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SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

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Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#321

It’s important to note that Anchor as a division is being shut down as a cost-saving measure by its owner Sapporo, a transnational, publicly-traded corporation. Sapporo says they have tried to find a buyer for Anchor, but to no avail. Meanwhile Sapporo recently purchased Stone Brewing in San Diego and are beginning Sapporo production there while still making Stone beers. If Sapporo hadn’t also bought Stone, presumabl…

> presumably their plan was to brew Sapporo at Anchor in a similar way

Think again. Anchor was unionized. Stone is not.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#322

It’s important to note that Anchor as a division is being shut down as a cost-saving measure by its owner Sapporo, a transnational, publicly-traded corporation. Sapporo says they have tried to find a buyer for Anchor, but to no avail. Meanwhile Sapporo recently purchased Stone Brewing in San Diego and are beginning Sapporo production there while still making Stone beers. If Sapporo hadn’t also bought Stone, presumabl…

Fun fact is that anchor had a custom brewing setup unlike any other. Custom made pots, open air swimming pools to brew (that's what makes it steam beer) and a different process to every other brewery. It was fun to tour their brewery since it's so wildly different.

If Sapporo bought this brewery assuming they could make Sapporo premium there that's fucking hilarious. All it would have taken was a tour to understand that's not possible. Anchor Steam brewery is as different to any other brewery as a concrete plant is to any other brewery.

I didn't like their beers myself but did appreciate their unique process.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#323

It’s important to note that Anchor as a division is being shut down as a cost-saving measure by its owner Sapporo, a transnational, publicly-traded corporation. Sapporo says they have tried to find a buyer for Anchor, but to no avail. Meanwhile Sapporo recently purchased Stone Brewing in San Diego and are beginning Sapporo production there while still making Stone beers. If Sapporo hadn’t also bought Stone, presumabl…

It would seem that Sapporo did not do enough diligence when they bought Anchor. Anchor's facilities are far too small, their infrastructure and their team not setup to brew at that sort of scale. Stone is a much better fit for what they seem to be trying to do.

I mean they had an entirely unique process. That was their whole shtick.

They had a big multistory warehouse type brewery with fields of open air swimming pools fermenting. That's what made it steam beer. Their setup isn't like any other brewery at all. No vats for brewing!

Anchor Steam brewery is as similar as a concrete plant to other breweries.

So if Sapporo bought this for $143million thinking they could make other style of beer there and didn't even do a brewery tour omfg.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really despise this about the American beer industry. Your typical tap list these days is 8 IPAs, 1-2 dIPAs, 4 sours, something that contains coffee, some other weird shit (cucumber göse e.g.), and like one normal everyday lager or pilsener that isn't making some sort of personality statement and pairs well with food. Worse, this appears to be catching on among trendier bars in Europe, even in places like Munich an…

They're there because they sell, and they sell because people like them. IMO one pilsner or lager is enough; what's the point of having a whole bar full of different beers that all pretty much taste the same? They certainly don't justify the premium pricing that these bars often charge. Germans think their own beer is the best in the world. To the rest of us, it is reliable but boring. It's not just an American thing…

As an American, I find German lagers to be just as varied and interesting as American IPAs. I didn't realize this until I moved near a pub with multiple rotating taps of German lagers.

Later, I went to Oktoberfest, and tried multiple fresh lagers a day for four days, which only convinced me further.

I am convinced, in general, that we don't notice subtle variations within styles of (beer, wine, music, etc) until we are repeatedly presented with multiple options within thay style. Of course it'll seem like all lagers taste the same if you only have one good lager to try at a time.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#326
post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone rants about how great guinness is, but the draught cans taste incredibly watered-down to me for some reason. Extra Stout and Foreign Stout are fine and I have to imagine that's what guiness tastes like for EU customers.

Guinness Foreign Extra stout is so good! It’s a shame its so difficult to find.

Yeah that's my favorite of the guinesses. Extra is an acceptable example of a stout, drinkable but I've had better. But Foreign is actively good and I'd put it near the top of my list. My local grocery store was clearing them out, 4paks for $7.50 and it was a nice little turn of events.

The Anniversary Stout is another great one but that was a limited return.

Bell's Kalamazoo Stout is my One Beer For The Rest Of My Life though, just absolutely perfect in every way, as is customary for Bell's. I still enjoy some Fat Tire in the summer, and Bell's does a fantastic Czech Pilsner, and their Flamingo Fruit Fight pomegrate sour is actually fantastic too, but Kalamazoo Stout is the one I could never live without.

Sad that Bell's has gotten bought out too, it's a trend recently where macros are buying up micros so they don't have to do the work of building their own products and branding. The macros know they're in trouble, nobody under the age of 40 is actively seeking out a budweiser or coors these days. A few of them are acceptable (Milwaukee's Best Ice, Rolling Rock, Genesee Cream Ale, etc) but most of them I'd rather drink something else than suffer through Budweiser or whatever. Calories count too much these days for me to waste them on something I'm not enjoying the taste of.

Goose Island is coors iirc, Sierra Nevada got bought a couple years ago iirc, Blue Moon is macro, etc.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

5% used to be considered high or an ‘export’ lager when I was a lad. We called Stella Artois at a massive 5.2% “wife beater”. Typical session lagers like Heineken were around 3.5%.

Yeah, I'd call normal anywhere between 3.5 - 5%, with session beers being anything A lot of these are just too much, and too weird (as I and many others have commented), for day to day drinking. Nowadays I mostly drink session beers because I normally have to worry about driving, getting up early, or functioning in some at least semi-useful way later in the day.

Jesus, that ‘speccy brew’ burning tyre taste. We got a couple cans once when properly skint and choked them down.

Some of these 12% burned hops ipa’s taste like special brew to me.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know. It seems a mix of traditional and innovation does well. Yuengling seems to be a good example of a small brand becoming regional and now almost national. They have their traditional brews and have added a few new ones.

Grew up in PA and love seeing Yingers blow up, but I bet their success is largely due to the same reason we loved them back in the early 2000s: they brew a tasty no-frills lager at a good price. Seems a lot of the brewing industry chased fads for 20 years.

I like Yingling Porter. I'm annoyed they aren't in NYC while brewed so nearby.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#329
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to see what '23 the numbers look like before declaring it a contracting market. Sales by volume for the entire category are indeed down, but somewhere between 2-3%, and that is still likely attributable to the crash starting in 2020, when it was actually illegal to serve or even order beer in many places. (To this day, there are still aggressive measures taken against breweries, brewpubs, and taprooms, like…

Oh my gosh. Section 1 of that about tours. What a ridiculous ordinance. I assume all this is in there to protect some other class of business that lobbied for it, right? Like bars trying to prevent breweries from competing?

There's multiple kinds of liquor licenses.

You can be a bar or restaurant that serves alcohol (retail consumption license).

You can also be a brewpub (restricted brewery license), which comes with production limits and requires the above.

You can be a brewery, which mostly makes and sells beer to retailers and distributors to consume elsewhere, but might have some tasting events (limited brewery license).

New Jersey strictly limits the number of liquor licenses of different types. Limited brewery licenses don't count against these limits: it's expected they're mostly selling their goods to other licensees.

It might be protectionism, but more likely it's just an effort to regulate alcohol that doesn't take into account the changes in the craft beer scene in the last couple of decades.

Re: SF's Anchor Brewing Company shutting down after 127 years

#330
post #251
post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does a beer have to innovate?

the same reason as any market needs to innovate : consumer trends and goals shift with the times. Let's take the most run-of-the-mill common bolt in the world as a product example : the 200 year old company that has changed to sell that run-of-the-mill bolt online w/ fast delivery and with a companion app has innovated without a product change. innovation doesn't imply a product change, it implies that a company is n…

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