Free Will Brewing (2023)

People do line up in the morning before the sale time, but I never have and I've gotten bottles/cans every year.

The last couple years I got there about an hour after the "on sale" time so that the initial line had been cleared out, and only the one most limited variant was sold out.

Its very organized - they give you a sheet of paper with all the variants listed, you write down how many of which ones you want, and the checkout process takes only a couple minutes

And its been Black Friday every year since they switched to that release timeline.

 

Definitely the base makes it past the release day. Last year they also had a few variants that made it to their online shipping store on Cyber Monday.

The past few years when they've been focusing on the various barrel variants - they appear to be one barrel's worth (300 or 350 bottles). But the base variant, coffee, vanilla, are higher bottle counts. This post had the list of variants from 2022:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/commun...-updates-etc-2022.664114/page-18#post-7646245
This post had the bottle counts from 2021:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/commun...-updates-etc-2021.653023/page-14#post-7386947

 

I realized I should not have referred to the regular Ralphius as the "base". Regular Ralphius is still barrel aged, it's just a blend of barrels as opposed to some of the variants that are specific barrels.

 

Info on this years Ralphius release from Free Will social media today:

"The big day is quickly approaching! We’re just a little over one week away from Ralphius Release Day, Black Friday 11/24.

This year’s featured variants are as follows…

- Amburana Ralphius
- Apple Brandy/Bourbon Ralphius
- Cherry Brandy Ralphius
- Dystopias Ralphius
- Ralphius
- Scotch Ralphius
- Tawny Port Ralphius
- Three Year Chambourcin/Bourbon Ralphius
- Three Year Hoodoo/Whiskey Ralphius
- Two Year Basil Hayden Ralphius
- Two Year Buffalo Trace Ralphius
- Two Year Heaven Hill Ralphius
- Two Year Mezcal/Grand Marnier Ralphius
- Vanilla Ralphius

We’ll be open at 10AM at Perkasie and @PeddlersVillage taprooms. We’ll have all of these available at both locations - albeit in a bit more limited quantity at the Village.

We’ve had some questions about online ordering, anything that remains will be inventoried Sunday night and made available for Pennsylvania statewide shipping on Monday at 9AM."

 

Looks like the Ralphius labels have been updated to match the rest of Free Will's label art

 

For anyone else wondering about Amburana:
https://www.craftbeer.com/craft-beer-muses/american-brewers-fall-for-brazils-spicy-amburana-wood

 

I haven't seen anything yet on this year's prices or bottle counts.

Last year regular was $17 and most of the other variants were $20

 

Just picked up my bottles right around Noon. 5 of the variants were already sold out. (Cherry Brandy, Dystopias, and the 2 year BH, BT, HH).

Not sure what combination of effect was bigger crowd than last year, lower bottle counts, or the higher purchase limits (3 or 6 depending). Only one I was bummed about missing is the Dystopias aged.

 

Nice. Drinking the Two Year Buffalo Trace on draft right now.

No they've been 375 ml bottles for a few years. In the past there has been 12 oz cans and the year of the 8.4 oz cans. The first few years were in 12 oz bottles