What ever happened to beer balls?

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

kahunaman

Well-Known Member
Joined
Oct 25, 2008
Messages
170
Reaction score
2
Location
Buffalo, NY
Anyone remember these things? We used to get them for small kegger parties. i havent' seen one around in years... but seems it would be a cool/ideal container for lagering or something along those lines.
beerball.jpg
 
Didn't Coors make those? I think they called them Party Balls or something. I was young when they came out and have killed many brain cells along the way, so I don't know if I am recollecting correctly.
 
They're not practical for the manufacturer. I worked at a liquor store for a while, and beer balls started to come back earlier this year, so there was a lot of talk about them. All it is is a disposable 1/6 keg. If I remember correctly it was within $5 of the price of a 1/6 keg but you did not have to put down a deposit. Since the manufacturer had to make the beer ball plus tap for each one on top of the cost of the beer inside, it isn't logical to continue producing them. After they tried to bring them back, they briefly produced them WITHOUT taps in an attempt to continue selling them and still have reasonable profit on it. That idea failed miserable because you need a special tap for them, so you could only use it if you had a tap from an old beer ball. Beer balls are just one of those things that seem like a good idea, but in the grand scheme of things it just doesn't work out.

BTW, it was a Bud product, not Coors.
 
Didn't Coors make those? I think they called them Party Balls or something. I was young when they came out and have killed many brain cells along the way, so I don't know if I am recollecting correctly.

You are correct. In the late eighties and early nineties, Coors released a similar product called a party ball.
 
I was 19 when I got married and the groomsmen and I were kind of upset that we were not gonna be able to get tanked at my reception. O' Contraire Monfraire, My best man came through for us as he showed up with one of these beauties iced down in the back of a 92' Berretta. Hooray, the night was saved! My dad asked why we kept going out to the parking lot that night, I think he new but was cool with it. Hooray beer!
 
I was 19 when I got married and the groomsmen and I were kind of upset that we were not gonna be able to get tanked at my reception. O' Contraire Monfraire, My best man came through for us as he showed up with one of these beauties iced down in the back of a 92' Berretta. Hooray, the night was saved! My dad asked why we kept going out to the parking lot that night, I think he new but was cool with it. Hooray beer!

If I ever found one and could get it to work... i would actually name the beer I put in in "92 Beretta" - hahah That is one of the best stories ever, and completely personifies a beerball.
 
If I ever found one and could get it to work... i would actually name the beer I put in in "92 Beretta" - hahah That is one of the best stories ever, and completely personifies a beerball.

You've heard some pretty boring stories in your life my man!
 
don't they sell those large (1gal?) aluminum kegs now? Heiniken even has one that is pre pressurized, so there is no pump and keeps longer than the gravity fed ones.
 
I know at my local liquor store they have a sign up for Budweiser part balls but I have never inquired about them. I know that next time I am in there I will to see if they even still offer them.
 
They should have tried pig skin. Then you could have played football with it after drinking the beer. There's nothing quite like charging around an empty lot with your buddies, drunk off your ass and butting heads, while trying to gain control of a clear plastic pig skin.
 
I remember getting 3 of those for a small get together when I was in college. I seem to recall that for the money they were cheaper than buying the equivilant amount of Killians in bottles. Never saw those party balls in anything but Killians back then.
 
LMAO, what do you mean what happened to them?? Everytime we throw a party (drunk people don't appreciate good beer so don't berate me please :)) We ALWAYS get beer balls. We have a tap and $20 so odd bucks for 55 beers isn't too bad! They are made of plastic have a top with cardboard to push the tap through. I am sure any liquor store near a college will sell them. In fact, we are getting 4 of them this coming weekend. You can't reuse them as the tops get punctured but they work fine for getting everyone drunk on the cheap!
 
Can't reuse them?
Ever look at the photos section of this site and see the sick and twisted things people do with blowtorches here?
Someone will figure out how to reuse them.

LMAO, what do you mean what happened to them?? Everytime we throw a party (drunk people don't appreciate good beer so don't berate me please :)) We ALWAYS get beer balls. We have a tap and $20 so odd bucks for 55 beers isn't too bad! They are made of plastic have a top with cardboard to push the tap through. I am sure any liquor store near a college will sell them. In fact, we are getting 4 of them this coming weekend. You can't reuse them as the tops get punctured but they work fine for getting everyone drunk on the cheap!
 
Can't reuse them?
Ever look at the photos section of this site and see the sick and twisted things people do with blowtorches here?
Someone will figure out how to reuse them.

With the huge number of corks available you'd think someone would be able to cork up a party ball.
 
I didn't think about using a cork or a blowtorch. I think the top has a lot of cardboard in it, so a new top would probably have to be constructed. I can give you all a definite answer as to what they are exactly made of on Sunday as we will have a bunch of empties. :drunk:
 
before the local brewery closed shop, they used to sell em. called em draught balls. 55 beer for around 30 bucks or so. cheaper if you kept the old pump from your last one. man, many a drunken night with those. we filled up my roommates closet with them once.
 
I remember those lol. Man I haven't seen one of those around in over ten years. I see some people are saying you can still buy them but I got to liquor stores all the time and they definitely don't sell them here in Florida.
 
Last time I saw beer balls was when this guy at a bar was hitting on a woman way out of his league.:D

Beer balls: Trying a friend’s homebrew when you don't even know what his kitchen looks like.
:D
 
they came in bud coors & matts! boy did matts suck....but it was cheep. this was around 1987 in western ny.
 
Whoa, this thread brings back lots of memories of high school parties.

One guy I graduated with used to take those things, fill them up with gas, get 200' of fuse (can't remember what he used as a fuse) and blow them up out in the middle of nowhere. Mini mushroom clouds. FIRE! FIRE!
 
I liked how they came with their own ice bag. I still had one of these taps until a few years ago.

300506756_fa02c53c23.jpg


In college we went to a local park to have a bonfire in the woods and we were walking next a ravine where a creek was below. The guy holding the party ball slipped on the edge and at the same time the cardboard handle cutout ripped and the party ball rolled all the way down into the creek. It didn't break and we drank half foam cups of beer that night. I remember like it was yesterday even though it was 13 years ago. Fun times!
 
Last time I saw beer balls was when this guy at a bar was hitting on a woman way out of his league.:D

Beer balls: Trying a friend’s homebrew when you don't even know what his kitchen looks like.
:D


no, beer balls would be trying my homebrew after you see my kitchen
 
If I ever found one and could get it to work... i would actually name the beer I put in in "92 Beretta" - hahah That is one of the best stories ever, and completely personifies a beerball.

You've heard some pretty boring stories in your life my man!

I know this is an old thread, but dammit this exchange was funny.
 
beerball.jpg


Is it me, or does that think look like it's filled with egg nog?

:eek:

I wish. Egg nog would have tasted better :cross:. When I moved into my house 4 years ago I found one of the bulb pump taps in a cardboard box. It was a left over from my early years at college. I graduated almost 8 years ago :eek:!
 
Spring weekend concert at school this year:

The night before the concert, a couple of my buddies snuck onto the field where it was being hosted and buried one of these in the back. Free delicious beer the next day.

A+
 
My brother and I were just talking about these the other day...and how some people would decorate their front yard lamp poles with them.
 
LMAO, what do you mean what happened to them?? Everytime we throw a party (drunk people don't appreciate good beer so don't berate me please :)) We ALWAYS get beer balls. We have a tap and $20 so odd bucks for 55 beers isn't too bad! They are made of plastic have a top with cardboard to push the tap through. I am sure any liquor store near a college will sell them. In fact, we are getting 4 of them this coming weekend. You can't reuse them as the tops get punctured but they work fine for getting everyone drunk on the cheap!

Yep! I'm a student at Northeastern University in Boston and beer balls are the go-to item for any party. In our neighborhood all the off-campus joints are small apartments so beer balls are perfect to get a group drunk. Plus when you're finished you can cut a hole in the top and wear it like a space helmet (excellent for walking home late at night!).

I have never seen them elsewhere, I assume we are keeping the beer ball concept alive!
 
This just happened 2 nights ago. I decided to bottle my Hobgoblin clone that was chilling in a fridge in my basement. I get everything sanitized and head to the fridge. I squat down to heave the carboy for its short journey to a table beside the fridge for racking...my hand slips and the carboy lands right between my legs on my nads as I'm slowly fallling backwards...ouch. I would say i had beer balls...for 2 days.
 
Back
Top