The headline — Costco Is Coming for Craft Beer — about store brand beers reads like click bait. The story itself, on the other hand, serves interested readers well. But . . . I can’t remember how many version of this I have read. It is a function of knowing that Mission Street Pale brewed by Firestone Walker and sold by Trader Joe’s won two gold medals and a silver at the Great American Beer Festival before purposefully hazy IPA existed.
Every few years there is a story about which Trader Joe’s beers are brewed at what breweries. (I’m pretty certain that shortly 2011, Firestone Walker quit brewing the Mission Street Pale and Trader Joe’s found another brewery to make the beer.)
And almost 10 years ago there was the “Is Walmart Looking to Dethrone Budweiser as King of Beers?” story.
That too many posts sound so familiar to me is one reason you won’t find a list of links here today, or on the Mondays that follow. Another is that a regular Monday posting does not sync the rhythm of life around here (or wherever we are). Random might work better.
Regarding the “but it’s not 2003” post: I don’t know what BUFF was, but I don’t remember Bill Covaleski being quite so in-your-face the way Greg Koch and Sam Calagione were? Granted, my exposure to him was pretty much solely through the writings of Lew Bryson and the late Jack Curtin, whereas the other two were EVERYWHERE, but…
Also in the spirit of “but it’s not 2003” and I guess of “it’s not beer’s fault, it’s me”… seeing those three gentlemen/breweries juxtaposed makes me realize how much the market has changed: the beers I liked best from Stone and DFH seems to have all been discontinued and the beers I liked best from Victory don’t make their way to the Chicago area anymore as far as I can tell. The same can be said about a few other regional breweries. I guess it makes travel more exciting — I can reconnect with no-longer-present breweries. Interesting to me to see how my tastes haven’t kept up with what is now popular, though.
May not having to read and post weekly give you space to find occasional writing you like and want to pass on!
Hey Bill, the first Victory beer we had was the Brandywine Valley Lager. I miss that one. We still make it to the Philadelphia area at least once a year, and finding Prima Pils can be a challenge. It would be interesting to know what the “epic beers” each of the breweries will be pouring.
A strange post, Stan. Everything all right in your world?
Thanks for the concern, Jeff. Given that we live in the world we do right now, it would be weird to say things are great. But beyond that, and I’m pretty sure you know what that is, things are great.
Must have been a failure to communicate, that perhaps I should be embarrassed about. I thought about posting nothing, leaving the revised greeting on the right to be announcement that I am discontinuing Monday links. The reasons are two fold. We had plenty of other things to do on the weekend, when I usually find time to put links together. And there are many stories, new to them, for others to write about. There are fewer things that look new to me. When I find stories that are, I may write about them here.
Sounds good!