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Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

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Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#101

Post by andygcook »

subpixel wrote: post #40

I live in New England. There isn’t a single brewery in any New England state that would cause an uproar if it ceased to sell beer tomorrow. Sure I have some preferred beers but they are all interchangeable in the big picture. Such is progress - there is no more regional taste, only trend. Even the bottle conditioned beer you stand in line for on vacation - a bottle of Duvel will be reliably better and probably cheape…

It probably depends on the geographical scope of the uproar. Trillium and Treehouse shutting down suddenly would cause quite the kerfuffle for people living in the Boston area. Allagash from Maine would cause a national uproar in my opinion too.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#102

Post by noirbot »

cwzwarich wrote: post #96
bsder wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is happening in the craft beer market? Ballast Point had a similar trajectory. They got bought for a gigabuck and now are just gone . Why the hell would you buy a company and then screw it up ? In the case of Ballast Point, all Constellation Brands had to do was leave the bought company alone . And, no, I don't believe that the issue is because you can buy great beers in every market. Hogwash. Maybe I can buy IP…

> Why is everything in craft brew now shipping in cans instead of bottles? When did that happen? - They block all light - They’re better sealed than bottles - They weigh less and are more compact than bottles - They don’t break - They’re more often recycled The freshness reasons probably correlate with the rise of hazy IPAs, which are more sensitive to freshness than other styles.

My understanding is also that canning lines can be a lot more compact than bottling lines, so cheaper/easier to install in a smaller brewery. For a while, I know there were a couple local breweries who essentially time-shared a canning line on the back of a truck that would just drive between the breweries and was cheaper than all of them buying it themselves.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#103

Post by Qworg »

bsder wrote: post #87
pdntspa wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Such is progress - there is no more regional taste, only trend Can you tell that to Yuengling, I would really like to partake in their beer without having to fly to Philly

Well, you can get Yuengling in Texas, last I checked.

Yuengling is made in Pittsburgh and Tampa.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#104

Post by prawn »

prottog wrote: post #23
0xB31B1B wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate local beers. Local wine makes sense, there is terroir, a sense of place etc. Local beers are just some weird competition to see who can make the hopiest bitterest beer. I don't want to try a new lager every time I cross county lines, when I want beer I want something reliable.

People get it in their heads that small and local means good or at least better than the stuff mass-produced by MegaCorp, but that's not always the case. I think beer is a case where it's hard to beat Big Beer. Heineken, the second-biggest brewery in the world, moved 231.2 million hectoliters of beer in 2021[0], or nearly 19,000 acre-feet of beer (!). How many locally-produced lagers actually taste better than Heinek…

I think with big beer, you get consistency of product and usually pricing. That's great for some people who don't want to be fussing with beer. I used to care about tasting every obscure beer from a location, but over time I've started to care a lot less.

For wine and vintages, the absolute consistency is less of an issue. They aspire to some consistency, but a little variation is part of the romance.

The great thing is that in wine and beer, you get both ends. You get the familiar brands and the loony craft beers with outrageous labels. If I favour smaller producers, a good part of it is that I like to support younger businesses. Big producers pretending to produce young-business products is a bit meh though.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#105

Post by evmar »

ecshafer wrote: post #50
subpixel wrote: post #40

I live in New England. There isn’t a single brewery in any New England state that would cause an uproar if it ceased to sell beer tomorrow. Sure I have some preferred beers but they are all interchangeable in the big picture. Such is progress - there is no more regional taste, only trend. Even the bottle conditioned beer you stand in line for on vacation - a bottle of Duvel will be reliably better and probably cheape…

Sam Adams and and Trillium would both probably cause a bigger uproar than this Anchor Brewing company, which honestly I have never heard of not being in California.

Growing up outside of California I knew their name from a line in this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6y0R-QccpcQ

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#106

Post by noirbot »

ecshafer wrote: post #50
subpixel wrote: post #40

I live in New England. There isn’t a single brewery in any New England state that would cause an uproar if it ceased to sell beer tomorrow. Sure I have some preferred beers but they are all interchangeable in the big picture. Such is progress - there is no more regional taste, only trend. Even the bottle conditioned beer you stand in line for on vacation - a bottle of Duvel will be reliably better and probably cheape…

Sam Adams and and Trillium would both probably cause a bigger uproar than this Anchor Brewing company, which honestly I have never heard of not being in California.

Treehouse is almost definitely in that conversation as well. Hill Farmstead as well.

The uproar is probably more among folks who follow the industry though. Most people have seen Anchor at a grocery store at some point. They were, I'm pretty sure, a natural niche craft brewery before those things were normal. In the same zone as places like Sam Adams or New Belgium or Sierra Nevada. You didn't have to really be "into beer" to know what they were and maybe enjoy buying a Christmas Ale from them every year as a seasonal thing.

To OP's point, there's less places like that now, but that's because I have 3 local breweries I'd be sad about if they closed, instead of 1-2 national breweries. I'd be sad if Trillium or Alchemist closed, but it's not as if I could buy them without traveling to the area, so it's more of a "aww, that's a bummer" and less of a change to my life.

I'm not sure either is better/worse though. We've just moved beyond the sort of craft beer monoculture. We don't just have 2-3 Christmas Ales we all drink, in the same way we don't all watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade or all talk about the new episode of ER every week.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#107

Post by pfranz »

eyelidlessness wrote: post #51
pfranz wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Beer is incredibly difficult to keep shelf-stable. International beers, unless very specific efforts are taken, will taste off. I heard a story that Austrian beer enthusiasts just assumed American beers tasted "skunky" because that's how they tasted after importing them. Time, temperature, and light are enemies. Anheuser-Busch has a dozen breweries across the US. I'm not a fan of hops, but the PNW grows 96% of hops i…

The skunky odor/flavor comes from light exposure to hops and it’s easily prevented with dark bottles or cans. Other herbs work well as preservatives and don’t get skunky at all. Beer can be shelf stable basically indefinitely if well kept, and often ages very well.

If it's easy to prevent, why is it so much more of a problem than for wine? Budweiser had a “born on date” and later switched it to a "freshest before" date. Other breweries insist on cold shipping--that's quite expensive.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#109

Post by xarope »

girvo wrote: post #36
pjm331 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Raging Bitch is made by Flying Dog brewery whose art is done by Ralph Steadman - well known for his collaborations with Hunter S Thompson. I started drinking it because of that fact after reading Fear and Loathing for the first time in college. It’s also nice and strong - 9% iirc

> It’s also nice and strong - 9% iirc As all good stouts should be, in my humble opinion! My all time favourite beer is the BrewDog, Nogne and Mikkeller collaboration stout: the Black Tokyo Horizon. It's 17.2%!

17.2%?!? That led me down the rabbit hole to find out beers with very high alcohol content. Apparently Brewmeister Snake Venom, at ABV 67.5%, is the highest.

Re: Anchor Brewing Company ends national distribution, kills Christmas Ale

#110

Post by CSMastermind »

elephanlemon wrote: post #8

Bummer, they were one of few breweries with an interesting Christmas ale.

When I was growing up Great Lakes had the best Christmas ale around but then they scaled up production and it hasn't been the same for a decade now.

I was told the head brewer left to Thirsty Dog and took the recipe with them but while closer that still doesn't taste quite the same to me either.

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