I was thinking about this during my hour and a half commute to work this morning, and I was wondering how this would go down (assuming someone had one to trade). The trade value of Dave as well as the volume and cost of what it would take to land one would be outrageous ($500+ ?) Then, there's the fact that Dave is so rare that some sort of proof of it's contents would be questioned. But how would you accomplish this? I know I wouldn't want to send $500 worth of beer to someone unless I was DAMN certain I knew what was in that bottle. So I extend the floor and this hypothetical scenario to you guys. If you were on either side of this trade (assuming both parties have outstanding trading records), what specifics would you need to be in place before you printed that shipping label?
Trading reputation. It's unlikely (right now), you'll find anyone with a Dave who doesn't have a long list of trades under his/her belt, so you can fall back on questions to their previous partners.
It depends, has the person with the stellar trading record and Dave always have it? Or did they get it from a trade/3rd party sale?
At this point, if a Dave were to be traded/auctioned it would likely come from Alan himself, and that's pretty dependable if you ask me.
$500 is a pretty low offer. The last I heard of anyone getting a Dave, I believe it was won at a charity auction where it went for $1500.
I know of a trade for Dave that went down very recently. I'm assuming it was initiated and completed behind closed doors for obvious reasons. There really isn't a dollar amount available to assign to it, since it was traded for other beers that "price" is irrelevant for as well. My issue would be trading away multiple beers that are pretty much impossible to replace, that you probably didnt get the opportunity to try, for one highly sought after beer that you've likely never had before. There are a number of people who are willing to gut their cellar to land one, but I dont think I've seen anyone who's had it that is trying to make a big push to land one. It's a tickers dream, but for anyone looking just to obtain a good beer, it's questionable whether this isn't a complete mess by now.
You're probably right. But isn't it more fun to hold onto the thought that someone out there might stumble upon a cache of "old" beers in a basement somewhere and find a Dave? And happen upon the BA website? It's like an episode of Antiques Roadshow where some lucky sap shows up with a T206 Honus Wagner or a Detective Comics No. 27, and has no idea that they've hit the lottery.... (Okay, okay...for much smaller stakes!)
