Chicago Hop Contracts Buy

PLEASE READ EVERYTHING BELOW BEFORE ASKING QUESTIONS. DEADLINE: JANUARY 1, 2013

We are running what we believe to be the first hop contracts buy in Chicago. This buy is for Chicago area participants only. We are not shipping anything anywhere. Contracts are for securing those hard to get varieties in the future at a predetermined price. Basically, people will request their hops, we then submit our cumulative request to our hop supplier. The supplier will then give us a contract quote which specifies variety, quantity and pricing for the contracted year that we are requesting. There are many more details but they will be made on the google group that we are using so we don't clog up HBT with 'fluff'. See the initial instructions below.

If you do not belong to any of the clubs listed below or your club isn't listed then you will be placed under the Chicago Home Brewers Group and I will manage your orders. PM the appropriate people below with your email address.

Hop Contract Steps

If you belong to a club that is participating then place your hop contract requests through the club representative. Below is a listing of the clubs that are participating. If you do not belong to a club then Bill Mason will be your contact for placing your contract request.

Chicago Home Brewers Group-bmason1623
PALE-ghoti
Northern Illinois Homebrewers Collective-SathingtonWilloby
Pour Boys-BigInChicago
Evanston Home Brew Club-Randar


Each of the reps above will have a spreadsheet link where they will add your desired hop quantities and varieties. Hop increments are in 11 Lb cartons for pellets and full (200#), half (100#), quarter (50#) and mini (13#) bales for leaf. No contracts are allowed for less than 11 pounds. Just as in my group buys,work out he splits among yourselves then have one person order/pay the 11 pound increment. All hops can be quoted.

Each club member will tally up a total amount of hops. All of the tallies will be added together to solicit a contract quote. Once we get the quote then everybody submits payment to their representative. All of the money will added into an escrow account whose monthly statements will be scanned and published for the participants to review.

You can start pulling from your contracted inventory as soon as it becomes pelletized each year. There is not a specific date for which hop will be ready. Harvest is in August/Sept and pelletizing starts at that time and continues by variety for about three months. Leaf hops are available much earlier – around October. All hops must be taken delivery by no later than June of the following contract year.

Excellent!

This I great!

Well over 100lb on the request list already

wagz said:

Well over 100lb on the request list already

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!

I haven't even checked yet, let alone add my request.

Sweet!!!!

Remember, if you want to get into a hops contract but do not belong to any brew club or your club is not listed in post #1 PM me your address and I will add you under Chicago Home Brewers Group

The Chicago Home Brewers Group is up to 257 Lbs of hop contract requests. Not sure about the the other clubs that are participating. This buy closes in 16 days (January 1, 2013) so don't wait too long if you want to get involved in buying hop contracts for those hard to get and usually-expensive-when-you-get-them hops.

Any idea of what we are looking at price per pound? Or what I will owe and when it's due?

I'm guessing it's pretty close in price to what the hops spot buy was. But we will find out soon. Remember, the idea behind a contract purchase is to try to secure those hard to get hops and to a lesser extent competitive pricing.

we are currently at over 500 lbs for contracts. The buy closes on 1/01/13 at midnight. so if you want to get in please do so before then.

this buy ends at midnight on 1/01/2013 so don't delay!

I just hope when we submit for the quote we all aren't all disappointed...

Wagz, think positive!

Bill, I have about 100 lbs in now but I need to get a few things sorted out for potential splits. I have several varieties with only 4-8 pounds, so unless we can share an 11# bag with another club in the next few days, we are going to be a little short of that. I will post things to the site in the next day or 2.

Randar said:

Bill, I have about 100 lbs in now but I need to get a few things sorted out for potential splits. I have several varieties with only 4-8 pounds, so unless we can share an 11# bag with another club in the next few days, we are going to be a little short of that. I will post things to the site in the next day or 2.

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Yeah, ask the other clubs if they want any splits on the Google group. Thanks

About 48 hours left.

This buy is closed. We will now solicit quotes from the vendor(s). We are looking at under 700# of hops. Pretty impressive if you ask me.

That's very impressive! I wonder where we stack up compared to small breweries/brewpubs...

I think our group buys in both grain and hops are quite significant for our vendors considering that we're home brewers.

we ended up at 701 pounds exactly. Not too shabby!

The RFQ has been sent.

The total contracted amount was just under $5,700.00; not too shabby for a bunch of home brewers!

We have received a signature on the contract form the vendor. This means we are officially locked in. Now we do rain dances every Tuesday and hope for a good hop harvest. nice job everyone.

latest from the vendor on the hops contract. more particulars on the CHBG forum in my sig.

We are hoping to get all the pelletizing done by February and we start getting our imported product around December.

UPDATE

Ok, the Cascade, Centennial and Simcoe have been shipped. The tracking number is not coming up yet but as soon as it does I'll let people know when to expect delivery. Reminder: I will not be doing splits on the contracted hops. This is why I ordered full cartons for myself. The shipping costs will $0.80 per pound. I'll post later on how much people owe.

The Citra and Mosaic will ship either today or Monday.

bmason1623 said:

The Citra and Mosaic will ship either today or Monday.

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YES!!! I was on the Citra split with Matt!

Gothic_Horror said:

YES!!! I was on the Citra split with Matt!

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Which Matt?

Oh what does one do with a 13 lb minibale...ipe:

wagz said:

Which Matt?

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Van Wie

the first shipment of our contracted hops will be arriving today.

Cascade, Centennial and Simcoe has arrived. It's been a long time (signed the contract in January IIRC) waiting for these.

Bill, did we ever heard back about our Amarillo wait list?

not yet

OMG, you have a skid of hops! When can I get my box of simcoe?
Again, thanks for organizing this. You da man!

mikescooling said:

OMG, you have a skid of hops! When can I get my box of simcoe?
Again, thanks for organizing this. You da man!

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Mike, the sooner the better.

I'll have that humidor and a stick or two, to show my thanks. Are we doing this again for next year? When do I need the coin?

our contracted citra and mosaic arrived today.

Thank you sir....love my 11lb pillow of leaf..