Bourbon County 2018

The couple of local, smaller spots that I frequent, always seem to get their delivery the week after Black Friday now.

 

A lot yeah, but if all Binny's but LP are getting like 6 bottles of Reserve, the math still says most of those variants are gone BF day.

With that being said, there's also the large drop WF does (usually the week after?).

You know, I just realized--LP opening at 7am actually sucks for everyone, because a lot of the people in line are just going to migrate over to the next nearest Binny's (that opens at 9). Maybe Jewel is the better play this year...

 

Shhhhh.

We want everyone and their uncle to go to Binny's LP.

 

Yeah, I thought about that while I was typing. In fairness, LP is the best bet if time is no object, and you're okay sleeping outside for 2 days without a tent.

 

Right. Was like $40 I think for NW last year.

 

That assumes there won't be lines at the other Binny's or that they will have a larger allocation than we expect.

 

As someone who's haunted the other Binny's the past few years, don't hold your breath that you'll be able to double-dip on variants. There's folks lining up at the other locations long early and they usually only have variants for the first 20-60 people in line. Prop is always closer to that first number rather then the last.

 

I always had a great time, but i mean, it's my event, i owned it and fretted over it continually so it was rewarding to buck the fuck up and do the thing and see it all come to fruition. Now it's equally rewarding to not have to think about it.

Looking at the blog this year, i think their decision to do overnight wristbands/line enforcement/7am open are all good ideas. Loosening up the purse strings for additional staff and security is worth it to make sure you guys have a great time and less shit to complain about.

 

Let's be honest, no matter what is done, in the whole Black Friday equation that will always be the constant.

 

A g..g..g..ghost!

 

Bourbon County has to be the biggest hyped beer that doesn’t have the Independent Craft beer seal on their bottle. I think this shows that beer drinkers no longer care if the beer they buy is from a small craft brewery or a big beer company.

 

Oh yeah. No. They definitely don't. For sure. I never hear about it.

 

In fairness, Goose is still a local company to a lot of us in Chicago, so the people making the beer are still "local." I typically am a "buy local" guy when it comes to beer, and while I don't buy a lot of GI stuff (because most of the stuff I enjoy isn't bottled/canned), BCBS being brewed and bottled 20 minutes away is good enough for me.

 

I think it just shows there isn't a viable alternative yet. The local brewer has disrupted most styles of beer, but really has not been able to unseat GI for bourbon barrel stouts because demand for top bourbon barrel stouts is still outpacing supply. Yes, local brewers can do these styles as good as or if not better than GI, but they have nowhere near the supply. How much of this does GI make and all the variants sell quickly. If there were equal or better quality alternatives available to meet demand I think you'd see a lot of people moving away from GI based on the "macro" association. The problems with local brewers BBA stouts is they either aren't that good, if they are that good they don't package them, or they don't distro them, or you have to wait in a long line/raffle/etc. for a chance to get a limited item that more often that not isn't worth the hassle to obtain. GI just puts enough of this stuff out to give the masses the belief they can obtain it.

 

I think there's some truth to that, but I also find it hard to believe that all things being equal, everyone would drop Bourbon County. Honestly, I'd probably at least grab Prop every year, even if there were another stout from a local place that tasted exactly the same and had a similar price point and availability. But you're definitely right that people still buy BCBS because it's still king.

 

It'd be hard to completely unseat it, but there are plenty of people I know whose only exposure to ba stouts is BCS. They'll load up on a case or so and be done for the year. That could change.

 

To be clear, I'm not talking about anyone outside of Chicago (since I was talking about the local angle). Hell, I'm barely talking about close suburbs. It's entirely understandable that anyone not extremely local (and even some who are) would have no loyalty to Goose.

 

They may not have loyalty, but I've found that there's a pretty serious overlap between the people who know enough about beer to care about InBev, and the people who know where to get good alternatives.

Anecdotally, most of my out of state beer friends are pretty pumped for bourbon county every year.

 

I know last year there were a few liquor stores in WI that decided to stop carrying Goose Island. They were not happy because they only received BCBS and no variants. These stores had carried GI products since they were distributed in WI.

Myself, what other people buy is none of my business. There are so much good beer out there that I don’t go out of my way for BCBS. Black Friday is for getting the new vinyl from Record Store Day.