For anyone living in MD, just wondering what prices you are seeing at local breweries for growler fills? Seems like around Frederick area, prices are up. $11-$16 fills on standard lineup beers (most <6% ABV). $15-20 on barrel aged options. That's for 64 oz growler = a little over 5 12oz beers. Quite pricey for mostly average beer fair. Does MD have laws that force higher prices on growler fills at the site of a brewpub/brewery? Just wondering. Doesn't make sense to me since distributor, retail and bottling/canning costs are all out of the cost/expense equation for an on-site growler fill.
If you look at it as 16oz draft beer then the prices aren't too bad for MD. Four pints of beer for $15-20 isn't bad. Especially because at a lot of places macro brews are $4-5 per pint
I don't consider a growler fill on premises at a nano brewer the equivalency of ordering a draft beer at a restaurant. Why should brewers profit more off of growler fills on site? Do they profit more per oz or is there some state laws that force them to mark up on site costs?
Those prices are reasonable. Never think of getting a growler fill here: http://www.gillyscbfw.com/index.html
Shawan is doing a good job keeping prices reasonable. Ill probably never get a growler in PA again. Check beermenus for current list.
Reasonable throughout MD breweries/brewpubs? I'm not talking about retail growler fill stations. Those will always be marked up some because of distribution costs and retail shop profit. I'm more interested in price checks for on-site growler fills right from the source.
Why should brewers profit more? Huh? Why shouldn't they? They are for profit businesses trying to make a living. Why should they give away their beer? If the market will bear it then they should charge whatever they can get. I have never seen any brewery anywhere in MD or any other state that is charging less than $10 for 64 oz growlers. The lowest I have seen would be maybe $8 and that was for some low abv basic pale ale. Just don't really understand why you seem to be upset about this? A business that is trying to make money?? Geesh. Who's ever heard of such a thing. If you don't like it then don't buy their product or start your own brewery and you can find out just how much expense there is in trying to put out a quality product.
I guess small MD brewers don't want their local community to come to the brewery location for growler fills to consume at home. I read the price point of growlers in MD as either a) forced to sell high from laws or b) a sign they'd rather sell pints to consume on premises or sell kegs to local bars/restaurants. If they really wanted local community to rally around buy their beer in mass volume vs. opting for other equal or better beers from area bottle shops for at -home consumption, they'd lower the growler pricing to the $6-8 range for most standard offerings to make it competitively priced. Sure, charge $15-20 for growler of a barrel aged stout, sour etc. since they are more time/labor intensive and worthy of higher price point.
