1. Yes. $100. Will pay for itself buying in bulk and you own a mill
2. Nice but not needed,roll up the bag for free
3. Nice but not needed,hops stay plenty fresh in the freezer
4. IF YOU NEED A SEPARATE FRIDGE TO STORE HOPS GOD BLESS YA
5. A closet or empty corner work just fine
6. Why???
7. A scale cost like $6 and you can use it to cook with when not brewing
8. Just plain silly
What works for you doesnt work for everyone you know...crazy, I know, but true.
1. Sure it can, but after how many batches? I'm brewing maybe a batch every other month, so to me, this isn't worth the hassle. Also, I need to store one and maintain one (minimal, but still)
2. Ok, still need to house big sacks of grain somewhere temp/moisture/critter friendly and then you still need to go to the LHBS for the specialty stuff....
3. Debatable, especially for someone who doesn't brew once a week
4. Sorry I don't use one type of hop in my beers. I generally have leftover 2-oz sacks of 6-7 different hops at any one time in my freezer. If those were leftover 1lb bags, it would take a good chunk of space...
5. Again, the point here is my house is not a brewery, I have enough brewing gear filling up spaces in my house/garage/shed, i'd like to use my house as a house, not a brewery.
6. The driveway is likely fine for this
7. AGAIN, another piece of equipment for a very small purpose. I don't know about you, but I don't weigh out pounds of anything when I cook.... My ounce hop scale sure, but not a scale for weighing pounds of grains...
8. Whether you want to admit it or not, there is work involved in keeping track of all the different items you're mentioning that are currently not needed in the current process.
Really, it all boils down to preference. It's a no brainer to ME to buy for the beer I want to brew, not keeping a bulk stock on hand of numerous ingredients. If I brewed weekly, it may make more sense. If I brewed similar beers that used the same common ingredients, it may make more sense. As it is, I don't feel the need to buy more equipment, store more ingredients, and end up compromising my recipe design by feeling a need to use the base stock of items I bought in bulk (or keep more items on hand to avoid this). Plain and simple. If it works for you, cool, if this works for me, who cares, all i'm doing is supporting the shops that sell items by paying a higher markup for this convenience. At the end of the year, it might be a total of like $100 saved, and that benefit doesn't outweigh the items mentioned previously to me.