Night Shift Barrel Society 2015

I was part of the Society during the first year. I had some mixed feelings about the experience and decided to not renew for 2014. NS did a great job with the exclusivity factor, but for the most part the beers were just OK. There were a few that I really enjoyed, and a few that were disappointments. The other perks were nice, but ultimately I bought in for beers that wouldn't be available to me otherwise. While I thought about rejoining, I decided that the investment was just too much for beers that (for later releases) I wouldn't see until the following November/December.

I will say that I think they've done a better job of offering different levels of membership to make it more affordable if you only want one bottle. I also like that they started doing a "members only" draft line at the brewery - something they didn't have in 2013. I'm considering joining again for 2015 but haven't decided as of yet. $150 is a lot to drop all at once for 7 beers, a t shirt, and glassware (and some other perks) that you won't see until at least January. I know the point is to front them the money up front for their future projects, but it would be great if they had a 3-4 installment payment plan that was automatically billed to your card throughout the membership.

 

I've been in the Barrel Society both years. The Barrel Society beers this year have been awesome, and definitely among the best beers Night Shift released this year. The offerings were definitely improved over the first year. To me, everything the first year was at least good or better, but this year they've been top notch all around. Easy decision to renew for me.

 

I joined the society in 2014 and just renewed for 2015. I split a 2-bottle membership with a friend who is not local. I'm a huge fan of the NS Weiss series but I feel like the Society beers have been a mixed bag. There are some that I've really loved (Aurora) and some that have been a little off base (Renaissance).

I live a short drive away from Night Shift and stop by every couple of weeks so the perks are a big selling point for me. The exclusive tap line often has variations on the Society beers (e.g., Pre-Renaissance) or other high gravity beers that aren't released to the public. And the ability to purchase xtra bottles of Society beers (including left overs from the previous years) is nice. If I wasn't local I'm not sure it would be worth it to me.

 

Passing this year. Personally I would like to see more consistency before I shell that out. It's a cool concept and I think they're getting better from year to year but there's just too much up and down for me to put out that kind of cash without knowing what I am getting in too.

 

Looks like the memberships are all gone???

 

I made it to the page to order and it said memberships were out of stock. Hopefully an error, but not looking good.

 

Probably loading a cached page, as it said "out of stock" before they were to go on sale.

 

Via email just now:
2015 Barrel Society: Ya'll Crashed
Our Website!
Hello,

Anyone able to access our website? Yeahhh, us neither. Apparently so many of you are trying to get Barrel Society memberships that our website crashed! Just so everyone knows - no sign-ups have gone through at all today so far, so nobody's missing out. We're fixing the issue now, which requires us to reboot our server. Give us 30-45 minutes to get this solved and please try again. Apologies for the hassle, and thanks for all the [attempted] support!

- The Night Shift Team

 

Sorry to all who have been struggling to purchase a membership. We upgraded our hosting services prior to the release but I guess we didn't go big enough. Working hard on getting the site back up and running.

Thanks for your patience and more importantly thanks for your support!

Rob

 

Got it!

 

We upgraded the server and it appears to me working now. Cheers all!

 

Don't feel bad. By now, I think BAs expect unscheduled downtime.

 

Thanks. I was laughing when the site went down right at sale time. Good for you guys. Got my order in a few minutes ago.

 

You should be good. It seems the server is a slowly batching up confirmations and sending them out. If you don't get one by tomorrow shoot us an email and we can look into it.