The State of the Beer

There are few, if any, industries outside of brewing where a large company will protect a potential competitor's trademark, return it to them for free and encourage them to take advantage of the resurgent market and get back to work. That's what happened with Samuel Adams and New Albion Brewery a few years ago (New Albion is back in production after being closed 30 years). Founded as a craft brewery in 1976, New Albion helped kick-start the craft brew revolution, but couldn't grow and closed just five years later. Sam Adams' owner, Jim Koch, dug the beer so much he bought the brand and the recipe and did his own spinoff with former New Albion owner Jack McAuliffe. When the beer was a success at the 2012 American Beer Festival, Koch did what any business person would do, he returned the brand to the founder and said, "Get back in the game." Seriously. If a movie ended like that it would be trite. If you're not familiar with the New Albion Ale story, thi...

I do a weekly podcast about homebrewing. It's my hobby. I'm not on anyone's payroll, but, because people are looking for gifts this season, we did a show about getting people started in homebrewing that I thought was worth promoting. So I apologize in advance if I sound a little pitchy. I blog a bit about the brewing industry, but think about the brewing culture way more often. Brewing is one of those endeavors where, once you get hooked, you just wanna brew beer and help people who aren't brewing cultivate the interest. I love talking to homebrewers about what they do and (believe me) they love talking about it. This week's guest didn't show, so instead, Doug at Xtreme Brewing  and I talked about what it took to get someone into beer. Sometimes, taking a class helps. Doug gives free brewing classes occasionally and lots of people go to a couple before making the plunge. But, more often than not, a person will come in, pick up a starter kit, and get to brewin...

For those of us who run in craft beer circles,  it's easy to forget that, proportionately, almost no one drinks craft beer. As with any culture, immersion can give you a false sense of superiority in numbers as well as in beliefs. But of course, the former isn't true. The good news is, a staggering number of people, because of all the craft beer noise, are about to start drinking craft beer more regularly. According to  this story  from the San Diego Union-Tribune, craft beer sales may double next year.  On the Delmarva Peninsula, home to  +Dogfish Head Craft Brewery , we have added six or so breweries in the last five years. While we may add more, as a regular patron of many of the local breweries, the trend seems to be plateauing. The novelty has begun to wear off and, in some instances, novelty was all there was to begin with. It is this notion about novelty that made a quote by Dogfish Head Founder Sam Calagione in the linked story stand out.  To su...

Jimmy Sharp measures his grain into the mill one recent Saturday at Xtreme Brewing The first time I went to Xtreme Brewing, in Millsboro, Del., I was hooked on the homebrew culture. I am not a homebrewer, but, rather, have always described my self as a hobby collector. I love to learn about other people's hobbies, what drew them to their passion and why they pursue it so ardently (or, when they don't, why they no longer do). The culture surrounding a hobby is often more fascinating than the hobby itself. The subculture of inclusivity intrigued me more than any other part of the hobby, except for the beer of course. Hobbies can encourage factionalism by encouraging esoteric cliques defined in opposition to one another. Tribalism often is what makes hobbies sustainable and, for me, worth watching. What is hobby-ier than talking to passionate people who are willing to go to war over details an outsider barely can distinguish. For the homebrewer, however, the distinction is o...

Young women have really only stopped brewing for the last 200 years or so. Homebrewing news stories (most recently, " Not Every Homebrewer Has a Beard ")  increasingly emphasize the fact that women are brewing, which is funny because it highlights a generational, rather than a gender gap. Stereotypically, the oldsters who assign trend stories in newspapers truly are locked into a perception of gender roles that has only barely been true for the last 200(ish) years, especially when it comes to beer. Women brewed until industrialization made it too profitable a potential business for men to ignore. They ladies returned to homebrewing throughout Prohibition, making beer (and liquor and wine) at home to keep the family wet. The real newsflash is, stories about women crossing gender lines are more about establishment bias than about the real world.  Women 'Discover' Brewing Expertise is about knowledge and passion.  It's not so much that women continue to ...

Sure. Like you don't have a beer writing hat. When I was a reporter, and then when I was an editor, publishers would give me a hard time if I wrote too many brewery stories. I understood where they were coming from, but there were (and still are) few small-town business stories as compelling. The story about small batch breweries has always been a double-trend story. Opening and hiring people was bucking the employment and economic development trend of the time (2008-2012). Plus, there was the larger, new micro-brew revolution trend. Beyond the fact that the story was compelling was the fact that it included beer. No one believes spending an hour or so at the brewery counts as taking one for the team. It's funny but at the time I never considered how widespread that phenomenon was.  I wrote for a small paper in a small town. There were millions of guys like me, educated but barely employable in any other industry. We were all gravitating toward the local beer s...

The State of the Beer is a weekly podcast discussing home brewing, brewing and beer news, trends and culture. Hosted by Tony Russo and Doug Griffith, the show is a great way to learn the language of beer and to participate remotely in the larger beer community. Homebrewers will be an important part of the show. Each week, Doug and Tony will taste and review a home brew submitted by a listener. If the brewer is available, we will have them on for the beginning of the show. If not, we'll still record the tasting and initiate a conversation on our blog about the beer. If you are interested in being on the show, we record at 11 a.m. You can reach Tony socially on Twitter ,  Facebook , by posting to the show's  Google+  page or commenting below.