Oh dear, getting serious, bulk ordering.

So, I was putting in an order for my first lager. Ingedients came to £13 for a 2gl batch.... but as it was over 1kg, shipping was £5.95. Then a light bulb lit up and I realised I'd be sitting at the PC in a weeks time ordering my next 5gl batch (circa £25) and another £6 to £10 shipping.

So I checked their shipping rates and sure enough 2kg up to 20kg is flat rate £10. So I started filling up 20Kg of brewing stuff.

* 6Kg Light DME
* 3 Coopers Draught hopped LME tins.
* 1 Youngs bitter hopped LME tin (I'll try this with just 1kg DME).
* 1Kg of Crystal 80-140 EBC
* 500g Carapils 3-5 EBC (for the lager)
* 2 Nottingham Ale Yeast pkts
* 2 Saflager S-23 Lager yeast pkts

Pairing all that off into recipes:

1. 5gl Coopers Draught + 1Kg DME + 500g Crystal + Nottingham Yst (EKGs / Willamette / Saaz)
2. 5gl Coopers Draught + 1Kg DME + 500g Crystal + Nottingham Yst (EKGs / Willamette / Saaz)
3. 5gl Coopers Draught + 1Kg DME + 500g Crystal + Nottingham Yst (EKGs / Willamette / Saaz)
4. 5gl Youngs Bitter + 1Kg DME
5. 2gl lager 1Kg DME + 200g Carapils + S-23 Yeast (Saaz)
6. 2gl lager 1Kg DME + 200g Carapils + S-23 Yeast (Saaz)

6 Batches and I'm only short a few hops, using left over EKGs, Willamette and the new Saaz are for the larger. At 100g a packet, hops are cheap shipping. When I get used to hops and what I like, I can by 500g packs and keep them in the freezer.

That should keep my primaries full for 2 months at least.

You're suffering from MBS, multiple beer syndrome. There is no cure.

Time to put him down. No one look......

It's a shame that his heirs will have to mail us his beer. Damn shame.

Man I work for an LTL shipping company. Can you say free shipping.:rockin::rockin::rockin::rockin:

Problem is my boss is an alcoholic, so it's not really free.

It gets worse!

Doing some quick sums...

Order: £110
Litres: (22litres * 4)+(9 litres * 2) = 106 litres, £1.03 / litre

At ~10 litres a week, that's 11 weeks beer at tenner a week.

Cost of the "local super market default lager" here is around £1.89 (£10 / (440ml x 12cans)) a litre. So a saving of 85p a litre or £90 overall. The super market lager is also rising steeply at about 15% a year.

And, hopefully the HB will be better beer!

If I bought the 10kg bulk LME it might get even cheaper.

A side point, and I know this has already happened in the US, but that price per litre is cheaper than petrol/gasoline here now. Goes to the saying, don't drive, drink!

I recently started buying 3 beers worth of ingredients at a time... It's really brought my costs down.

I'm all for buying in bulk to keep the shipping down.

Can anyone say Austin Homebrew??? I love their shipping deal.

hope2perc said:

I'm all for buying in bulk to keep the shipping down.

Can anyone say Austin Homebrew??? I love their shipping deal.

Click to expand...