Seasonal Beer Rules

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I like seeing seasonal beers appear in their seasons. I live in New England, where we actually have seasons, not in an air conditioned wonderland. No doubt it's "good business" to release seasonal beers months early. The problem is that eventually this tends to sever our relationship to the world around us.

We'll have to have a reality check on this around Thanksgiving. My recollection of last year is that my favorite pumpkin ale had been off the shelves for weeks by then.

 

My comment about them brewing more than one batch of their Fall beers has nothing to do with them sitting around on shelves around Thanksgiving. July,August,September is when they're pumped out. October,November,December is when the Winter beers are out.

My point was there's no need to "stock up" in July when they first appear. You can easily get them in September as they produce batches more than once.

 

My point was that fresh pumpkin ale should be available at Thanksgiving, our most pumpkin-intensive holiday.

 

This much is true. It should be and it's not. You'll probably want to buy in September or early October. After that you risk missing out and certainly won't be getting fresher beer by holding out any longer. But it's also true that you don't have to snatch up the first ones you see in July. In fact, if planning to serve pumpkin beer for Thanksgiving I'd think you'd want to wait to try to get some from the last batches produced by your favorite brewers, not the first.

Edit: I'll add that the the one I've been waiting for, CBC Great Pumpkin Ale, just came out this week.