Unique Beer Recipes

According to some data I found today there is about 750,000 American home brewers and 1400 breweries (e.g. commercial, pub). With so many people brewing, how do new brew pubs and microbreweries start up?
Is it like a burger joint; they have the same ingredients just a different way to make the burger?

there is a lot of ingredients to chose from and an endless number of combination. Take any beer recipe and change the yeast and you have a whole new beer.

Plus there is the limitations of distribution area. Like we have 10 breweries in my town and you will never be able to buy their beers up in MA. I'm sure you have tons of beers up there that we can't get down in NC. Same goes for burgers.

I have just always been curious if someone brewed a great beer and decided to distribute it commercially to only to find out that someone is selling the same thing on the separate coast.

FensterBos said:

I have just always been curious if someone brewed a great beer and decided to distribute it commercially to only to find out that someone is selling the same thing on the separate coast.

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It doesn't have to be unique to be good. Think of classic styles. Brewers are encouraged to all do the same thing because it tastes good that way. In a competition you usually loose points for being out of the norms.

OTOH, there's quite a market for the cutting edge of brewing, with many breweries doing quite well at it. Thank God...the incredible variety and amazing taste possibilities in beer is what drew me to beer and brewing in the first place! Dogfish Head is an extreme example, but many other breweries (Terrapin Brewing, Troegs, Rogue, Brew Dog and Stone all readily come to my mind) do a pretty good business playing hell with the Reinheitsgebot!

It's funny, but in a slightly different vein I was thinking the same thing today. Take food... you can cook carrots or potatoes or make chocolate cake, b-b-q ribs or cheese. Allf food, but very different. Then take beer... barley, water, yeast and hops. Over and over and over and over... And yet, oh boy, are there some good ones and great differences by varying those four same ingredients!

B

FensterBos said:

According to some data I found today there is about 750,000 American home brewers and 1400 breweries (e.g. commercial, pub). With so many people brewing, how do new brew pubs and microbreweries start up?
Is it like a burger joint; they have the same ingredients just a different way to make the burger?

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You're putting way too much emphasis on recipes. There are tons of cookbooks with wonderful recipes and still lots of crappy food in homes and restaurants. A recipe is meaningless if you have lousy technique and quality control. On the other hand there are plenty of bad recipes available too.

birvine said:

It's funny, but in a slightly different vein I was thinking the same thing today. Take food... you can cook carrots or potatoes or make chocolate cake, b-b-q ribs or cheese. Allf food, but very different. Then take beer... barley, water, yeast and hops. Over and over and over and over... And yet, oh boy, are there some good ones and great differences by varying those four same ingredients!

B

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beer is food

It's actually pretty simple. If your data is correct homebrewers represent less than one quarter of one percent of all the people in the country. There are a lot more beer drinkers than there are homebrewers and likely all homebrewers drink commercially available products to some extent.

maida7 said:

Plus there is the limitations of distribution area. Like we have 10 breweries in my town and you will never be able to buy their beers up in MA. I'm sure you have tons of beers up there that we can't get down in NC. Same goes for burgers.

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Being from Asheville and living in Atlanta....I can see how much of an uphill battle microbreweries have with national distribution. It also depends on convoluted state laws in distribution that really makes things murkey. From what I've heard from homebrewers looking to get into the pro side, they've commented how much easier it is to start a brewery in NC as compared to GA (so it's no surprise that NC has way more microbreweries then many other southern states). GA is backwards about how a brewery has to go through a distributor vs not being able to sell growlers in a tasting room first. Highland Brewery seems to be the most distributed Asheville beer....but I'm also starting to find French Broad here in stores now (and I did try them first when they were just doing self distribution). Terrapin seems to be the highest regarded microbreweries in GA (they do make better beers then Sweetwater). I'd say the best microbrewed beer in Atlanta is actually a unique brewpub: 5 Seasons. They're pretty successful because along with having a good variety of beers...they also offer more upscale food. But they don't seem to have any plans in going with distribution.