How have your consumption habits evolved?

Age and activity based. Started with bourbons. In my middle 20's, wines, particularly Rieslings. Beer didn't come into the picture until my late 20's in 78 or 79, when I would assist a blind musician friend by transporting and setting up his equipment at gigs in various bars. The beer be one of the house drafts-MHL OR PBR usually, and I drank a lot of it. That stopped when I got married and moved to Florida in '86. Really cut back on quantity, and stayed that way until the late 90's and the advent of bars with multiple (10 or more) bottle/draft selections. That's when it became a matter of quality over quantity. Cut back again in 2001 after my bout with Non-Hodgkins lymphoma, but after I beat that I really got back into it. Those were golden times; BA, sports and otherbars with bigger (25+) choices, craft beer festivals, and beercations, the first being at the Eccentric (Bell's). Retirement, age, and this covidiocy has slown me down, but not that much. As long as the great brews are available, I'll be buying them. Cheers, m8's!

 

The confessions of a long-time beer drinker: Going way back (i.e. college days) before the dawn of the craft era, I abused whatever beer I was able to get and was drinking to excess for what I thought was impressing my friends. (Very juvenile and nieve of me.)

Then came the 'marriage and the family' stage where I was nearly broke and couldn't afford to drink much (this is still long before craft beer). I'd keep a case of Schmidt's returnables around the house because it was only $3 a case, but would stretch it as long as I could, maybe one per week.

Still drinking AALs for another 20+ years until craft started rapidly expanding, my thrust was as a ticker to try as many beers as I could in a learning process. (Also got into homebrewing.) I drank mostly dark or malty beers for the first couple years because my first exposure to an IPA was a huge turn-off. I've been mostly ticking since the mid-90s but recently started usually buying old favorites.

I've been having one beer a day with dinner for 20+ years, but just now starting to cut back for health reasons to just 2-3 per the weekdays. However, one tradition that won't change is having some special beer from my stash (formerly my cellar) with my Sunday dinner.

 

I grew un in Nova Scotia, where we wouldn’t really support Upper Canadian macros like Blue or Canadian. Thus, I started out with Keith’s and Moosehead. After moving to Ontario in my late 20’s, I started experimenting with the German beers I could get at the LCBO. This led to Polish beers and eventually into Belgians. I was introduced to American craft in the early 90’s and would buy whatever was available. Over the last twenty five years my style diversification has increased tremendously. I drink a fair number of sours now, which twenty years ago I despised. My style preferences fluctuate with the seasons. Heavier stuff in winter, more refreshing stuff in summer. At this point I never purchase macro produced beers.

 

When I first got into craft it was all about strong dark beers, often BA, and I loathed IPAs and sours. A couple of summers ago, I was having trouble finding new dark beers to drink, so I started trying more IPAs and sours. Now I mostly drink pastry sours, DIPAs, NEIPAs, and DNEIPAs. What's also changed recently is that due to a new health issue I've had to limit myself to one beer a day, drink earlier in the day, and reduce the number of strong beers I drink. I almost exclusively buy/drink new Sour/IPA singles to review, so the 125+ strong dark beers in my cellar are mostly just aging...

 

When I joined BA I ticked every single thing. Hundreds of dollars on beer every couple weeks. Now I drink maybe 5-6 a week only on weekends if I’m lucky and try to keep it around $10 sixers or no more than $3 a single if I can help it.

I prefer lagers to IPAs now as well from that time.

 

I have followed the same path, but use Yuengling as a reminder.

 

As a retired guy with 50 years of beer drinking I've evolved several times. In the late 70's I moved from Pabst to the few original "craft" beers and imports that were available. Then I married a French woman, started spending time in Europe and I got hooked on Belgian and German beer so I started homebrewing. For years I kept up to 12 different beers on tap in my garage, ranging from sours to rauchbiers to 3% ABV session beers. Health issues made me drastically cut my beer consumption, but I'm about to start homebrewing again on a much smaller scale. One thing that has not "devolved" is if my choice is AAL or water, that water looks damn good.

 

I have been drinking craft beer for around 14 years, and most of that time I have also been an avid homebrewer.

Before my craft beer days I drank copious amounts of LaBatt's Blue, Rolling Rock, JW Dundee's Honey Brown, New Castle Brown Ale, and Pete's Wicked Ale.

Once I got into craft, Arrogant Bastard and Rogue Dead Guy being my gateways into the craft beer world, I drank everything I could get my hands on. And brewed as many styles as I could.

As time went on I drifted into IPA's and big stouts. Among my favorites were Racer 5 IPA, Hop Stoopid, 2 Hearted (which I still love to this day), Yeti, Old Rasputin, and others of the sort. My brewing habits followed suit though I never quite got the hang of brewing a consistently good big stout.

Over the last several years I have found myself drinking more lagers, though I still drink other styles my everyday drinking beers tend to be lagers (mainly German Lagers). It helps that I have a world class lager brewery here local to me (Olde Mecklenburg Brewing). And I found my niche in brewing those styles as well, before I took a hiatus from brewing. I have recently got back into brewing and feel reenergized into the hobby.

 

Early ticker. Not so much now. Started ticking in the early 70s in San Diego. Tried west coast labels plus specimens from friends travels, A-1, Peoples, Walters (CO), National Boh and Prem., Neuweilers, Chesterfield, Steg. Porter, Old Reading, Grain Belt, Braumeister (Huber), etc. Standbys Ballantine Ale and Andeker. Chicago mid 70s Zodiac Malt, Drewry's, Leinenkugel, Old Crown, Walters (WI), Dubuque Star,Little Kings, Point Special, etc., Standbys Augsburger and Andeker. To the east coast in 77. Now maybe a beer a day. Standby Montauk driftwood.

 

Mine have evolved similar to coronavirus variants.
Bigger and more virulent.

 

I've become more open minded to all styles and have grown an appreciation for any style that's done well. I've also become much more mindful of how certain breweries operate and will try to avoid supporting breweries that bully, are shady, mistreat staff, pander to misogyny/racism/marginalized cultures, etc.

 

We’re starting to get a ton of very fresh 16 Oz singles in many styles at Bestway. Downside is some are as much $7-8 per can.

 

While I'm mostly a beer guy, I enjoy wine and an occasional mixed drink. I have gravitated to the NEIPA 'Juice Bombs' in the past 18 months but also enjoy seasonal beers -- stouts and porters in the Fall/Winter and lagers/pilsners in the Summer. High ABV doesn't make a beer better and flavors and hop types are important when making my beer selections. I probably drink 6-8 beers a week and make a beer buy every three or four weeks. The biggest recent change is not being able to drink socially very often. When drinking by myself I usually have one or two.