Almost as British as the Royal Air Force, the Real Ale Fest changes zipcodes this year. After two years in Chicago, Ray Daniels has decided to bring his cask ale festival to the western suburbs. Once again, attendees will be treated to the largest collection of cask ales outside of Britain, along with great Pub food, Pub games, educational seminars (Saturday morning) and a preview tasting with famed beer guru, Michael Jackson (Friday afternoon). But the beer is what should draw you to this event. The RAF has received entries from 78 breweries in 30 states for a total of more than 130 individual beer brands. On the British side, in addition to beers from long-time RAF supporter Fuller's, you can taste the 1998 Champion Beer of Britain, Bluebird Bitter, the 1997 Champion Beer of Britain, Workie Ticket, along with other award winning cask ales from Gales, J.W. Lees, and Swale. So if you didn't make it out to Denver for the GABF, here is a great event in your own backyard - Don't miss it!
Crank up the brew kettles, Fall has arrived! Although I realize that some of you are year-round brewers, those of us that do not have dedicated temperature controlled environments (read: spare refridgerator) welcome the arrival of more favorable ambient temperatures. For me, this is the start of the '98-'99 brew season.
As opposed to my usual preview of future club events, I would like to reverse course and look back on a number of happenings that took place over the past two months. Not to overlook what's "on tap" in the next few weeks, I direct you to the Calendar of Events located in this newsletter as well as the calendar located on the club web page which can be easily linked to from www.thebrewerscoop.com.
The Second Saturday Social Nights continue to be well attended. We took advantage of the favorable weather in August and September to enjoy the beer gardens at The Weinkeller in Westmont and The Roundhouse in Aurora. I look forward to socializing with other members of the club who may not have been able to attend past gatherings due to summer vacations and the like.
A few members, including myself, made the annual pilgimage to The Great Taste of the Midwest in Madison at the beginning of August. This event gets bigger every year but somehow manages to maintain a high degree of organizational and logistical effectiveness as well as "customer" satisfaction. Kudos are in order for the event organizers - the members of the Madison Homebrewers and Tasters Guild. Two Brothers Brewing once again gratiously shared their space with the club so that we could sell some of our merchandise. I'm pleased to say that the t-shirts were again a big hit. As a result we only have about a dozen left in inventory in the L and XXXL sizes. We will be reordering new shirts, and I'll get to that topic later in this column.
September proved to be a busy month with a competition at Beer In A Box (BIAB), the aforementioned Social Night at The Roundhouse, the BOSS picnic, and the cider run to Sycamore. I thank John Mains, Shane & Laurel Coombs, and Don Alton for helping judge at BIAB. Although it was a small competition, the BIAB staff were wonderfull hosts and very generous in terms of the awards given. The club also thanks BIAB for donating the competition entry fees to the club treasury. We look forward to working with BIAB on future competitions. Speaking of which, John Mains has volunteered to chair a committee whose purpose will be to better organize and conduct club supported competitions. Naturally, all members who are interested in assisting John with this effort should contact him at future club meetings.
We once again thank the Brewers of South Suburbia (BOSS) for extending an invitation to our club to join them in their annual picnic. Those who attended can attest to the fabulous variety of food that was prepared (including the roasted pig) along with the huge selection of commercial draft and homebrewed beers. I thank Dave Maki for his extended duty staffing the bar and Mike Uchima for providing a Porter that he threw together 3 weeks prior to the picnic.
The trip to Sycamore with the air conditioning running in the car didn't exaclty have the feel of a crisp fall day that you would normally associate with a trip to an orchard for cider. Nonetheless, a few members and their families journeyed to Plank Road Orchard to obtain a few gallons of fresh (pressed the night before) unpasteurized cider as well as pick a peck (or two) of apples from the orchard. My sincere thanks to owners Brian and Jan Walsh for their hospitality and tour of the operations and to Brian Jr. for his effort the previous night to press our cider order. We may try to schedule a sampling next spring of the end result of everyone's hard cider attempt.
Finally, I mentioned previously that we will be ordering new club merchandise. At the September meeting we discussed two items; shirts and glassware. Given the interest and suggestions made, the board of directors will be pursuing the purchase of club sweatshirts with a slightly modified appearance from the current t-shirt and club bulge pint glasses which will have an embossed image cropped from the infamous monks "logo". Preliminary discussions with vendors indicate that the final cost to club members of these items should be very reasonable.
I thank all members for their support of the club. We had good attendance (in my opinion) at this past summer's meetings which are typically sparsely attended. Just a reminder, if you have an e-mail address and have not given it to me, send me a message at dproksa@fcmservices.com. In this way I can keep you informed of any club-related information that may not be able to wait for the next newsletter.
Remember that crazy Budweiser truck driver "Gus" from tv ads a couple of years back? You remember, he would be at "Bud Central" I guess it was, and get a call from a distressed beer drinker who just opened up one of those "fancy" foreign beers, and smelled something "skunky". Watching these ads would give the average beer consumer the idea that it was not a good thing for your beer to smell like a small bushy-tailed mammal that emits an offensive-smelling , musky liquid when molested. This seemed to be Anheuser-Busch's point. That was why they came up with FRESHNESS DATING on their products. Well, guess what? A-B is now test marketing a new brand called "Catalina Blonde" that comes in clear bottles. The brewery's St. Louis County (MO) distributor, Grey Eagle Distributors Inc., found that Catalina Blonde is sometimes skunked. But Grey Eagle is telling retailers that, well, a skunky aroma is OK. If the distributor is asked about the matter, its sales staff hands out a memo to retailers. Here is a copy of that memo as printed in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. It is dated May 7, 1998, and is addressed to "all sales personnel" and signed by Tony Cira, key accounts manager at Grey Eagle.
"I have heard from several sources, and have experienced myself, that Catalina Blonde will sometimes have an off-odor or skunky aroma. I contacted the brand team to ask them if they had any comments along these lines, and surprisingly, their answer was yes. In talking further with the brand team and a subsequent conversation with brewmaster, Scott Mennen, this was anticipated.
As Scott explained, Catalina is made with natural cone hops, versus hops extract, to give the beer its clean, light, refreshing taste. Natural cone hops are extremely sensitive to becoming light struck and creating a skunky aroma. All of A-B's other clear bottled products, i.e. Bud Ice and Bud Ice Light, are produced with hop extract giving the product more stability against light, but a heavier, fuller bodied taste. To maintain the desired taste profile for Catalina, natural hops were required.
Other clear or green bottle beers that use natural hops in the brewing process, such as Corona and Heineken, characteristically have a similar skunky aroma that have actually come to identify those brands. Scott has heard comment from consumers that Catalina smells like Corona or Heineken. And this did not have a negative connotation, it was just a statement of fact.
This off-odor, therefore, is not unusual. We do want to try to protect the beer from light as much as possible, but it more than likely will become light-struck despite your best efforts. Let your retailers know this is OK, and does not affect the taste of the product. I realize we taste what we smell, but fortunately, the vast majority of consumers drink their beer from the bottle not ever smelling the product as you would by pouring it in a glass."
What more can you expect from "The King of Beers"?
As I reported to you in an earlier issue, Anheuser-Busch is spending millions to become the "Official Beer of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games." Well now someone has gotten smart and is marketing themselves as the Unofficial Beer of the 2002 Winter Games. That someone is Greg Shirf of Shirf Brewing, makers of "Wasatch Beers". He began his campaign by putting the phrase "Wasatch Beers. The Unofficial Beer, 2002 Winter Games" on one of his trucks. Shirf notes that he was careful not to use the word Olympics in his claim. "No one has claim on 2002 and everyone uses the word games,' said Shirf. And now he is going one step further by marketing a beer labeled "Wasatch Unofficial 2002 Amber Ale." Shirf doesn't know how long he can continue to fight Olympic organizers, but did admit he could change his mind. "We don't want to make a deal. We just want to have some fun," he said. "The only way we will acquiesce is if they make us drink Budweiser."
The South Carolina Supreme Court has made it official. If you get drunk and hurt yourself, or someone else, you can't sue the establishment that sold you the booze. This sounds almost self-evident, but until their August 1998 decision this sort of thing was happening there. Specifically they ruled on the case of Robert L. Tobias who in 1989 entered a bar in a Ramada Inn already intoxicated. He was served one drink, left, got in his car and proceeded to kill another person when his car hit theirs. Mr. Tobias was suing the Ramada Inn for serving him that one drink. A Court of Appeals had ruled that state law forbids the sale of beer, wine or liquor to an intoxicated person to prevent him from becoming an even greater public risk. The Court of Appeals said the law was designed to protect the intoxicatd person from harming himself and concluded the drunken person could sue the business for negligence for selling the alcohol. The state Supreme Court disagreed and stated, "We now hold that public policy is not served by allowing the intoxicated adult person to maintain a suit for injuries which resulted from his own conduct."
Maybe since this story happened in New Jersey, it really isn't a good idea after all - but it sure sounds like a good idea. Over last Labor Day weekend, Bergen County Sheriff's Department wanted to get the message out about drinking and driving. So they made a deal with Anheuser-Busch, set up road blocks, and as cars were stopped, the drivers were handed a cold bottle of O'Doul's Non-Alcoholic beer along with a flier warning motorists to drink responsibly. Needless to say, motorists were a bit confused at first. Some were satisfied that they were getting a free drink, but others, especially those that don't drink alcohol at all, were upset by the delays these roadblocks caused. One tee-totaler remarked, "I don't drink and drive anyway, and now all my frozen food (sitting in the trunk) is melting."
Most people look back on their college days quite fondly and have very specific memories they associate with them. It's a time in your life when you get away from your family, start experimenting with different ideas, and begin to discover just who you are. You may find that you have a gift for politics, or the law, or if you're like John "Bluto" Blutarsky, John Belushi's character in the movie "Animal House", you discover that beer is going to play a major role in your destiny. Since 1988 Student Monitor LLC of Ridgewood, NJ has been surveying college students about their lives, and for the first time since its inception, beer drinking has not finished first as most popular activity among students. According to their spring study, seventy-three percent of the 1200 students responding at 100 colleges and universities named web surfing as an "in" activity; beer drinking was second at seventy-one percent. Other popular activities included using cellular phones (64%), watching Seinfeld (56%), using beepers (54%), body-piercing (48%), and finally, my favorite, pessimism (16%). Now these may seem like shallow activities to you, but I did a survey of my own when I went to college way back in the 60's and the difference between then and now is quite striking. Back then the most "in" activity was pot smoking (92%), followed by looking for more pot (79%), talking about pot (62%), listening to music while stoned (58%), looking for food while stoned (43%) and playing frisbee while stoned (35%). Those were the days!
College and beer. They go together like ham and eggs. Sometimes though, it is not a good idea to mix the two. The folks at Lowell Brewing Co. are finding that out now. The Massachussetts brewer wanted to come out with a new American lager, and after doing some research on the old Harvard Brewing Co. that opened in 1898 and closed in 1956, they came up with Harvard Lager. This quickly got the attention of the folks at Harvard University in Cambridge MA only twenty miles away. They protested not only the use of the Harvard name, but the crimson flag with a letter "H" on the label. Marty Finnegan of of Lowell Brewing said thoughts of the university - with its distinctive crimson logo - never entered their minds while working on their new brew. "We didn't think one moment of the university when we were running this project, " he said. "We were thinking of nostalgia." Harvard's trademark attorneys have asked the brewer to stop using the Harvard name as well as the style of packaging. I imagine Lowell Brewing will lose this battle, but they can take heart. There are plenty of other beer names to use. Although it may sound a bit strange, I bet DeVry would make a good name for a beer. Or how about U of I beer? Maybe they could work something in there about it being the Champaign of Bottled Beers.
Attention all Green Bay Packer fans. The Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co. has announced that together with another Chippewa Falls company, Kell Container, the arrival of the brewer's new Honey Weiss "fan pack". This triangular (think cheese shaped) container holds 15 cans of beer and has a perforated circle that allows the customer to convert it into a hat once all the beer is gone. Jake Leinenkugel, brewery president, said the green and gold container honors the team and marks the start of sales of Honey Weiss in 12-ounce cans. This sounds like a great idea to me. Maybe Goose Island can work out a deal with the Bears. You would get 12 bottles of Honkers Ale in a brown paper bag, perfect for wearing over your head at Soldier Field.
A shopping center built in the shape of a beer stein? Must be Wisconsin, and it is. Ground was broke in August for a 44-store complex, 134 feet tall and overlooking an interstate highway interchange. The project is the brainchild of Susan Sampson, artist and developer, who wants to include office space, an eighth story restaurant and a tavern on the ninth story. "There is not a stein-shaped building anywhere," she said. "It's gotten tremendous interest worldwide. It will be very picturesque from I-94. You'll be able to see it a mile away from either direction. It'll be a landmark for Black River Falls." She envisions also adding a convention hall and hotel. Sampson proposed the building for LaCrosse in 1993 but withdrew the idea after getting opposition from people in the Mississippi River community, home of G. Heileman Brewing Co. She took the idea north to Black River Falls and got a warmer reception. "Everybody's saying it's going to be a wonderful addition to our community," Chambe of Commerce president Darren Durman said. "It's going to be a great thing to have. It's one of those things where people are going to have to pull off (the interstate) to see what it is," Durman said. "The location will almost sell itself." Plans include an exterior of stone and glass with a stainless steel roof, simulating a stein's lid. It's tentatively scheduled to open New Year's Eve 1999.
Wallace S. Weicherding, 64, of Salem, IL faces up to 15 years in prison after being convicted in federal court of conspiracy to possess and make illegal firearms and destructive devices, and possession of a machine gun. Weicherding is one of five men charged with planning assassinations and bombings to start a race war, all to be financed by robbing banks and armored cars. Their hit list included movie director Steven Spielberg and civil rights attorney Morris Dees. It's no wonder he was convicted by an all-white jury of nine women and three men. His attorney, Assistant Public Defender Renee Schooley, decided to use the "beer defense" to protect her client. According to Schooley, Weicherding was a drunken fool whose did nothing but "puff and boast and tell tall stories" - and drink excessively. Unfortunately for him, a government informer had taped his "boasting". Sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 4 in East St. Louis.
It had to happen. Panther Brewing co. of Westwood, MA has come out with Three Stooges Beer. Plans are in in the works for tap handles that would emit such signature Stooge noises as "Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk" and Woo,woo,woo,woo,woo" when a Stooge draft is pulled. The beer is brewed under contract with a Pennsylvania brewery and is not a micro-brewed type beer. Only fitting for Stooge Beer I guess.
Sifting through the news stories this month, I noticed a couple of items from a small town in southwestern Florida, Bonita Springs. I guess the Twilight Zone is mobile, moving from town to town each month. The first story is a modern day Goldilocks story. Richard Devers returned home in mid-August to find someone had eaten the lasagna and salad his girlfriend had left him. He then noticed someone had been drinking his beer. There were three empty cans on the floor. And lo and behold "Goldilocks" (in reality a neighbor from a nearby trailer park, Edith Ann Lorenzo) was asleep in his bed! The cops finished this fairy tale story by booking Ms. Lorenzo on petty theft charges. The second story from Bonita Springs is not a fairy tale, but more like deja vu. In our last issue, we told you about that crazy guy from Kentucky who tried to shoot a beer can off his friend's head, and missed, critically wounding his best friend. Well, Randall James Baker, 45, should have read that item. He and his buddy Robert Callahan, 47, (aren't these guys old enough to know better?) were drinking beer and playing with their guns when they thought it would be a great idea if they tried to shoot a button off each other's basball cap. They were sitting about six feet away from each other when Baker fired his .22 caliber rifle as Callaham turned towards him. The bullet struck the left side of Callahan's forehead. Unlike that Kentucky jerk, Baker ran to a nearby home and called 911. Police arrived and took Callahan to the hospital and arrested Baker for aggravated battery.
Holy Rheinheitsgebot Batman, what is happening in Germany? Changing lifestyles and tastes are slowly putting breweries, both big and small, out of business. In the past five years 42 have closed and some analysts predict that half of all breweries in Germany will be closed in 10 to 20 years. The industry is starting to consolidate and some big guns are going against the grain of another German tradition - the preference for distinctive local brews - to promote their labels nationwide. The small breweries who want to survive try to carve out their own creative niches. The 409-year-old Cloister Brewery in Neuzelle, near the Polish border, is staying afloat with such market-expanding innovations as medicinal "bathing beer." They have also opened the brewery up to tour groups, and its trying to interest health spas in buying their spent hops for beauty packs! (Try that one on your wives guys, and see how far you get.) Factors for diminishing sales include exposure through travel to other drinks, especially wine; anti-drunken driving campaigns; fitness fads; and changing tastes, especially among the young. In the final shakeout, analysts say survivors will probably be those brewers that can build strong regional or national brands, and small niche players, like the Neuzelle Cloister Brewery.
While the brewing industry is struggling in Germany, it is thriving in Bulgaria. Beer is the only market sector in the former Communist country that isn't flat - growing seven times faster than the national economy. Brewing is also the only industry that has been almost fully privatized. Of 13 breweries, 12 are already in private hands, attracting over $30 million of foreign investment. "It is good time to invest in beer," said Oleg Zhablyanov, owner of a small brewery in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia. "So far this year, our sales have grown 20 percent over last year." Although Bulgaria is known mainly for its wines, it has a 100-year brewing tradition and 50 local brands of beer. And beer has never been bigger, with production expected to grow 30 percent this year - well ahead of the 4 percent growth forecast for the overall national economy. Nearly all of the estimated 104 million gallons that will be produced this year will be consumed domestically, with only about 2 percent exported, says Peter Paunkov, chairman of the Brewers' Union. "The demand for beer grows due to the good quality of local beer, its affordable cost and the extreme heat this summer," Zhablyanov said. A pint-sized bottle of Bulgarian beer costs the equivalent of about 30 cents, while the average monthly salary is the equivalent of $100. Zhablyanov and his partners paid $700,000 for a 62 percent stake in their factory. They also promised to invest $550,000 in a new production line and assume $300,000 in debt the company had amassed while in state hands. "The brewery has been poorly managed," Zhablyanov said. "We switched it from one to two shifts per day to more efficiently use the equipment. In June we raised wages by a fifth." With some 13,000 gallons per day, his company, Sofia Brewery, is much smaller than Bulgaria's flagship breweries Zagorka and Astika. Zagorka is owned by Dutch beer giant Heineken and Belgium's Interbrew hold a controlling interest in Astika, as well as two smaller breweries.
Hula Hoops. Pet Rocks. Nehru jackets. Fads like these are here one minute, and gone the next. The only way for any fad to get started is for people to turn off their brains and routinely follow the crowd. This is what makes fads dangerous. Not that pet rocks or hula hoops are dangerous, but when you stop thinking and start following the crowd, before you know it you're drinking Bud Ice Light and talking about that new show on the W-B. While I was going over the news items for this issue of the Knave Knews, I got to thinking about fads after reading two stories. The stories are in no way related or even similar, but all fads have to start somewhere, and let's just hope that new fads don't sprout from these. The first story comes from Tel Aviv, Israel. It was announced that a new "restaurant" had opened, "Cafe Ke'ilu" (Cafe Make Believe). It's located in a trendy section of the city, has tables, chairs, silverware, menus and servers just like any other cafe. But it has no food or drink! Cafe Ke'ilu manager Nir Caspi, who calls the experience "conceptual dining", explains that people come to be seen and to meet people but not for the actual food. The menu, designed by a top-rated chef, lets diners order some of the world's most exquisite dishes like eel mousse or salad of pomegranates (if in season), "served" on elegant, but empty, platters. There is no mention in the article what this will cost you. Do they charge you based on the food you weren't served and didn't eat? You can see how this idea might spread. Wouldn't you love to open a Fantasy BrewPub? Patrons could order any beer from around the world, or choose to order a house specialty "brewed on premises". You put down a nice coaster, take their $5 and present them with a beautifully clean and empty glass (appropriate to the style they ordered of course) You won't even need dram shop insurance! What a spendid way to tell people they have more money than brains. The next story is from Toronto, Ontario. The mayor of Toronto wants the Molson Brewing company to custom make a beer to be sold only within the city limits of Toronto. The mayor even wants to name the beer. "Mega Buzz sounds terrific, T.O. Buzz, T.O. Beer, whatever," he said. Should this prove successful in Toronto, you can be sure, other cities will follow suit. Will Richie Daley tell Goose Island that he wants an all-Chicago beer called Big Onion Ale? How about Rudy Giuliani in New York? Any thoughts about Rotten to the Core Amber Ale? Let's leave running the cities to the mayors and running the brew house to the brewers. You don't have to rack your brain to hard to figure that one out.
Dow Jones got you down? Want a hot stock tip on a brewing winner? Try Coors. In January of this year, Coors stock was trading below $30/share. By the 24th of September that price had risen to over $50/share! While much of the market is haunted by Asian recession worries and White House scandals, Coors has good defensive characteristics. "Investors are looking for investments with little or no Asian exposure, and Coors stock certainly fits that bill," says Coors spokesman Kevin Caulfield. "And beverage companies in general tend to be countercyclical. They're not as vulnerable to concerns about real or projected recessionary trends." And that's not all. A potential for higher beer prices in the fourth quarter has sent Wall Street into a tizzy about Coors and its far bigger competitor, Anheuser-Busch. The word is that A-B has adopted or will adopt price increases and that archrival Miller Brewing Co. will match. "Coors as the No. 3 brewer has a lot of operating leverage and margins are low. The benefits of a price increase to it are even greater than Anheuser," says Douglas M. Lane of Merrill Lynch. If the predicted price increases hold, Coors will reap three cents of profit per share to every penny gain for the Bud boys. This estimate assumes modest commodity prices (aluminum, barley, hops, rice). It also assumes shipments will remain strong and costs are controlled. Lane even believes Coors will trade over $60/share. And Mr. Lane said in his September report, "Given the nature of the stock in a decelerating macro-environment, we continue to see Coors as an intermediateterm buy." That's good ( I think.)
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Last modified 11/3/98.