Victory Old Horizontal

Awesome that it is out but you could have given a brother a better heads up than the 14th.

its a no brainier what i'm going to be doing tomorrow, thanks for the heads up.

 

...And 22 oz. bottles of Old Horizontal are still sitting on shelves here at almost every beverage center in the Capital Region, almost a year later.

 

In your opinion, why are these beers sitting vs. selling?

Cheers!

 

I don't know? Maybe it's the area and a lack of interest in barley wines? Unbalanced distribution... all of the above. Last year when Bigfoot came out (early 2013), there were cases and cases of the stuff. It sat around at many places for much of the year. Then, the 2014 batch that came out was nearly non-existent. I hardly even saw the stuff. The same thing with Old Foghorn. It's not even distributed up here anymore. I went to Olivers in Albany two weeks ago and found two loose bottles. I asked a guy there and he said its not even distributed in the area anymore and that he had to special order a couple cases for some clientele from downstate New York. It was the first time I found any in over two years. Look at Monster from Brooklyn. Its everywhere still and the last batch made was in the fall of 2012. Brooklyn stopped making it. Olivers has two full cases of it on the shelves and a few four packs from 2009. Bolt Cutter, the 25th Anniversary beer from Founders, aged in Bourbon barrels hung out around here for about a year after release also. I agree with the OP that the Old Horizontal would be great in four packs, but $7.99 (in my area) for a 22 0z. bottle of a great beer with a high ABV. is a great price. There are certainly many bombers in the $10.00-13.00 that seem to move off the shelf with regularity as items such as this seem to sit.

On this site, barley wines are some of the highest rated beers. I love them for their bold, complex flavors and their ability to change over time. It just seems that they are those styles that often get passed up on the shelf.

 

Thank you for your thoughtful response.

You mentioned: “I agree with the OP that the Old Horizontal would be great in four packs, but $7.99 (in my area) for a 22 0z. bottle of a great beer with a high ABV. is a great price.” What if you could purchase a 4-pack of 12 ounce bottles for 10 bucks. Would that be even ‘better’ for you?

Cheers!

 

Since I don't live in a state where there are a lot of stores that have slots on the shelf for a 22oz bottle I don't much care what rotates in and out of that retail slot in some other state. Given that the Old Horizontal is not available to me in a 12 oz bottle I'll just have to take a pass on it and go for Bigfoot or Old Foghorn to put have in my basement storage area.

 

“Like you, I don't really get what the advantage of a larger bottle format is when…”

From my perspective there is no advantage for the beer consumers. For the beer industry the advantage is greater profit per unit of sale. I am doing my best to thwart this profit taking by not purchasing beer in formats larger than 12 ounce bottles. I hope that other beer consumers will do the same. In a free market economy, the way that we consumers can influence the market is to not buy large format bottles (and to not give the beer industry those increased profits per unit).

I am hoping that beer consumers in the Albany, NY region are doing that and letting the 22 ounce Old Horizontal bottles sit and collect dust. Good for those folks!!

Cheers!

 

I doubt that's the case. While some consumers might be passing on it strictly because of format, I'd wager that most are passing on it because they aren't interested in that beer. If it was Bourbon County Coffee in a 22, I suspect there would be takers.

(For what it's worth, I'd rather drink Old Horizontal than Bourbon County Coffee, and I'd rather have it in a 12oz vs a 22, but I'm just speculating on the shopping habbits of the average fancy-beer shopper in that region.)

 

“…I'd wager that most are passing on it because they aren't interested in that beer” You might be right here but you really don’t know. All that you and I know is that there are 22 ounce Old Horizontal bottles collecting dust in the Albany area.

Did you take note of the previous post by @FatBoyGotSwagger of “Harvest Ale in 22oz? Common mayne, you guys should be fighting for space in my fridge not space on the bomber shelf(dust collectors).”

I will confess that I also don’t know the answer to why 22 ounce Old Horizontal bottles are collecting dust in the Albany region but they are collecting dust nonetheless.

Hopefully the folks at Victory will ‘listen’ and take note?

Cheers!

P.S. Just two days ago I bought a case of Victory DirtWolf; it was sanely packaged in 12 ounce bottles!

 

I am not sure if "sanely packaged" is the most appropriate description of a box of 24 bottles of beer.

 

It is for a yummy beer like DirtWolf. Hell, I wish that Victory would make a 99 pack of that beer (a la Austin BeerWorks):

 

Thank goodness for short shelves. Could you imagine all of the dust that would be on that box?

 

They are selling 99 beers for 99 bucks; no dust on that package.

Cheers!

 

Jack, I wouldn't even buy that if it was a 99 pack of Victory's kolsch.

 

Your loss!

Cheers!

 

Well as more than one person has pointed out, 24 bottles in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence?

 

24 bottles of Old Ho in 24 hours? That would have been an interesting display of drunkedness.

 

Yeah, with Old Horizontal that would work better with 24 days, 24 weeks, or 24 months... But only the first two for DirtWolf.

 

I guess I'm in the minority here, but I was really pumped to see old ho in bombers.

While I understand it's more expensive per ounce, it's still cheaper per transaction (i.e. the price of one bomber vs a 4 pack or whatever). I don't care to think about long term savings with a beer like this - so I tend to focus on the cost of the transaction at hand. If I were to have the option of a 4 pack for $11 or a bomber for $8, I'd buy the bomber cause that's all the ounces I want that day and it's $3 cheaper. If I were to buy the 4 pack, I'd be spending $3 more and I'd inevitably have two extra bottles that will sit around until I'm in the mood for it again. I don't really care to have two extra bottles of old ho hanging around. I'd rather just go grab another bomber when I feel the urge. Sure, I'm losing money when combining the two transactions, but I'm saving in the short term with each individual transaction. I realize this is probably illogical or counter-intuitive to most, but it's the way I think when I'm buying beer to be enjoyed in the short term.