Do I have anything good here?

Welcome to BA!

It completely depends on what you're looking to trade for. Locals for locals? You've got some decent beers that many people don't get (Westbrook Gose, Ballast Point Sculpin and VaS, Prairie Bomb, Founder's Breakfast Stout, Bell's Expedition Stout, etc.) and I'm sure you could find someone to trade with. If you're looking to land "bigger" beers like Proprietor's, Duck Duck Gooze, Cantillon, Hunahpu's, etc. it won't be very likely that you'll find a taker.

 

You've also got access to Creature Comforts which I did a trade for. And I don't understand why Silent Night doesn't get any love.

 

You will have a lot of 'working up' to do. Don't take it the wrong way, but whales don't usually trade for quantity of non whales. People who have those whales already have, can get, or just don't want those non whales. Whales trade for whales.

 

Put in the leg work to travel to big beer releases or hunt down hard-to-get limited releases. As paulys55 said, working your way up will be tough, as quantity for quality usually doesn't go over that well unless the quantity is already a fair bit up the scale in desirability.

 

Definitely some locals for locals trade possibility there, but don't expect anything crazy

 

I've got cans of Athena and Tropicalia in my fridge brother. I'd start working on locals for locals trades and start going to beer releases. Most of the beers you listed are available everywhere so I'd stick to stuff like Westbrook and Creature Comforts that are getting a lot of good PR that you can trade for other high quality locals you can't get in your area. You can also try and pool resources with buddies to try for a bigger trade.

If you can get up to Westbrook in May for the Mexican Cake release and can snag the variants, those are trading pretty well from what I've seen.

 

I'd trade for the Westbrook Gose

 

I would suggest you get to know the beers available to you.

You didnt list Burnt Hickory, Creature Comforts, or Orpheus. Those are 3 breweries that only distribute to Georgia and mostly limited distro even in GA.

I just sent out a box of Big Shanty, Cannon Dragger, Zeke's Wheel, Atalanta, Lyric Ale, Tropicalia, and Athena. That is pretty good trade ammo for Georgia Distro. In a month or so you could add WB Gose and Orpheus Transmigration of Souls to that list. Probably land just about any local type beer you could want with some of those beers, including limited or seasonal types like Cafe Royale. Still probably not pulling down brewery only beers $4$ with those beers.

The beers you did list most of the country gets.

To go from locals to whalez bro you are going to have to win a LOT of trades. But you would be better off just buying the whalez instead of trying to trade up for them.

if you want to try some big beers, come to Brick Store Pub HMOG on sunday.

 

My advice...start small. And learn about beer along the way. Don't just look on the Top 250 and say "i want to try that." Make sure you try what is available to you and figure out what you like. Local for Local is a great way to make trading partners that eventually just want to help you out rather than use you to grab a bottle for them.

Chasing whales simply to chase whales is dumb. Work your way up the ladder and you'll find non-whale beers that are as good or better than a lot of those Top 250 beers. Once you've got a feel for trading in general, and how to accumulate some ammo, then you can make a move.

It is my opinion (and that is all this is) that a lot of bad trader threads are the result of new trader trying to start out too big. Play the long game and you'll make a lot of friends, establish some good trade relationships, and really become a true BA, which is what this site is intended to create, promote and foster.

 

I am in AL and we get similar distro, our breweries also cannot sell direct which means a lot less limited/brewery only beer. That said I have had success trading my locals (Good People, Straight to Ale) for other good beer. I have found that WB trades well, especially their 22oz offerings as does the Terrapin reserve series. We also get limited CCB here, which helped me get off the ground with trading (JA & Invasion brought me some good beers).

The best advice I can offer is do a few trades for shelf beer and start good relationships with trading partners. If there are certain beers/breweries you want to target, setup up shelf beer trades with people near the brewery and then cultivate the relationship. The FT/ISO forum can be very cutthroat, so I would suggest just messaging people that live in your target area or use the Wants/Gots/FT list to find people with beer you want. I can't tell you how many people have contacted me via my Gots list, and I have done probably 15+ trades just from those interactions. Lots of people don't even use the Wants/Gots/FT feature, but I can tell you it has been a useful tool for me.

I started trading last summer. At the time I had tried maybe 12-15 beers on the Top 250 list. To date I have now had 62, and have probably 15 more in the cellar. I started trading to get CCB special release beers, that was my only goal. I then added breweries like FFF, Surly, Alchemist, and New Glarus to the list. I have 5 regular traders in my target areas (South FL, MN, IN, TN/KY, NY/NJ, and CA) that get me as much of these breweries as I want. Any time I get seasonal or special release beers, I just send them along and they do the same for me. As I have accumulated multiples of certain "whales" I trade or gift those for other rare beers I want to try. Beer karma is for real and if you pay it forward and share good beer, you will reap the rewards. I would say that 95% of my trades are done outside of the FT/ISO forum, and probably 75-80% are just with my core trading partners. I hope this helps you out, it is definitely doable given your distro.

 

The sad part is they taste the same as most shelf beers. But they're rare, so yeah!!!!!!!

 

I would suggest not worrying about any "whales" just yet. Drink everything you have access to locally and get a good idea of what you like and what to look for in a well made beer. If you've already done that, then start doing some locals for locals trades. You have access to plenty of things that will get you some new excellent new beers.

The problem with jumping straight in to trading for whales is that as a newer craft drinking (which I assume you are), you haven't had enough exposure to other beers to understand and appreciate what makes some of those hard to find beers actually special and unique.

 

You have Westvleteren?

 

Doubtful, since they don't make a 6 or 10. Probably confused it with Rochefort.

 

What I figured too, but it can't hurt to ask.

 

I was guessing WestMalle