Craft Beer- The next big thing, or was it?
Beer.
To most people it’s an adult beverage. One to be enjoyed after a long days work, or to celebrate friends, family, and life. To others, it’s a lifestyle. Not so much the “drinking” but more the hunting down rare varieties, sharing with friends, and photographing. Yes, I said photographing.
Head over to Instagram and search things like: #craftbeer #ipa #beerphotography and you’ll see what I mean. I too am guilty. Besides brewing my own, I also enjoy the “craft beer lifestyle.”
Here is just one of my pictures from @lakeshorebrewery on instagram:
This industry is so huge right now, I’m afraid it’s going to pop! I predict that the smaller, self distributing breweries are going to be in high demand, and the bottle shop brands are going to be left in the dust.
So many creative people are getting involved, that brand new styles of beer are being created. New yeast strains are being refined and are now readily available.
Although all of this is good for the market and lifestyle, I wonder if it’s changing too much?
Could this new wave be the end of the craft beer industry as we know it, or just the beginning?
Thanks for reading.
Cheers!
I hope craft breweries last for decades. I enjoy trying new breer. I have had some good ones and some not so good ones. I've brewed my own batch a couple times and plan on joining a brew club, although I would be the only woman in the club, so I have been putting it off.
I think as long as there are new brews to try and innovative recipes good breweries will stick around. I recently tried some infused craft brews that were very good; combinations I didn't think I would like were phenomenal. Our local craft brewery is still going strong and actually has expanded twice over the last 3 years. They always have the favorites on tap, a seasonal, and some experimental beer.
Craft breweries will survive as long as a quality product is being produced and the products the customers like, and keep coming back for, remain a staple of the brewery.
@bugfixr Well said!
What brewery is local to you?
Have you tried any kombucha/beer infusions?
West O is the name of the brewery near me, named because they are located on the west side of Lake Okoboji, and also get the water from the lake to brew their beer. It is one of the few blue water lakes in the world.
I have not tried a kombucha/beer infusion but I look forward to trying one some day.
Assuming that there is available distribution there is certainly the market there for craft beer. I know the biggest issue down in here in Australia is not a lack of breweries as everyone wants to own a brewery is the outlets for the sales whether it's bottle shops (laregly controlled by a couple of big corporate players who like doing a single deal with AB Inbev) or bars/pub which again have contracts yo sell AB Inbev exclusively. What we need is more craft beer loving pubs/retailers, but thats a business much harder to scale up
I recently had a short visit to Australia (Ettalong Beach and Syndey) and it did seem that there were quite a few tied houses. It seemed like Lion? controlled the taps everywhere.
Are tap rooms a popular model in Australia or do the laws make it prohibitive? In the US, many breweries have become the "third place" and in some areas a brewery can thrive on tap room sales alone.
Breweries opening their own tap rooms is certainly a trend, there is definitely the business model of a brewery big enough to do the tap room and some small take away (growlers are problematic here due to weird tax laws so they are that popular), even the bigger craft breweries are opening tap rooms in their breweries, we haven't really seen the model you get overseas of the brewery with 5 or 6 tap rooms though, usually just the one and usually on site at the brewery.
Interesting. In the US, most places I’ve found are either entirely craft beer, or no craft at all and are exclusively AB InBev. Perhaps that will be the next step for Australia?