New Ballast Point bottle dating

Exactly. How many folks can instantly decode the Month and day equivalent to Julian 16255? Granted, spelling the date out takes room, but they find room for clever comments in the printing so why not just say "Jan 10, 2016"? Yup, more digits, but so what?

 

I think those beer geeks get a sense of superiority when they hold beers real close to their face and immediately decode Julian nonsense. Those same people measure their d**k's in millimetres which makes it sound bigger. Why bother saying that it's February 13th when you can say, the 45th day of the year. That shit is just annoying

 

Because multiplying/dividing by 30 is so F'n difficult...good grief.

 

are you really trying to argue that julian is better in any way shape or form?


good luck paddling up shit creek in a shit canoe with nothing but shit for a paddle.

 

I'm falling generally in the anti-Julian camp per my post above, but this is something I didn't consider. You don't need to decode it to the exact day when you can get the month close by dividing by 30. But then again what's the point of having the exact Julian date if you can't instantly decode it?

BTW - the Julian date they're using here (YYDDD) is an adaption of the real thing, which is days and fractions since noon Universal Time on January 1, 4713 BC. Feel lucky we don't have to decode that!

 

At this point I'd say I'm happy if I get any information about the date the beer was bottled/canned, as it can influence my purchase depending on style and storage format. I don't have hard/fast purchasing rules that require knowing the exact date, but if I've got a ballpark feel for a beer's age that's all I need. I'm less interested in what the brewer/packager feels is the best by date (this can be an issue for those smaller brewers that don't have their own bottling/canning lines). So for me Born Date (in any format) >> Best By Date >>>> no info. I'll happily use any given format for born date, and I really don't find julian dating that challenging. And as long as I know where to look, I could care less what others think of me examining a bottle/can in public. I'd say the bigger problem than whether there a dating scheme is its mere presence. Absence of any indicator of age is a definite deterrent. Last time I checked this was for me a hobby, so a little effort for my enjoyment is true to form. YMMV

 

Julian dating makes inventory freshnees control easier to manage, especially if computerized accounting/tracking is involved. Also used by the military and other large organizations that need a high level of accuracy/control over managing supplies of various items to be sure they get to the right places at the right times and that if necessary get pulled out of inventory after a certain period has passed.

 

drtth, that's a good point that I never thought of. I guess I was just thinking of it from the side of the consumer only and not the business side. Then again if I owned a brewery and I wanted a customers to choose my product over someone else's I think I would want a clear bottled on date, I mean if SN can do it why can't BP? I'm also getting older and have less patience when it comes to making a selection, I could give a shit what someone thinks why I'm doing holding that beer up to the light, spinning it around around looking for that elusive date.

 

And as consumers that is exactly the proper perspective for us.

Bingo! Breweries are indeed capable of printing easy to read and easy to understand dates. If Sierra Nevada can do it then Ballast Point (or any other brewery) could implement it as well. It really comes down to having the desire/will to provide easy to read and understand bottle/can dates for the consumers.

Cheers to Sierra Nevada Brewing Company!!

 

Being a bit of a cynic with more than a couple of years in working with people who program computers for a living I'd probably say that the last thing computer programmers are likely to think of is usability on the part of the end user. (I'm also reminded of all the furor about the Y2K problem because the source progams still in use in many computing systems dated back to the days when the programs assumed the last two numbers of the year were all that was needed so everything would go back to the turn of the 20th Century. Also I just realized that Julian dating is something easily read by such legacy software. )

I'm more inclined to ask if Sierra Nevada and several others can provide us with easily read consumer-oriented dating why not other big folks such as Lagunitas (who use Julian). BP is still a newcomer and minor player in the world of flavorful beer compared to them.

Edit: As someone else pointed out I'm fine with looking at the Julian date, dividing by 30, and estimating botled on date when shopping. Its the other more arcane codes, e.g., Anchor brewing, that are a real problem for me.

 

IIRC it's a provision of the post 9/11 Patriot Act that certain consumables have to be trackable back to the point in time and location of origin. That may contribute to a need for the additional informaton as well.