Keggle Ethics Question

JohnnyO said:

Yooper, I agree with you. However, I do believe living in a city that chews you up as NYC will do has a lot to do with why he sees the world this way. NYC is a very very cruel place.

Staten Island at that. Yeesh.

To the OP, congrats. That is a total score. Glad it worked out for you.

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The crueler the place, the more you need to hold on to your principles. I recommend Meditations by Marcus Aurelius Antoninus.

Yooper said:

I know you're being sarcastic, but I think that living my life by a certain set of rules DOES make the world a better place. It hurts to hear it made fun of like that. Maybe it's just the little 86 year old man who needed help yesterday, but he told me that I made his day yesterday. And he definitely made mine. "Applying your high level of morality" was supposed to be an insult, but I think it's sad to think that the moral choice was mocked. I'm very disappointed in you for that.

Sometimes doing the right thing is simply just the right thing to do.

Good for Switchback! And good for you on doing the right thing.

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Bravo...where do we make nominations for best post of the week. Sometimes "making the world a better place", needs to start with our own little corner of the world

Yes, obviously my posts were being sarcastic. And obviously I don't go around slamming doors on little old ladies or handing kids hot-pepper lollipops.

BUT...

These keg threads blow my mind. And I feel compelled to comment on them. Unfortunately, this one just happened to harp more on the moral issues so I guess that makes me sound like a nihilist for disagreeing.

There was a VERY long thread about this topic that actually delved into the legal aspects of keg transfers. It actually caused me to go to work and actually research in the law books and with other trained law enforcement professionals, what the keg transfer laws in NY actually are.

Here, when a distributor sells you a keg, they are selling you everything you walk out the door with. You can keep it all - beer, keg, and pump - and not face any criminal charge whatsoever. Everyone involved knows this (including the microbreweries), so they charge you a deposit hoping it will compel you to return the keg and pump. If you don't, you aren't being an immoral person - you are availing yourself of a perfectly legal transfer of property. Personally, I never have, I don't need keggles. But two of my brewing buddies went out and bought kegs this way once I told them it was 100% legal. and that doesn't make me feel bad.

The only stipulation is if you sign a contract stating you will return the keg and pump no matter what. Specifically, if it says you forfeit the deposit only, that means nothing legally. The contract must specifically state that the keg and pump must be returned. In that case, the distributor can sue you in Small Claims Court.

Secondly, I find it VERY hypocritical that these threads inevitably contain at least 1-2 posts stating that its okay, as long as it is BMC. So apparently, with a good portion of the "keeping a keg is stealing" people, BMC doesn't count.

I've never read a property law that only applies to "small" (you know, 'cause places like New Belgium, Surly, Sierra Nevada are SO small) businesses retaining legal possession of their property.

So I apologize for coming off like a brute, I'm not. But, due to my line of work and wanting to keep my job, I am used to making decisions based on fact and ever since researching the FACTS of this topic, it just bugs me to read some of the comments in these threads.

To those for whom this is purely a moral issue - even if they knew it was perfectly legal - I ask if you really think the craft brewers hold these same high morals on their side of the transaction involving beer flowing from them to you.

And lastly - if you fish ANYTHING out of a river other than a dead body, a boat, or an out-of-season wild species, odds are you can keep it. Return a keg from a river? This reads like some kind of Hallmark Movie plot.

Oh, and as for bringing my location into the argument, I refuse to use stereotypes of different regions in conversation, because having traveled the country at a young age, I quickly learned that stereotypes apply to very few people who actually live or come from those areas. I learned a serious lesson on racism when I volunteered to go down to N.O. after Hurricane Katrina, but I try to chalk that up to the people down there dealing with an extremely bad situation at the time.

Oh wait, immoral a-holes like me shouldn't be volunteering to leave their families for weeks at a time to do stuff like that! What the hell was I thinking?! I'm going to have to steal an old lady's shopping cart to make up for it...

Yooper said:

"Applying your high level of morality" was supposed to be an insult, but I think it's sad to think that the moral choice was mocked. I'm very disappointed in you for that.

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And just to be clear, I apologize for leaving my comments open so that anyone could take them this way, but if someone came on here and posted a story about how they got run over by a car because they pushed an old lady out of a cross-walk, you wouldn't hear me say anything like this.

I only wrote that because I find that some of these posts display morality - involving kegs - that they very likely do not display in everyday life situations that probably do require good moral character. Hence, this post:

Airborneguy said:

Again, I wish I could say this with certainty (I don't know you guys obviously), but if the super-karma, super-moral, keg-returners-at-all-costs (except in the case of BMC)'ers applied such super-human righteousness to the rest of their lives as they do to micro-brewery kegs, the world would be a much better place.

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If anyone wants to see more morality in the world, it's me. I have to deal with the a-holes who have none. Fun, and I'm very well compensated for it, but sometimes it gets a little dangerous.

If you find an envelop on the ground w/someones bank receipt and phone number w/$200 in it from their paycheck.. would you call them ? or would you just stick the money in your pocket

it's the same thing.......... It's a misplaced item with the owner clearly outlined

Airborneguy said:

And just to be clear, I apologize for leaving my comments open so that anyone could take them this way, but if someone came on here and posted a story about how they got run over by a car because they pushed an old lady out of a cross-walk, you wouldn't hear me say anything like this.

I only wrote that because I find that some of these posts display morality - involving kegs - that they very likely do not display in everyday life situations that probably do require good moral character. Hence, this post:



If anyone wants to see more morality in the world, it's me. I have to deal with the a-holes who have none. Fun, and I'm very well compensated for it, but sometimes it gets a little dangerous.

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Thanks for explaning it better- I know that you're one of the "good guys" and I was surprised at the sarcasm but I undertand now!

My grandma explained character as the old quote, "Character is how you act when no one is looking".

bschoenb said:

If you find an envelop on the ground w/someones bank receipt and phone number w/$200 in it from their paycheck.. would you call them ? or would you just stick the money in your pocket

it's the same thing.......... It's a misplaced item with the owner clearly outlined

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That's not even close.

A keg having a brewery's name on it is the legal equivalent of an advertisement. You can see it how you want to see it, but that's the facts where I live. Maybe it is different in other places. When you purchase something, you also purchase the package it is contained in, period.

You want a better comparison? Have you ever bought a car, used the gas that the dealer gave you with it, then promptly returned the car to the dealer because it said Chrysler on it?

Yup, THATS the legal equivalent here.

Yooper said:

Thanks for explaning it better- I know that you're one of the "good guys" and I was surprised at the sarcasm but I undertand now!

My grandma explained character as the old quote, "Character is how you act when no one is looking".

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We probably agree 100% on moral issues. I just can't stand that what we see in real life doesn't come close to what I read here when someone suggests they might keep a keg (as long as it used to contain craft brew, remember, BMC is okay).

Your grandma's quote is pretty much the secret to a good life. The Army uses that to describe Integrity.

Airborneguy said:

There was a VERY long thread about this topic that actually delved into the legal aspects of keg transfers. It actually caused me to go to work and actually research in the law books and with other trained law enforcement professionals, what the keg transfer laws in NY actually are.

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Holy Crap! I used actually WAY too much in here.

does the "morality" change when the distributor is trying to screw you?

I ask because my family owns a building that was rented out as a restaurant. the restaurant went out of business (opperator got locked out for not paying rent and the court awarded us the contents they left behind which are to be auctioned and the proceeds put towards the debt they own). included in the contents are 11 kegs wich were left behind. we contacted the distributor to return the kegs but the distributor is refusing to refund the despite on these kegs stating that we can not prove a deposit was paid since we do not have the original invoices.

i am unwilling to return these kegs to the distributor since they are refusing to refund the deposit. After all, why should the distributor be allowed to keep the deposit when we have a finding against the formed restaurant operator and the distributor does not.

This is sounding to me like a great opportunity to upgrade my 5-gallon system to a 10-gallon system and to start fermenting and kegging in 1/2 barrels.

i am also going to get a 24"x48" stainless steel table on casters that i am going to convert into a single tier electric brew stand.

So i ask, would you return the kegs to the distributor when they are refusing to refund the deposit?

Sounds to me like you CAN'T return them. The distributor has abandoned them as they're not willing to take them back.

I would have no problem using those kegs in that situation.

That's not the situation most people find themselves in, however.

Keep the ones you want then sell the rest.

Airborneguy said:

Keep the ones you want then sell the rest.

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That is the plan. I am hoping to cover most of the cost of converting them and setting up the larger rig. We will see...

BrewMoreBeers: You are really discussing several things in a single post (and is the "trying to screw you" part something you would want to state in a court of law?)

1. The distributor has refused to refund a deposit, because you can't provide a receipt or other proof that the deposit was paid. The question here: does this legally free you to do anything you want with these kegs? I don't know, it may.....or it may not. My guess is that their failure to refund the deposit does not, in itself, make the kegs your property.

2. Do you have an obligation to return the kegs? I would say, unequivocally, no. By not refunding the deposit the distributor is creating a dilemma for themselves. If you are in possession of their kegs, they must either refund a putative deposit or accuse you of theft of the kegs. As they are probably well aware of the actual situation, they're not likely to do the latter.

This is an interesting little situation.....apart from the fact that most people would just go ahead an keggleize away.

rico567 said:

BrewMoreBeers: You are really discussing several things in a single post (and is the "trying to screw you" part something you would want to state in a court of law?)

1. The distributor has refused to refund a deposit, because you can't provide a receipt or other proof that the deposit was paid.

2. Do you have an obligation to return the kegs? I would say, unequivocally, no.

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Yes, i would be comfortable saying in court that they are trying to "screw me" (that is a highly technical legal term). we all know that every distributor charges a deposit for the keg. their own policy/business rules state this. They have a geographic area that they service as defined in their franchise agreement. They know and I know that they provided these kegs to the restaurant. Their refusal to refund the deposit that their records likely state they collected is simply a tactic to attempt to recover the kegs without refunding the deposit. I understand the economic forces that encourage this behavior - they believe i have no need for these kegs and thus they believe i assign little value to them and will forfit them. However, that is not the case and their attempts to get me to return them and to retain the deposit are not going ot work.

on your point 1. - I frequently buy and return kegs at the retail level without need for documentation. I believe their requirement of docuemntation is simply a tactic to get me to forfit the kegs without claiming the deposit. Either they have a record documenting the transaction and they can sue me (which we will settle for them refunding the deposit) or they do not have a record in which case they can not prove the kegs are "owed" to them.

On point 2. - i agree.

The distributor should feel grateful the we allowed them to have back some of the signage they gave to the restaurant... after all, they did not have any documentation that they actually provided it. That was us being nice. If they really want the kegs back, they should have been equally willing to work with us.

rico567 said:

The question here: does this legally free you to do anything you want with these kegs? I don't know, it may.....or it may not. My guess is that their failure to refund the deposit does not, in itself, make the kegs your property.

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i would argue that it does because their justification for not refunding the deposit was that our lack of an invoice means we can not prove a deposit was paid to them. I would extend this argument that given their lack of documentation for this transition means the distributor can not prove they have a right to these kegs. Heck, for all I know the restaurant opperator (who we can not contact because he is AWOL) may have bought and owned these kegs out-right. Thus, our court order give us ownership of them.

There is one other way to look at this. The distributor does not own the kegs, the brewery does. You can return the favor by contacting the brewery and offering them the kegs for the price of the deposit. I am sure that they would love to know that their distributor was not willing to get their equipment back for them.

Otherwise you made a good faith attempt to return them and the avenue for doing so did not want them.

cfrazier77 said:

There is one other way to look at this. The distributor does not own the kegs, the brewery does.

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You can do what I did if you want - read up on your state's property transfer laws. In my state, the person who purchases a keg full of beer legally owns the keg, not the brewery that put their name on the keg to advertise their brand.

I'd venture to say that this applies to most states, but I don't know for sure. I do know that this is the case in NY.

Not to speak for the brewy, but I bet they would not even know how to do the paper work to take these back without the distributor in the middle. I work for a large multiple-national, and if it is out of policy/norm, it just does not happen. There is more red tape in a corporation than there is in government.

The way I see this, the brewy's issue is with the distributor, I have done more due diligence to try to return these than I feel I needed to. I am going to trust in my court order and call these mine... Afer all, they are contents of the permises that were abandoned by the operator.

I also found a keg, driving down a local road here in Key West, I saw this keg on the otherside of the road along with other trash to be picked up by the trashtruck on the next block. I backed up and pulled up to the keg, lowered the tail gate and grabbed the keg. Guess what it was full, I couldnt move it. The guy cleaning out the yard came up and asked if he could help. A few bucks later made me feel better. The keg was stamped Key West Brewery who went out of business 4-5 years ago. As I drained the keg at the harbor, everyone asked if the beer was any good, I offered free samples, no takers.

I wasn't going to bump this up, but since someone else commented. . .

I returned the keg yesterday and received the $30, a perfectly reasonable "keggle" keg, and had a kick-ass personalized tour with the big wig Bill Cherry. What a great brewery! Have a pint of Switchback next time you are in VT.

Cheers everyone!

melamst said:

I wasn't going to bump this up, but since someone else commented. . .

I returned the keg yesterday and received the $30, a perfectly reasonable "keggle" keg, and had a kick-ass personalized tour with the big wig Bill Cherry. What a great brewery! Have a pint of Switchback next time you are in VT.

Cheers everyone!

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That is definitely an ending that I will drink to!

Awesome!!!! And guess what, you'll probably be drinking some Switchback once in a while because of his good deeds. Well done, Switchback!

M_C

melamst said:

I wasn't going to bump this up, but since someone else commented. . .

I returned the keg yesterday and received the $30, a perfectly reasonable "keggle" keg, and had a kick-ass personalized tour with the big wig Bill Cherry. What a great brewery! Have a pint of Switchback next time you are in VT.

Cheers everyone!

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Airborneguy said:

You can do what I did if you want - read up on your state's property transfer laws. In my state, the person who purchases a keg full of beer legally owns the keg, not the brewery that put their name on the keg to advertise their brand.

I'd venture to say that this applies to most states, but I don't know for sure. I do know that this is the case in NY.

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So here in New York that means if I go to my distributor, purchase a keg of beer, I own the keg? Where is this written? I know that NYS has set the deposit now to $75 per keg.

Sawdustguy said:

So here in New York that means if I go to my distributor, purchase a keg of beer, I own the keg? Where is this written?

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Post #129 on this page:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/dfh-score-220957/index13.html

Straight from the NYS Penal Law and consultations with my boss, who is the final say on how a criminal complaint gets classified.

Even though most of the "info" in that particular thread was nothing more than assumptions by people who don't actually know much about the laws involved, it was still an interesting thread.

Return it to the brewery itself and they'll probably give you at least a sixer in thanks!

Airborneguy said:

Post #129 on this page:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/dfh-score-220957/index13.html

Straight from the NYS Penal Law and consultations with my boss, who is the final say on how a criminal complaint gets classified.

Even though most of the "info" in that particular thread was nothing more than assumptions by people who don't actually know much about the laws involved, it was still an interesting thread.

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LARCENY BY EMBEZZLEMENT
A person [also] wrongfully takes, obtains, or withholds property from an owner when, having been entrusted to hold such property on behalf of the owner, such person thereafter, without the permission or authority of the owner, intentionally exercises control over it in a manner inconsistent with the continued rights of the owner, knowing that he has no permission or authority to do so.

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I think the first paragraph in your quoted document pretty much says that keeping the keg is a crime. I don't see anywhere in your document that says the person who purchases the keg, owns the keg. You are purchasing the contents and the distributor is loaning you the vessel that contains the contents you purchased.

I'm not getting into the whole thing again because I'm confident in my answer. The only thing I would like to point out is that I did make it clear that a contract between the parties involved could possibly make keeping a keg into a crime. The last few times I bought kegs, I did not sign a contract though. I went to a distributor and bought property. I paid a deposit that I would get back if I returned the keg, that's it. Without a contract, keeping a keg in NY is not a crime, period.

I also have no idea what quote you are referring to considering I pointed you to a previous post of mine in which I most definitely did not say anything about this being a crime.

BrewMoreBeers said:

Thus, our court order give us ownership of them.

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So what if the restaurant was working on renovations at the time, and the owner had rented a large piece of equipment (air compressor, table saw, etc.) from Home Depot. The owners goes AWOL, and then the court order is filed. Do you consider that piece of equipment yours too?

I am not saying that I wouldnt do the same thing as you, but I believe your reasoning is a bit off in the above statement.

BrewMoreBeers said:

Not

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to speak for the brewy, but I bet they would not even know how to do the paper work to take these back without the distributor in the middle. I work for a large multiple-national, and if it is out of policy/norm, it just does not happen. There is more red tape in a corporation than there is in government.

The way I see this, the brewy's issue is with the distributor, I have done more due diligence to try to return these than I feel I needed to. I am going to trust in my court order and call these mine... Afer all, they are contents of the permises that were abandoned by the operator.

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So Lets get prices!

Confirmed with the brewery... They would not refund the deposit and take them back (miller coors).

kpr121 said:

So what if the restaurant was working on renovations at the time, and the owner had rented a large piece of equipment (air compressor, table saw, etc.) from Home Depot. The owners goes AWOL, and then the court order is filed. Do you consider that piece of equipment yours too?

I am not saying that I wouldnt do the same thing as you, but I believe your reasoning is a bit off in the above statement.

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In sort, yes I would until the rental place proved ownership. In my case, the distributor and the brewery have both refused to honor the deposit and accept the kegs. I doubt this same issue would occur with tool rentals as the contact clearly states the renter owns the gear and that it must be returned and the renter could produce this documentation to support their claim. This is not the case with kegs as the purchaser of the keg and beer own the keg. The deposit is only an incentive to return/recycle the keg much as a deposit on a bottle is an incentive to recycle in Michigan.

I offered these kegs to the distributor and they declined to exchange them for the deposit...name for the brewery. However, the distributor gladly took the neon beer signs and tap handles back. In hind sight I should have kept these too as the distributor did not have any papers to prove their ownership...

kpr121 said:

So what if the restaurant was working on renovations at the time, and the owner had rented a large piece of equipment (air compressor, table saw, etc.) from Home Depot. The owners goes AWOL, and then the court order is filed. Do you consider that piece of equipment yours too?

I am not saying that I wouldnt do the same thing as you, but I believe your reasoning is a bit off in the above statement.

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But there is a rental agreement signed upon payment. If There is no agreement signed when purchasing the keg, the purchaser can claim ignorance in any legal proceedings, and get off Scott free, in the event the distributer attempts to collect the keg.

o4_srt said:

But there is a rental agreement signed upon payment. If There is no agreement signed when purchasing the keg, the purchaser can claim ignorance in any legal proceedings, and get off Scott free, in the event the distributer attempts to collect the keg.

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I have never signed a rental agreement to buy a keg of beer. If you have, can you post a copy?

As a side note, I still believe returning a keg for the deposit is the right thing to do. I am just unwilling to allow a distributor or brewery to refuse to refund deposits for kegs. I believe they have an obligation to refund deposits if they want the kegs back. IMO their refusal to refund the deposit would be tantamount to theft of the deposit should I "donate" the kegs to them.

BrewMoreBeers said:

I have never signed a rental agreement to buy a keg of beer. If you have, can you post a copy?

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I've never bought a keg of beer...

Me either...personally, I couldn't care less. I got two of my kegs from a guy that had them laying around in his garage that he was going to throw away, one of them was half full of 20+ year old budwesier. Another was a Sierra Nevada Keg that was given to me that a friend had had for a couple of years that didn't have the new-law sticker on it so the liquor store would not accept it back, and I actually did purchase one from a guy that rented it, I paid the $50 to him for the deposit. The way I see it, $50 for a used Miller/Coors keg to the owner of the keg is good enough for me. If the kegs cost more than that, the deposit would be more, that's the way I see it.

This is what we ended up with in SC: http://www.sctax.org/NR/rdonlyres/EE163978-48CD-4387-833F-C1FAAF718C1D/0/ABL907.pdf

M_C