Other Half (2019)

I know brewers this day in age are doing their best to celebritize themselves, but there's no way I would know who they are even if I bumped into them at their own brewery while they were wearing a tshirt of the can art with their caricatures.

 

The OH crew, Shaun Hill, Dan Suarez - I think those would be the only ones I’d recognize in the wild

 

Dude. Cmon. This is getting a little much. If you have legit concerns then spill the beans. But otherwise these no-context disgruntled ex-employee jabs that pop up once a month are getting a little stale. You used to be the other extreme for a long time.

And in any event - legit gripes or not, is it shocking that the guys that started the place appear on other brewery’s #tributecollabs? That’s sort of the way the world works. Not a beer thing. If people want that recognition they should take the risk/time/effort and start their own brewery.

 

Maybe I'm a little more into the weeds on the scene than most but I'd probably say I'd recognize 30 or so industry people just off the top of my head.

 

Don't listen to him kanger. It's only been couple of years now and we know you're still hurting. Let it out, man. If my exes had forums I'd be shitting all over them too.

 

Reminder - if you’re interested in the meet up - fill out the google sheet and we can settle on a date by the end of this week:


https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mSjnf7TcxoFnLtZ00rVGorpw92w7xNUCfFnz6opR9N4

 

Things change, people change, hairstyles change, interest rates fluctuate.

Brewery workers deserve respect. Not sure why you would be upset at that.

 

Not upset about anything. And please don't put words in my mouth.

More intrigued that an ex-brewery worker would expect their face on a Veil collab instead of the guys that own/run the place. I mean I would love to be paid more / get more recognition - same probably goes for 90%+ of people who are employed by someone else. But also not shocked that it's the guy who owns/started our company that is the visible face of the place.

If you were simultaneously being forced to fill cans with trub while having your balls cupped, all for sub-minimum wage, then come out with it. Otherwise why not just move on?

But for real - if you have a legit complaint then you should explain in detail - god knows this thread has been slow of late.

 

It truly must be a slow thread if you care so much about my innocuous posts.

I have moved on. I own my own brewery now, but that doesn't mean I'll stop fighting for the plight of the average brewery worker. It's much more than just being a face placed on a label. Feel free to scroll through OH's IG and show me one picture of a brewery worker (that isn't an advertisement for T-shirts). Do you even know the name of the current head brewer?

 

not to interject, but does the name of the head brewer matter?

I can not name one head brewer, just breweries where I enjoy beer from.

Even more I can not name one brewery owner; because candidly I do not give a damn and find that irrelevant(this discounts macro beer obviously)

. I go to said brewery because a) I enjoy their product b) I enjoy supporting local business

but again i am on the side of the fence that does also not care about a label art, or make a owner/brewer a celebrity, I just appreciate their craftmenship

 

You are free to ignore everyone if you please. For you it doesn't matter. For me, the person who makes the beer deserves some credit.

 

You and I differ on the definition of innocuous.

No I can’t name the head brewer. But if you see my post above I can probably only recognize/name a handful of people in the beer/brewing world, period. So I may not be the best person to ask.

To be fair to OH - these days ~85% of the feed seems to simply be beers they’re putting up for sale. And ~14% is merch or event related. So maybe the remaining <1% (more likely in stories vs an actual post) shows pictures of people. Usually Anthony pouring at some overseas event or, yes Sam and co doing a collab offsite/onsite. But rewind a bit and I think they used to post other people a bit more - I even remember you on there once or twice back in the good ol days.

I’m sure being a run of the mill brewery employee can be a thankless job, with hard physical work being rewarded with low pay, poor/no benefits and minimal recognition.

If Other Half’s offense here is simply allowing that status quo to continue, would you not be better served attacking this industry-wide issue more broadly? Perhaps make your own brewery (congrats by the way) a beacon for how to do things properly and then leverage that?

But if Other Half have done / are doing something more nefarious. If we’re talking about illegal or at least questionable practices that go beyond the status quo, then surely you’d be doing your former colleagues the best service possible by shining a light on things. I mean doing that clearly affected positive change for the workers at Trillium. And obviously we (the consumers) would like to know as well. Would certainly affect where I spent my $ if it turned out there was something legitimately underhand going on.

But either way, the vague comments you periodically make - innocuous or otherwise - don’t seem to achieve anything except make you (someone who used to seem to enjoy their insider status quite frankly) appear a little bitter. Doesn’t help the workers. Doesn’t negatively affect OH. Doesn’t shine you (someone trying to get their own business off the ground) in a good light. So I don’t get the point.

 

I don’t care what anyone says, the Bissell collab is damn good. Maybe it’s the fact that it’s the only sub 10% ipa that OH has made all summer, but whatever the reason, I’m really enjoying these.

 

That is what I'm doing. My employees will get full benefits and start at $25 an hour.

You are correct in that I shouldn't be making those kinds of posts. Hence why I deleted it 2 minutes after I posted it, but you caught it. In the end, 95% of the people I knew there have left for greener pastures, so at this point there no reason for me to keep harping about it.

 

While I'm sure they're hard working and deserve praise, are they the ones writing the recipes, creating the book? I can name a bunch of celebrity chefs, but I can't name their line cooks or even their sous chefs.
And that's not saying I even agree to bringing brewers up to celebrity status, though there are 2 levels of that, too. Like Koch (either) or Caligione are mainstream versus the indy darlings.

 

Head brewers usually have a lot of input into new recipes. A good brew master will always ask for advice from their head brewer. Also a good brew master will let their head brewers create original styles.

Over at KCBC, every beer has the name of the person who created it on the menu.

 

I once saw the Grimms on 9th Street and recognized them but couldn't figure out why until it was too late and I'd started at them too long with that subconscious probing expression frozen on my face, so I hurried along and hoped to be quickly forgotten.

 

You reminded me that I had a similar experience. I went in to Hops hill and they were seated at a table with some friends. It was killing me that I couldn't place the face but then when Joe approached the bar and ordered six of the Grimm that was on tap, it couldnt have been anyone else.

 

As handsome and good-hearted as any couple in the industry, it shouldn't be hard to get this right.