Sometimes beer stories pop up during the week that seem to be thought about along side something that I am currently reading. Such as this story about “What’s the Next Big Beer Style?” It showed up about the same time I reached the seventh chapter of “Hit Makers: The Science of Popularity in an Age of Distraction.”
First, about the list. Adam Beauchamp at Creature Comforts stays true to what he said when Creatures introduced its Cold IPA collaboration with Bell’s Brewery. Second, I like the honest answer from Mitch Steele of New Realm Brewing, which is that making predictions is a crap shoot. “A lot of us brewers are wishing we had crystal balls. But we keep hearing that beer drinkers are moving back to lagers and other lighter styles. We’re also hearing that West Coast IPAs are making a bit of a comeback.”
Back to “Hit Makers” and the chapter where author Derek Thompson considers how random success can be. “Making complex products for people who don’t know what they want–and who aggressively cluster around bizarrely popular products if a couple of their friends do the same–is unbelievably difficult work. It’s important to appreciate the stress inherent to being a creator, an entrepreneur, a music label, a movie studio, a media company. People are mysterious and markets are chaos. Is it any surprise that most creativity is failure,” he writes.
That is not exactly like brewing something new and trying to sell it, but it also not totally different. And there is this next thought, “One solution for taming the chaos is to own the channel of distribution.” Hmmm.
BRINGING IN OUTSIDERS
Can ‘Outsiders’ Like Me Disrupt the Wine Industry? The Answer Isn’t Clear.
“Our culture, our heritage, and the places we come from shouldn’t determine where we land or what we’re able to be a part of. The truth is, there is no wine gene.” Pretty sure there’s no beer gene either.
STILL BODACIOUS
From Ireland . . . “There are certain products of American brewing that were once spoken of reverentially, back when all that was thrilling in beer came from the USA, and as a still-scribbling hack who was around then, I take great pleasure in ticking them off.” The original B.O.R.I.S. revisited, plus brand extensions.
PUBS, BARS & SALOONS
The Chelsea Drugstore – the pub of the future?
“In the 1960s, British brewers sometimes behaved as if they didn’t believe the traditional English pub had a future and scrambled to find ways to reinvent the pub for the late 20th century. For Bass Charrington the solution was a glass and metal wonderland in West London, on the King’s Road – The Chelsea Drugstore.”
For whatever reason, when as I was reading the responses (click to expand) to Robin LeBanc’s question I thought of the final words in “Faces Along the Bar.” They are, “The saloon was a creature of its time, and its time was past.”
What's your dream bar? Not a real place, but the qualities in a bar or pub that you like?
Is it minimal & clean, or traditional-style with wood framings and dim lights? How many taps does it have? What music is in it? many rooms, or just one? What's it looks like from outside? pic.twitter.com/O0Y0sj8NiY
— Robin LeBlanc, from work (@TheThirstyWench) March 2, 2022
Britain’s ancient pubs (or are they?)
“It also looks like most claims from pubs about their antiquity are false. Does it matter and do we care?”
A RENAISSANCE
Indigenous Maori Winemakers are Guardians of New Zealand Terroir
– “We are the land, and the land is us.”
– “The history of the Maori people’s relationship with their colonizers is one that echoes other nations around the globe: that of devastating disease, broken contracts, loss of land and systematic cultural oppression.”