Archive for the ‘Rants’ Category

I started the day with a little shout to Twitter this morning regarding North Carolina not getting any Bell’s Batch 9000 in bottles. The reason being that North Carolina requires the ABV (alcohol by volume) to be printed on any beer over 6.0% abv. The brewery’s southeastern rep replied to inquiries stating:

“To wait for the beer to finish fermenting to get the finished abv then have the packaging produced then submit the label to the TTB for approval was really not an option.  It would have taken too much time to wait for the beer to finish fermenting, get the packing produced, and hope there would be no problems with TTB label approval.”

In other words, the brewery didn’t want to wait on the product for a final ABV measurement and had the labeling printed and readied while the beer was in the tanks. Further, it was suggested that NC needs changes to the labeling requirements. That, I agree with, but not in the sense that these folks are talking about. They’re saying ABV should not be a requirement, because it isn’t in some states. The truth is, Batch 9000 finished with a final gravity of 12.5% abv, according to BeerAdvocate. That’s a full 2.5% below the legal limit cap in North Carolina. Clearly, someone had a clue that the beer would make it under—just not the exact ABV, but the law says the beer’s printed alcohol by volume must be within .20% of what it is. (Batches will always vary slightly.)

You can’t fault Bell’s for wanting to streamline the bottling process. Tank time is a precious commodity in the craft beer world and as the old saying goes, time is money. However, as someone who promotes and sells a lot their product, it feels like a slap in the face to know that Bell’s purposely excluded this product from our market. While no one has said as much, the fact that labels were printed with no ABV on them, immediately excludes the product from NC. And before everyone gets riled-up, let me state for the record: 1) I’m not bashing Bell’s, the brewery (other than being a miffed retailer over the sales losses of a beer I could move, and quickly); 2) Bell’s is a well-run machine of consistency; and 3) I love most, if not all, of their beers.

What this whole thing is, is a greater problem with “truth in labeling.” You hear that term a lot these days over MSG, wine, even vitamins. I think there should be uniform labeling requirements for beer across the board. A consistent packaging method for both the producer and consumer. I have never understood the arguments for why beer should be different. I just went into our wine cabinet and pulled out at least nine different bottles of wine from California, Argentina, France and Italy. Every single one of those has an ABV printed on it. Not only does this tell me how strong the beverage is that I’m drinking—it lets me decide whether or not I should have it. Beer has the most varied ABV’s in its craft, from kinderbier (with none or barely detectable ABV) to BrewDog’s newest, Sink the Bismarck at 41.0% abv. To not have this information printed on the label seems irresponsible at best.

I opened up questions to other folks, who mostly agreed with me. And there are other reasons to include health-related information on the labels. Some people need it for diabetes, gluten-free diets, caloric counts, etc. Be advised, there are some breweries, such as Dogfish Head and Rogue that do print this information on their website as well as this handy guide. But none of these really help you in a situation where you’re not immediately hooked into the web. Here are some comments from other beer drinkers:

@mikegeorger: @bruisinales Should be something like this on either the bottle or packaging http://twitpic.com/153jlw

@mygothlaundry: @bruisinales They should have calories on there too as well as ABV. I wanna know when 2 beers should be my entire daily intake.

@beercentric: @bruisinales Excellent point. Myself, being diabetic and managing love of beer and need of insulin, that number is important!

@cutefont: @bruisinales I think the abv should be on the label. Drives me nuts when its not. I like to know it. Makes a difference to me

@hookedonwinter: @bruisinales I like when a brewery lists as much information as possible. OG, FG, hops, grains, everything!

@ruinationpress: @bruisinales @hookedonwinter should be easy to measure FG and THEN print labels…quality first, not sales .#commonsense

Really, there seems to be no excuse as to why truth in labeling is not a big issue for this industry. “Organic” labels have been redone, there are other FDA requirements for certain things. Is there really any reason we can’t get an ABV printed label on every beer? And maybe some of that other stuff above while we’re at it?

Bruisin’ Ales is OPEN as of now, but we are playing it by ear. Last time, Jason barely made it home, so no taking chances here. Follow us on Twitter @bruisinales or the Bruisin’ Facebook Page for updates on business hours, closings, openings, whatever. AND, if you’re going to stock-up on beer for the winter white stuff (and we know you are), please consider shopping at your local, independent beer store for your storm necessities priorities.

You kids be safe out there!  Looks like Asheville is a wee bit more prepared this time. I even heard trucks dumping sand (?) on our rural road this morning! School’s letting out right about now, and although the MountainXPress says downtown in “crazeee” with traffic, most of that should be over by the time the snow starts falling. Same rules apply: 1) If you can’t drive in snow, don’t drive in it, unless an emergency; 2) If you can drive in snow, be cautious, as those around you may not be as confident (so don’t be a jerk); and 3) Take your time, go slowly—getting their safely if more important than getting there quickly.

The City of Asheville is taking more precautions, including the early closing of school to get families home, and remember: The parking decks are FREE after 6pm tonight, so if you leave your car downtown, put it in a parking deck. This will allow plows and other road clearance services to happen much quicker. Have your supplies ready, too. Ice is coming with this storm, so those without buried power lines are most vulnerable. One little tip I never knew (since we have never lived on a well system before): Fill your bathtub with water in case you lose power (for those with electric water pumps). That way you can freshen up, flush toilets, have water to boil. But please don’t waste it afterward; if some remains, use it to water your indoor plants or handwash your car from all that road salt.

Cheers, y’all! BE SAFE!

2009 was a strange year. A strange year in general, that is, not just personally for me, our business, anything is particular. Just strange. Challenging, difficult, often times horrific? I’m still looking for the right words. 2009 was an incredible deluge of personal tragedies combined with a tanking economy all the while trying to keep our chins up and heads above water. There were hot-spots of good stuff, no doubt, but in 2009, those were more fleeting than regular. So, two weeks ago, I thought “Oh, crap. It’s time to write to about 2009.” What will it be? My favorite beers? A beer resolution? A beer non-resolution? The ubiquitous list? A round-up? A Top 10? Goals?

Nope, it’s not any of that. What I want to say is this: Thank you, 2009, for being over. This post is not meant to be bitchy, belligerent or ungrateful. I hope it will be honest (and perhaps provide a little free therapy to the girl sitting here in this chair).

For us and many of our friends, 2009 was a year of great personal loss—family, friends, homes, jobs. For us, it was Jason losing his father and mentor. And while Bruisin’ Ales kept chugging along, there’s no denying the fact that we didn’t grow as much as we would have in a good economy, I slacked on the blog, and I suffered a major early (self-inflicted) burnout in our busiest Fall season from the stress of worrying about keeping a small business going. After all, we had big plans for 2009 before it clearly showed signs of potential disaster. Most of them, thankfully, we were able to implement, such as the launch of our new website, our major events like the Dogfish Head Weekend and hosting Allagash’s Rob Tod, and some behind-the-scenes stuff. But still, the fact of the matter is, many things had to be put off until this year, including a re-vamped marketing plan and projects such as the e-comm store. So, here it is. A promise to myself, you and the greater universe.

Don’t stress. Re-address.
The e-comm store is what really laid it all out for me in Fall. In the year where “social media” burst through an old marketing paradigm—and will someone please think of a better term for “social media,” because I am sick of it entirely—I made the announcement we were dipping our toes into e-commerce. I committed a VERY HUGE no-no in marketing: I leaked our own plans. Everyone who knows me personally knows I’m horrible at keeping Christmas presents until Christmas, or even birthday presents for that matter, but I usually can keep my mouth shut when someone tells me to. But I get so excited about things that I could not contain my own information. Basically, I forgot to tell myself to shut the F up. Shortly after announcing e-comm with the relaunch of the new site, it took on a life of its own. Soon, on Facebook and Twitter, this big addition was happening right away. There were mentions we were opening a warehouse in Raleigh, NC; a store in Birmingham, AL; you name it. It spun out of control, even for me (and I’m pretty controlling). Then came the incessant questions for launch date, the constant I-want-to-be-an-affiliate requests, etc. Understand: This was my fault. I mean, we were/are already shipping, and while admittedly, it’s not the best system, we still get the product out there with little or no need for a fully-integrated e-comm store or site. It’s still going to be Jason, myself or Mike calling you and packing boxes. (Now, if e-comm came with robots who work for free…) When we opened, we never even had intentions of shipping beer, it came out of one request for a really great customer in a time where it’s cheaper to ship then spend gas money on a road trip for beer. And so finally,  instead of stressing about it, I back-burnered the whole e-comm site for 2009. Why? Because I could. And I had to. It became such a beast that the project itself became unapproachable. We don’t have data-entry nymphs on-hand (they are with the robots somewhere); we are doing this ourselves with the help of Asheville Web, who will implement the project. Our first and foremost loyalty lies to the humble storefront, the home-base of Bruisin’ Ales, the community of Asheville, our local and loyal customers, and those that make beer treks to our fair city. Shipping is not a priority in the great plan, it’s just a super-delicious add-on that happened. We love shipping beer to happy beer people. It’s beerlanthropy, no doubt, but the e-comm is not critical. So, while we’re on the subject: Our goal for launch is first quarter 2010. That is all I can tell you and that is a goal, not a fixed date. Please be patient and we thank you for it. Until then, here is how we ship to you. Whatchu need?

Lesson learned: Big plans and big mouths can lead to big self-inflicted problems.
2010 Goal: Set goals in a way that best serve both customers and ourselves.

Social Media Overload
I joined Facebook over two years ago now. I wasn’t a cool kid from the get-go. I used to make fun of MySpace (sometimes I still do), Friendster, and whatever Friend/Face/Space products were out there. For the record, I often make fun of Facebook, too, but it has been an invaluable tool for the store. I reconnected with many friends, family who had no idea what I had done with my life. There is a sort-of public life that comes with being in front of people daily, and frankly—though probably against all the good graces of Social Media Experts—I don’t care if you see a photo of me making a complete ass of myself. Jason is private; me, not as much. I’m not Mrs. America, a politician hiking the Appalachian Trail of Argentina and I don’t have a PR problem. (Yet. Possibly after this post.) For the first year, my personal page was our business page. It was a mish-mosh of me and Bruisin’ Ales. Only after reaching a whopping 1200+ “friends” at some point last spring, did I realize I had a problem. While I am Bruisin’ Ales, Bruisin’ Ales is not always me. I’m not always drinking beer. I do have other interests. So, we set-up a Facebook Fan Page for Bruisin’ Ales. On Facebook, particularly, it became more of a privacy issue. I get more friend requests from more people than I ever know in real life. These days, my “friend” list hovers around 800 +/- and I clean it about once a month. It’s actually due for a cleaning. If I don’t know you, haven’t done business with you, or you’re not an industry person I need to contact, I won’t accept your friend request. It’s not personal. If you like Bruisin’ Ales, I thank you greatly, and please go be a fan of our page, which is an extension of our blog.

While anyone who follows me on Twitter (@bruisinales) knows how I love, love, love the Twitter, it can be overwhelming. After our initial foray (at the coaxing of our web team) to try this micro-blogging thing, I fell in love. Blogging took time, Twitter was easy. I could keep up with more people quicker and easier than I could ever do with one blog post. We were lucky. It took off for us, but I put a ton of time into it at the start, which paid off immensely. I don’t “tweet” about beer constantly. Half the time, I’m tweeting about crap you don’t even care about. Hell, half the time it’s crap I don’t even care about. But I try to keep it fun and mixed. If anything, the Bruisin’ Ales Twitter feed is an extension of us, not a separate entity unto itself. (In that way, I treat it totally different than Facebook.) Then, the pressure came: Klout (I’m a “persona”), TwitterAnalyzer, other things that “measure” your value on Twitter. Then, we snagged a couple local blogger/Twitter awards (for which, we are extremely grateful). Ack, the pressure! For about two weeks, I started stressing—again—because in my mind this was a reputation to be upheld. Then I realized I didn’t care. Or perhaps a better way of actively putting it to words: I needed to be unaffected by it. Cool, yes. Interesting, yes. Important, not really. But, yes, you will still see me out and about, Blackberry firmly planted in palm. Soon to be bionic, we can only hope.

The blog is still a work in progress. While back in the day, it was the first thing I did every morning, I eventually realized it’s a lot better to post less frequently with interesting content¹ than it is to post daily with regurgitated stuff from other people. Summaries are helpful and I know some of you enjoy them—and they will continue occasionally—but there are plenty of sites like BeerNews.org that do that already and much, much better than me. Simply put, some days I have no blog ideas; there is nothing to say; or if there is, I censor myself from saying it. So, our website hits are down a little in the second half of 2009. Oh, god, no! I must fix that! Truthfully, no. I’m cool with it. My readers read when I write. If they miss it because I’m less frequent than I used to be, perhaps they’ll catch it on a cross-post with our Facebook Page or Twitter. I mean, that’s how this crap works, right?

AddThis. Oh, AddThis, my love/hate relationship with you knows no boundaries. When we first added the little “share” button to each blog post, it just looked cool. Frankly, I don’t even know what the hell half of those things are and who is sharing them. So, we kept it, but added a simple ReTweet button. (Which, yes, I know I made disappear yesterday when I updated WordPress.) I like to stick with easy things. Easy is good. YouTube, I hardly watch you and everyone has a YouTube Channel, right? Perhaps I’m losing market share, or maybe I’m old and out of touch, but I’m not that much interested in being on video myself outside of others video casts. (Ask my mother. I didn’t even want a videographer for our wedding. Ten years ago.) Comments, you make me nuts. I hardly read you. (Except for the Citizen-Times comments, because those borderline on insane half the time and provide endless entertainment, which is a sort-of case study to my reasoning.) We’ve never had comments open on the blog—except once, just recently—and I don’t want them open. It’s not that I don’t care what people have to say, it’s that we’re not a forum. We’re busy selling beer, not moderating our comments. You can comment all you want over on the Facebook Page. Go nuts. Hell, you can comment on me not letting you comment! Boo-yah! And geo-tagging, Foursquare. This I will never understand. I can fully explore my city without Foursquare’s help. Pretty sure I can do it in others, too. And if I want you to know where I am, I will let you know myself. I don’t need to have my GPS location tagged in my Twitter profile. I don’t need to “check-in” unless it’s vacation, which I need desperately. I don’t want to be the mayor of anything. Except maybe BeerCity, USA.

Summary: Social media is great. Truly, it is fun to watch it evolve. It’s fascinating stuff for a marketing girl like me. But without really being social, without really meeting followers on Twitter—and we always encourage you to introduce yourself when you’re in-store—the whole entire purpose is defeated. It’s a great reaching out point, but without the actual social contact, you got nothing. So, we’ll see you out and about in beer land.

Lesson Learned: Ratings, numbers and statistics are overrated. There are no social media rules. Do what works.
2010 Goal: Fight off web/social media armies that will argue with me over these statements. But argue with them in a public social setting.

Back to Basics
My main point of all of this is Bruisin’ Ales is going to back to basics and moving forward at a pace we can live with. We moved here to simplify our lives, get out of the corporate wrangling, and actually get to spend some time together. We just want to sell great beer. So far so good. We’re a married couple running a business and have so far survived, thrived, and made a little, tiny dream come true. The rest will wait and evolve in due time. We thank you for success we never anticipated so quickly. Cheers to 2010!

Lesson Learned: What is good for you, is not necessarily good for the business. What is good for the business, is not necessarily good for you.
2010: Balance. Keep on keeping on, but don’t lose site of what matters. And that, of course, is the beer. And you guys.

“There are too many ideas and things and people. Too many directions to go. I was starting to believe the reason it matters to care passionately about something, is that it whittles the world down to a more manageable size.” —Susan Orlean, Adaptation. (2002)

¹ This blog post may or may not fall into the interesting category.

Three years ago, Bruisin’ Ales opened with no fanfare, no ribbon cuttings, no spectacular kick-offs, no big announcements, no press releases… we just opened the door.

We had realistically planned to open after the holidays, but we were ready. After months of renovating what was once a pottery studio, the painting was done, product was in place (that’s me, buried in beer above), permits were in hand, and we were getting anxious. (Possibly bored.) So, Jason & I just said one night, “Let’s open tomorrow. Let’s see what happens.” You see, there were so many awesome rumors as to what we were going to be. We did not have our outside signage yet, so we thought it would be fun to see how people would react. On the very long list of “what was going in the space at 66 Broadway” was: 1) a chocolate shop, 2) a homebrew store, 3) a jeweler, 4) a boxing training center (my personal favorite because someone apparently had seen our logo).

I remember before we took the paper off the windows for all to see, that I grabbed Jason and had one brief moment where I wanted to cry like a 4-year-old girl (literally), change my mind, and turn around. Now that we celebrate three years today, I love looking back. This was never a career move. It certainly wasn’t for the money—Dear Everyone-Who-Starts-the-”Beer-Store-Ideas” Threads on BeerAdvocate: Corporate jobs are much, much easier, pay more and provide little things like healthcare and vacation time. We just wanted better beer, more beer, rare beer—so we opened a store where we would want to shop. We really wanted to be a small-town boutique store, but as we grew, and people started driving—often far—just to shop here, the small beer store life became a bigger duty to craft beer and the people who love it. We now host some of the beer world’s major players in our small city for events. We have met some awesome people in the industry (such as Jay Brooks, and yes, that is fresh Pliny the Elder, six days off the bottling line). We ship nationwide (where we can) and have customers across the United States and Canada. In the first quarter of 2010, we’ll launch our full e-comm/shopping cart site. (Bear with us. We’re still just two people trying to make this little dream of ours work for everyone.) And we have to give a shout to our local kick-ass breweries and our employees past and present: Chris, The Brewsician; Philip, the Performer; and Mike, the Biking Beer Nerd. Without these fellas, we would have (well, I would have) lost our sanity a long, long time ago.

It’s not been perfect (like here, when our coolers were drop-shipped outside by common carrier onto the sidewalk on wooden palettes when we ordered full-service install). It’s not all been smooth. It’s definitely not easy. But it has been fun. Loads and loads and loads of fun. And that’s what matters.

So, cheers to YOU, all our beer loving friends and supporters who have brought us this far. We raise our glass to great beer and say thanks! Prost!

PS: I’ve just spent 25 minutes searching for a picture of Jason & I toasting beer glasses. He hates pictures, so I can’t find one. He’ll only pose with “important” people.

I don’t know about you, but Christmas has literally thrown-up in our house. In the midst of unpacking boxes from my illustrious Cyber Monday Extravaganza Experience (by which I mean, it was raining, the DSL sucked and the router signal was low in the area I needed to be), it now looks like a bunch of drunk elves attacked our house. There are presents unwrapped in piles, scattered rolls of wrapping paper, miscellaneous ribbons floating around, shipping boxes (which we’ll reuse for beer!) and all kinds of weird packing materials. And might I say, not one—NOT ONE—piece of bubble wrap in the mix. Don’t they know you need bubble wrap for the stress of these types of situations? I forgot to write down who was supposed to get which present for the “could-be-for-anyone” gifts causing general confusion. The Bear dog thinks everything is for him, too, making the process even more difficult as he sticks his nose in everything and I find random things in other parts of the house. Oh, plus, I’m doing my pre-holiday cleansing ritual of #nobeer at the worst possible moment, some say backwards. But I digress, as the world is NOT ending, I assure you…

Genesse converts old storage tanks into beer cans
Up in Rochester, NY, the owners of the old Genessee beer plant have converted three old 280,000-gallon tanks into art! Yup, they’re slapping massive wrap-arounds on their old outdoor tanks to look like the old cans of Genessee beer. It wasn’t good beer, but it’s a sentimental thing, so we approve. [Photo: Shawn Dowd, Associated Press]

“Space Barley” has been released in Japan
Yeah, you read that right. Remember months ago (maybe a year?) when Sapporo sent some barley to the Space Station? Well, after five months, they retrieved it and brewed with it, making just 250 six-packs that will be auctioned for charity. Okay, nifty little promotion there, but would you drink it? Personally, I do not know if I’m ready for space beer just yet. But beer IN space is something I can get behind.

ABC discovered Sam Adams Utopias
The beer has been made for years, but we love it when mainstream media discovers old beer news for the first time. It just shows how on top of things they are! So, yeah, Utopias has been released (last week, actually). The 27% beer that comes in a mini-copper brewers’ vessel and costs $150 or more, depending where you are. If you live in one of the few states that actually sees this stuff and have dispensable income, we suggest buying it. Pretty special stuff. “Due to legal restrictions, Samuel Adams Utopias is not offered in the states of Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Washington, or West Virginia.”

The Hop Press
In the world of beer sites, the two big players are still RateBeer and BeerAdvocate. Normally, we have used the latter more often in the past, but I gotta say, RateBeer’s redesign without all the eye-bleed-inducing emoticons and colors is slick; the numbers rating system is a bit bitter—gives a better understanding than A, A- and B+—and now they’ve got the Hop Press. If you haven’t noticed this addition to their site, now you know. Regional reps from across the country. We’re proud to say that RateBeer actually asked us for help in finding someone for our area of the world, and that person is Brian Cendrowski of Untamed Beer. He lives in Greenville, SC. (He’s also the person who picked-up Sam Calagione from the airport back in May for us and we’re forever grateful he didn’t actually steal him.) So check it out often. And you can follow Hop Press on Twitter, too, @hop_press.