Back in 2011, Joe Stange asked this question in The New York Times: So is there a limit to the number of craft brewers that locals are willing to support?
“Seriously? It’s beer,” answered Dylan Mosley, the head brewer for the Civil Life Brewing Company in south St. Louis. “You know how many people drink beer? If I opened a hamburger joint, nobody’s going to be, like, ’Hey, you know how many hamburger joints there are?’ They’d be like, ’Sweet! Another hamburger joint!’”
The hamburger joint-brewery analogy has lived in my head since. Hamburger joints close for a lot of reasons, often with barely a mention why. Now that there are more of the 9,000-plus breweries in the country and many have been around for decades, sometimes they close just because it is time.
That seems to be the case for LowDown Brewery & Kitchen in Denver. Owner Scott O’Hearn said the brewery, which will close this week, was not struggling and was profitable. “When you look five years [out], it becomes a little riskier. Not necessarily to lose money, but to not make enough to be worth staying open,” he said.
On the other hand . . . here’s an interesting take on Epic Beer entering liquidation in New Zealand. “There is a sad reversion to historical reality happening, whereby as the consumer becomes more price-conscious, they tend to shift back to beers put out by the very major breweries that brands like Epic existed to challenge. And in so doing they wear away at the spirit of innovation which helped fuel the craft brewing movement.”
But . . . Epic lives on.
“Well it sure has been an intense roller coaster ride over the last month,” founder Luke Nicholas said. “But we now can see some light at the end to this liquidation process with a successful purchase of Epic Beer. It means Epic will continue and I will be involved going forward. Exactly how and what this means still needs to be determined.”
Public service
Eight San Francisco Bars Where You Can Still Buy Anchor Steam Beer. Including the current status of what is in inventory. Generally, not much.
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– Wayward Lane Brewing and the History of New York’s Hop Houses. Brewing in a former hop house is much cooler than in a railway arch.
– If it’s Tuesday, this must be Kölsch. Martyn Cornell joins a tour that takes him to Cologne, Dusseldorf and several other places, including almost a complete set of Low Countries brewing abbeys AND St Bernardus, one of his favorite breweries. Part One is followed by Part Two and Part Three. He’s not done.
– Book review: Cask by Des de Moor. “It’s not a beer or pub guide but an attempt to think about cask from every angle: its history, the culture that surrounds it, the science, and the appreciation of the beer itself.”
– An Israeli beer brewed with 3,000-year-old Philistine yeast strain. “You might have seen headlines that declared: ‘Want to get drunk like a Philistine?’ or ‘Drink the beer that Goliath (or Cleopatra or the pharaohs) had!’ or even ‘A taste of history in every gulp!’You might have seen headlines that declared: “Want to get drunk like a Philistine?” or “Drink the beer that Goliath (or Cleopatra or the pharaohs) had!” or even “A taste of history in every gulp!'”