never moving then they need to nip that in the butt fast. Its a money game sure, but if your guys down the food chain are destroying your image then they need to go.

 

LOL that is pretty awesome..

 

Maybe BA could do us a solid and add another column to our ratings for freshness. Maybe once breweries start having stats collected on who is selling fresh beer and who is not they may act. They are all happy to use BA ratings or Untapped ratings, etc. when selling their beers, you see that all the time. Maybe these same sites should reward/shame companies based on their product quality and dating? I would be all in on that.
Or am I being too over the top LOL.

Just add a row that says (Months Old 1-12). Then when data is accumulated we could get an average of age per beer and maker....

 

And for the larger breweries they do since they have local beer reps. The problem in my area is that these local sales reps do little to nothing as regards having old product on retailer shelves. As near as I can figure out these sales reps are not financially rewarded for addressing old product on retailers shelves.

Cheers!