O'so 7th Anniversary Party

It was served clearly infected at the anniversary party. @Dactrius has posted about this in the past, and both @RobinLee and @SkippyChop can attest to it as well. When asked about it, the server did not attempt to rectify the situation and instead said, "It's not that infected," as if that was supposed to make it okay. That is abysmal, borderline insulting customer service; I don't blame O'so entirely for that, though since it's an employee, but employees are the face of the company, and it was their poor decision to put 2012 BANT on tap in the first place.

I'm not seeking vengeance of any sort besides requesting a refund. I'm simply voting with my wallet. Their beers aren't that good to begin with (though the BANTs were quite good on tap, as I've said), so I won't miss them at all. If they improve and actually start consistently brewing good beer, like I said, I will give them another shot. Until then, my business with them is at an end.

I don't think you're a fool, I just think you're more patient and forgiving. You're entitled to continue to give them your money; I won't stop you. I just try to drink great beer (in my eyes) at all times, never stooping to average or even good if I can help it, and my experiences with O'so have shown me that they can't fulfill those expectations at this point. FFG, on the other hand, is doing just that, even exceeding my expectations, but that is the closest I'll get to giving O'so my money for the time being.

 

Preach dude. I missed door kriek by not going, but I'm still flustered I bought 5 750mls in town when they came out here. Blackberry is the best. Regular was kinda sour, and imagine it shouldn't have been. And the poblano was a drain pour

 

2012 BANT was clearly infected, but I think most of us who got it suspected it. Also, I felt like there was something wrong with Blackberry when I drank a bottle in November, beyond the carbonation (or lack thereof). On tap it was fresh and delicious, though.

 

Guess I was lucky that I drank my 2012 BBNT right away because there were no signs of infection. Guess I've been lucky and only had one issue with Oso over the years and that was an infected Black scotch ale about 4 years ago. I have some pablano from this release and I'm hoping that they are right and the carb will improve with time. If they are also correct about no infection then its no an issue as it was made apparent that the carb level would need time. I'm hoping all the complainers pass on the BA convenient distraction and Coconut NT this upcoming release, more for me!!!!

 

I see that you have ties to the owners, emotional or otherwise. That's totally fine, and that's great, actually. As @THANAT0PSIS wrote, nobody would consider you a fool for continuing to want to keep buying their beer. You're not blindly doing it. I pretty much agree with everything THANAT0PSIS wrote.

To cut to the chase:
1. 2012 BBNT bottle release- we all know the story here. Officially infected. As a poor student at the time, buying a bunch of these bottles certainly hurt me in the wallet. I chalked it up to "infection is always a possibility" as I was homebrewing much more back then, and moved on. In retrospect, I should have driven up to the brewery to get my money back, but even then, it still doesn't change the fact that they struck out on this one.
2. Knowingly serving infected 2012 BBNT at the 2014 bottle release without advertising it as such
3. 2014 BBNT bottle release- no carbonation. Possible reports of infection. Still an evolving situation.
4. The occasional bottle of O'so beer that I open comes with a nitany of unexpected off-flavours. Seems to affect the darker, maltier beers more than their IPAs. This seems to happen a couple times a year. Also, one bottle of Convenient Distraction was great, but the other bottle I opened with a friend had some off-flavours in it. I always attribute this kind of thing to bottle variation, palate variation, but in the grand scheme of things I still do not experience this kind of variation with any other breweries whose products I drink regularly. Overall this has minimal impact compared to #1-3, but I can't ignore it completely.

I'm going to be generous and say that's two strikes for O'so here since there's only two beer releases involved here; and leave aside the fact that they knowingly served infected BBNT on tap at the party. Or knowingly sent their flat beer out to distro (leaving aside the explanation that they expected their distributor to sit on it for a few weeks before selling it to stores, that's a whole other story). Their overall track record and relatively pedestrian year-round offerings don't help the cause, either. I mean, come on! If none of this upsets you, then that's fine. I'm upset that I have to waste my time with having to follow the news and find out if I can bring the bottles all the way back to Plover to get a refund or exchange. If your local restaurant treated you like this and made you waste time like this, would you want to go back?

Do you know the saying, fool me once, shame on you; Fool me twice, shame on me. And, maybe even with the addition of fool me thrice, shame on both of us? As THANAT0PSIS wrote, I'm simply voting with my wallet this time around. Right now at this particular moment, I'm already spending a good chunk of my beer cash buying some Funk Factory sours and one CW17 allocation so I would prefer to get my money back, period. What O'so needs to understand is that there is a LOT of great craft beer available out there, whether its on the shelves in Madison or outside of Wisconsin's borders, that I can spend my hard-earned money on. They're local as far as being in Central Wisconsin, yes, but the concept of a local brewery in of itself means nothing to me- if it's local and makes good product, I will support it. If its local and makes bad product, I will not support it and spend the money on a good product from another local/non-local brewery. O'so is inching closer to the latter than the former right now. I've already given them a second chance on a hyped up brewery-only release and got burned.

They are trying a lot of cool ideas (especially with Brett) and I applaud them for that; hopefully these QC issues don't stunt that vision and I hope they are able to resolve the QC issues in the future so I can regain some trust. My individual buying decision doesn't make a difference in the grand scheme of things, but it makes a lot of difference to me in that I spend my money on products I can trust and enjoy. I hope this makes sense; if not, well let's just chalk it up to the internet being the internet and difference of opinions. Salud!

 

I don't actually have any ties with O'so other than meeting some of the staff when I returned my case of 2012 BA night train but I don't see them not giving you a refund. This was what Katina said to me last year when I contacted O'so about returning my beer.

"Thanks for the email and I am sorry that the beer didn't hold up. We don't have any BBNT again this year, but we do have a Brett fermented pale ale releasing Friday next month when your up. If your interested in that, we could trade up. If not, we won't have any BBNT till next November, so if you'd like a refund we can Do that for you too. Thanks for the support. Cheers, Katina"

Just because Mark didn't explicitly say they are giving refunds in a Facebook message to someone who may not have even asked about refunds doesn't mean they aren't.

I guess I'm just surprised because I drink regular night train a lot and some of their other beers with varying degrees of regularity and the only problems I've ever encountered with them where with BBNT maybe I'm just lucky or some of you guys are unlucky. (Come to think of it I did have a bottle of Convenient Distraction explode but with no other reports I assume it was a fluke. None that I've had where infected or over carbed either)

I wasn't trying to sway anyone's opinion one way or the other it was more out of curiosity because I didn't share the same experience I just wanted to dig a little deeper. I wasn't at this years release so I don't have much info on what was on tap or anything I didn't know they served 2012 BBNT did you try it? Because if its true 2012 was infected through bottling then the Kegs shouldn't have been affected.

 

@THANAT0PSIS

Lol sorry forgot you mentioned that already.

 

I've had 2 bottles of blackberry and both have been outstanding. Not overly carbed but not flat. Great flavor on both. I can't complain. Glad I have one more to go.

 

one would think that being burned by one-off releases would make people shy away from other breweries one-off releases... but... it never does.

it sucks but maybe the lesson to be learned from all this is STOP CHASING EVERY SINGLE BEER RELEASE. especially expecting that every one-off release is going to be mind-bendingly awesome, perfect in all ways and worth the time/effort/energy to get it.



eta: expecting is the wrong word. it's not strong enough. it's more like thinking that the buyer deserves utter perfection and world-class beer because they went through the "trouble" of attending.

 

Not everyone 'chased' these beers. Many simply bought them at their local liquor store because they sounded good and they wish to support O'So. Having the expectation that the beer be drinkable isn't asking a whole lot.

 

I'll bring a Door Kriek to the next bottle share. Been waiting to open one of those SOBs.
Also, I'll be at O'so the first weekend in Feb, so if I can still exchange bottles at that time, I can swap whatever extras you have.

 

not everyone. blanket statements rarely (never?) fit.

the feeling remains. many people expect that brewers make the perfect beer every time because the consumer, specifically THEM, deserve it.

i'm as bummed as the next guy to guy a beer and have it suck. or be infected. or not live up to expectation. that's why i don't buy a case of expensive beer without having tasted it first to make sure it will be something i want to spend a couple hundred dollars on.

people who bought one and wound up pouring it out are disappointed.

people who bought a case+ in hopes of making hay off trades are angry.

 

The problem is many people DID taste them first (including me) at the party itself. That's how I determined that I wanted to buy some. It was actually really good on tap (as I've said before in this thread); all three variants were carbed, and no signs of any off flavors were present. The bottles might as well have been completely different beers. So yes, after trying a beer, enjoying it, and purchasing based on that experience, I'm a little disappointed.

It's not an unreasonable expectation to purchase beer from a professional brewery (especially one of O'so's size) free of off-flavors, free of infection; and carbonated. All this is the foundation of the lowliest homebrewer. Mistakes happen though (too many times now for me to care about them or give the benefit of the doubt), so all I want is my money back.

People have a reasonable expectation of satisfaction when they out up money and time for goods and services, and they are entitled to both rationally and fairly display their disappointment and seek reasonable compensation. I don't understand how or why you would put this on the customer. I wouldn't blame someone for requesting a refund and complaining about a bad meal they had at a restaurant. Should people not expect a good meal from a restaurant they've never been to? Of course they should. Beer is and should be no different.

 

then they pulled a switcheroo on you and you should be mad.

fair enough.
craft beer is still small enough, imo, that there are going to be bumps in the road. i've learned from experience, and observation, to not rush in to mass purchases of unknown beers anymore.

reach out to them and ask about getting your money back. i'd bet they will accomodate. good luck!

i don't totally disagree with the sentiment. i don't go to a new restaurant expecting that the food i order will be sublime... seems some do... but i would surely hope that they don't completely fucking botch the basics. two eggs over easy (a Pale Ale) should be dialed in. but if they roll out an experiment (BB aged brett stout with peaches and cayenne topped off by a fried egg), i realize i'm taking my chances and should share in the responsibility if the experience doesn't off the way i'd hoped.

personality differences, i suppose.


i'll say this.. my wife and i had this conversation last night while watching Dexter re-runs (first run for me). Lithgow's character returns an omelette because it didn't have diced tomatoes IN the eggs. the waitress offered a side of diced tomatoes and he icily rejected the proposition.

my wife said "i'd be pissed, too! that's bullshit! if i wanted a side of tomatoes i'd have ordered a side of tomatoes!" (of course, that's bluster as she never ever ever complains to waitstaff when something is wrong/unsatisfactory)

to which i said, "it's really not worth getting pissed off about. they made a mistake. i'd just take the diced tomatoes on the side and move on with my day."

 

As crappy as it is, especially given that there haven't been many barrel aged beers bottled by O'so, let's try to keep it in perspective. I wish the infection spreadsheet still existed on this site (maybe it does somewhere?) because you will see a lot of breweries that we hold in high esteem have had similar problems, and many have handled them much worse.
Off the top of my head...

• Alpine - I had three barrel aged beers from them and ALL of them had unintended off flavors (Token - Infected, Odin's Raven - Infected, and Chez Monieux - Blue Cheese, and not in the "horse blanket" etc type way)
• Lost Abbey - Ask Tomme about the difficulties of carbing a 12%+ beer. He'll probably just tell you it's meant to be flat
• The Bruery - You can carb up a high alcohol beer easy if you have super lacto (or whatever what in there)
• Three Floyds - All attempts at a sour pre-2014 aside even, Conquistador de Muerte has been infected multiple times
• Deschutes - 2009 Abyss
• Cigar City - At one point Deja Vu was going to be the last sour they ever did because so many beers were getting infected.
  
• Prairie - Most of the Noir variants had issues the first run

And the list goes on. These things happen, especially early, and are sometimes hard to detect. O'so will trade or refund money. That's all you can really ask for. A lot of O'so size breweries operate with 10-20 employees. They don't have a huge lab, and don't have the storage to sit on a beer that the distributer can put in an empty corner. When the lab they do have says its clear, they assume its clear. If the distributer says they will hold it for them, why not send it out.

TL;DR

R-e-l-a-x. They may be 1-2 to start out, but they could end up with at 12-4 1st round bye when its all said and done.

 

This one?

https://spreadsheets.google.com/pub...BfdDRONmtnRW4zYm9YSVVIZ0hkUDUxQVE&hl=en&gid=0

 

That's the one, thanks John. Unfortunately it looks like the sheet died in 2011. Some blasts from the past though. Makes me remember doing a Kuhnhenn BBBW broken vert and thinking one of the years tasted like horse blanket that was shat upon by horses.

 

i just got aroused

 

resurrect it? or would something like that vanish in to the ether here?