Deep River Collaboration without representation

I believe there's been a large line every year. It does sell out fast at the brewery. Great beer.

 

The line was maybe half of what it was last year!

The double coffee varient only lasted on tap until like 11:45am!

 

Kind of a good thing right? I like less lines and more distro of excellent beers.

 

Not so good as an indicator of the problems that are plaguing the industry. The tourists are moving on and the over-capacity is starting to bite the producers.

I went to the BASC release last year and I don't think there were more than 50 people there when the release started, maybe much less. How is that good for Foothills?

 

It's probably not a good thing for Foothills.

That doesn't mean it's not a good thing overall.

Maybe increased competition will lead some established breweries to fail. Maybe it will force them to up their game. Either way, as a consumer I'm seeing an increase in the quality and availability of beer.

The goal shouldn't be to see every brewery succeed.

I doubt either Deep River or Foothills rely too heavily on these limited releases for their bottom line anyway.

 

I don't think that's the case at all.

For years NC has been 'starved' of having good craft beer. You never had 'tourists' going to Deep River can releases, come on man.

Why do I need to go stand in line for bottles/cans that are going to make it to my local bottle shop? Collab cans have every year, so there is little incentive to stand in line.

As for places like Foothills? Look at the craft brew scene, if they aren't willing to change things up, people are going to tire of standing in line overnight for the same beer every year, one that also is making it to distro.

Look at Burial's opening two weeks ago, its one off beers that aren't going to go to distro that Burial wants control over how they are sold, and people waited in line for 2+ hours for some IPAs.

Its not an issue with over-capacity, its simply and issue with quality. If you are going to charge $5+ for a can of beer, it better be some top tier beer.

 

You are taking my comment about tourists too literally. It refers to folks that came to craft beer a few years ago when it was hot and now have moved on to other beverages.

The Burial situation was an opening in a new location so I don't find that argument compelling.

I will give you a counter example. I go to Richmond once a year on a Tuesday and my first stop is at Veil. Two or three years ago, the line was out of control. This past year, perhaps 20 or 30 were in line.

Also, the BASC release featured the coffee variant for the first time and it was superb. Still, that hardly attracted any attention.

I also read an article the other day that some of the top sour-only breweries were seeing lowered demand for their products and were moving into clean fermentation products.

I agree with the above posts that, with increased capacity, the mediocre producers will go by the wayside. But there is no denying that craft beer's popularity among the mass culture is waning and it will be an increasing challenge for all breweries to find their niche. Some will succeed and some will fail.

 

I don't think that interest in craft beer is waning at all, if anything I would guess that it's still increasing, just not at the same pace that...

New breweries are opening.
Established breweries are increasing production. (Burial, Fonta Flora, Hi-Wire)
NC breweries are increasing distribution. (Bhavana, Heist, New Anthem)
Out of state breweries start distributing to NC. (Funky Buddha, Firestone Walker, Hardywood)

 

Yeah, cant agree about the Veil situation either, people literally waited in line for 12 hours to get their limited releases on Black Friday.

I for one am enjoying the way craft is moving, as every Dick and Jane have started their own craft brewery thinking it was easy money, there are a now lot of external factors (ie competition) to produce the best quality beer.

Simply adding coffee to a boring, tired stout aged 6 months or less in bourbon barrels isn't going to draw out the crowds anymore, and it never would have in other craft beer heavy states.

We may not agree on the positive or negative of this, but I know one thing, I can get better and better beers at my local shops and on tap than I ever have in the past, and I think everyone can agree that's a pretty darn awesome thing. Cheers!

 

When will this hit the local Triangle area bottle shops for distribution?

 

It’s supposed to hit stores “this week.”

And yeah, there was not very many people at the BASC release this year. I think I arrived at 9am and was like the 60-70th person in line. That coffee varient is delicious though, and I’m very glad I still have two bottles of it!