Question about Home Brew Shops...

Never been, but there is a shop close to my house that has a mostly everything.

On their website they say that online prices might be a bit cheaper but that they can be always trusted to have fresh products on their shelves -- unlike online.

Anyways, I wanted to do an IPA (my second 5 gal batch) tonight. Do i need to get a recipe online or do shops usually have there own kits available?

Not sure what to expect.

 

I would think most stores have a selection of kits, especially if they have some on their website.
Although it couldn't hurt to be prepared with a recipe

 

In addition to kits they may also have a recipe book that you can look through for ideas. Then they should help you get all of the ingredients necessary for brewing. Most homebrew stores also sell Liquid Malt Extract in bulk. You pay for your bucket the first time and bring it back to reuse for future beers. This will save money compared to buying 3.3 lb LME or dry malt extract.

In my experience, Thursday and Friday are usually the busiest days at my store so I would recommend going in the middle of the week so you have time to ask questions and not feel rushed.

If you are doing Extract with Grains recipes, at the store you can make minor changes to the recipe. As an example I made a Dark Wheat. One of the steeping grains was Crystal Malt. The guy helping me showed me all of the types of Crystal Malt and said open each, smell, taste and decide which you want.

If you are lucky to have a few shops close by check them all out. The first store I went to was basically a wine making shop that also sold beer brewing supplies. There were some times that they only had wine guys working so specific questions could not be answered. The store I frequent the most is a Beer Brewing store that also sells some wine stuff.

 

Did you call them to ask?

 

My local place has just about everything you could ever want, helpful people, and competitive prices. I also like supporting the smaller local business.

 

Every LHBS I've been to has had a small library of recipes for you to try out. Some have kits, some do not. You don't need a kit if you have a LHBS employee and a recipe at your side when you're first starting out.

In the end, the minimal price difference is worth it to have some experts down the street I can talk to any time for immediate help and to have a place I can grab supplies for emergencies, like leaking kegs, broken carboys, and empty bottles of star-san. I always leave my LHBS with new knowledge.

Just go to the store and chat with them. If it's a good store ;-) you'll be glad you did.

 

Why can your local shop be trusted to have fresh products on their shelves (compared to online retailers)? Because they said so? um... okay...

Some local shops have kits available, some don't. In my area, I've never seen a kit that I'd buy... they all look old and generic. Having said that, there are a couple of local places that keep recipe books. You can pick any recipe out of their book and they will build it for you right there. In a sense, that's a "virtual kit" that gets built on demand. That makes a lot more sense than spending the time to package a bunch of kits that you aren't sure are ever going to sell.

Also, there are several online retailers that sell great kits.

 

Sounds like he wants to brew tonight, so online shopping is ruled out.

As far as recipe or kit, just give them a call and see what they have. I might have a fairly busy local shop, but it does seem like they go through ingredients pretty quick and always stock from the back forward. I would imagine that most places would have kits available or at the very least, a recipe book. None the less, I would still call before I made the trip

 

Reputable producers of brewing ingredients have dates on the packaging. If you get old ingrefients, it is your fault.

 

Also, my home brew shop has 2 binders full of recipes, one grain one extract.

If you pick one of their recipes, they get all the stuff for you, good stuff like Breiss and Wyeast, and give you a 10% discount on the total.

 

Good point; one call can save bunches of time.

The one LHBS I often go to is super busy for the next couple months with selling the stuff to make wine on top of the beer ingredients. Your results will vary by region.

 

I am new to all of this and bought everything from my local shop. They make their own kits right there and had an entire aisle of them. Plus they had some samples to taste. I found them to be very helpful and they said to stop in or call anytime with questions. Plus they are dog friendly - don't have to keep Fido in the car while you shop

 

Strangely my local homebrew store seems to be cheaper for most things going into the store rather than ordering online. Even cheaper than their own website.

 

My local Brew store has very fair prices. They deserve a higher price due to the convenience of being local.

They have shelves of books of recipe's. The guys that work there are homebrewers, and can offer there own recipes and ideas.

If you're brew store is close enough, I would advise you stop in and check it out.

I always phone in my orders, so it's bagged and ready to go when I get there. Gives me some time to shoot the sh..t for a bit. The shop is always busy when I get there, so I know they turn they're stuff over.

I feel very fortunate that my brew store is only 2 miles from my house.

 

First ,I think their claim that their ingredients will be fresher than online is misleading to outright false. You might get old stuff online and they probably have old stuff on their shelves.

If you talk about grains, they are harvested then sit somewhere, then they are malted and sit somewhere else. Then they are sold to an online dealer AND to the LHBS. They probably were produced at the same time in the same place.

The LHBS's that I shop at both have a very good turn over. One makes up kits that you can grab and go. They will make up a recipe while you are there.

I often take a recipe with me and buy the ingredients that I need. I have my own mill so I often buy twice what I need un-milled so I have some grains on hand for making new recipes without a need to order more ingredients.

That said, I buy most of my specialty grains online because I get them fresh from the sites I use and they are quite a bit cheaper than my LHBS. Also shipping doesn't cost more than the gas to get to the LHBS

 

This.

I recently bought a blonde rye kit from AHS. When I broke down the individual costs for the components, the AHS kit seemed really expensive compared to my LBHS.

Then I did some more complicated math.

At the LBHS I pay tax, but not from AHS.

Shipping is "free" from AHS. My LBHS is about 25-30 minutes each way from my place... which means that a trip there costs about $5-6 in gas. And it's not in a direction I ever regularly go - so I can't easily combine the trip with other errands or work.

Then there's my time. Although I don't like to put a dollar value on it, when I order from AHS, the kit magically appears on my doorstep when I get home from work. If I go to the LBHS, I have to find 1.5 hours on a weekend to make the trip up there and back. Not so easy with a four month old baby. So even if the AHS kit costs, let's say $5 more than the ingredients at my LBHS even after gas and taxes, I consider that a "convenience" fee.

 

If you were to get a recipe and order the ingredients separately you could save even more $$.

I get my bulk base grains at the LHBS because that is one thing that I can't get cheaper online with shipping costs added.

 

I live, literally, 10 minutes walk from my LHBS (the Vermont Homebrew Supply, which is in Winooski.) While I obviously can't speak for all LHBSes from my experience, mine is great: dog friendly (the store has a dog,) kid friendly (they have a box of toys for children to play with next to the counter, so parents can shop while kids play) and a VERY competent selection of malts, hops, and yeasts.

The downside is price.... kind of. The price of grain, hops, and yeast are all dramatically higher than the (base) prices I'd get online, but once you figure in shipping it's a wash. Anymore, the only time I order online is when I need a really specific yeast or a large quantity of hops.

The upshot is, check your damn LHBS out. Chances are it's a great store with great people, and it's always better (and in the long run, cheaper) than shopping online. Don't be afraid to ask them if they can order the more esoteric ingredients.

I wouldn't say that claims of freshness are FALSE. A LHBS is much better equipped to know how frequently their stock rotates.

 

I really like dealing with my LHBS. They're close by, like 3 miles away. The weekend guy there is also the head brewer for a local microbrewery, so he's always helpful. The prices are slightly higher, but when I consider shipping, they are actually cheaper. A bag of base malt is $50, which is WAY cheaper than I can get it from online shops when the $25 shipping (minimum) is tacked on. I will order bulk hops online at times, but everything else I get at the shop. They only carry White Labs liquid, but it's always fresh, and I don't use liquid yeast all that often. They also carry a good variety of specialty malts and other odd adjuncts (like cacao nibs). They have kits (all extract based), but they make them "to order" while you wait. I was in there this past Sunday, and there was actually a line - something I really like seeing!

 

I use VTHBS fairly regularly, although it is about a 75 minute drive, so not as convenient as it is for Kerin.

+1 on the quality of this shop though. Kind of small and personal in size, but just enough for what Annie and Matt are accomplishing.

The first time I went in as a noob, I was full of questions and had ZERO knowledge base and got what I felt at the time was a very crappy level of service in the form of short, brief answers from the owner.

On a subsequent visit after gaining knowledge and walking in prepared with legit questions, I got it.... The level of knowledge and courtesy was second to none in ANY retail shop of any kind that I have ever visited.
I asked Annie to help me with an Irish Red and she walked me through the entire process. She had me taste each and every grain as we chose it.
She discussed her preferences for carapils versus other head retention processes and I ended up getting a second grain bill for another beer while I was there. Good customer service = happier customers that buy more stuff.

I also wanted to mention that while we were sampling the grains that day, she tasted some of the CR10L and immediately emptied the remaining pound or so in the storage bin and went out back and got a new bag and dumped some in. She said that it was tasting stale and she would not sell it.

IMO, the increased price of grains at my (not so local) HBS is WELL worth it.
Show me a single online supplier that can provide that level of service for around $5 per visit.
I usually call an order in and have my brother in law or in-laws pick it up for me when they go to Burlington, so the difference in price is moot, cuz I am not paying shipping and getting fresh grains.

Just wanted to throw that out there.

 

Hmmm? I buy from my LHBS and several sites online and most of what I get does not have dates on the packaging. Does that mean that they are all disreputable?

 

The thing about reputation is that it's subjective. If you're brewing high quality beer, who cares?

 

I go to the Norfolk location and have waited in lines several times recently as well. I like the staff at this location and have gotten good advice from one guy in particular. I don't have a mill so it is also convenient to have them crush the grain for me. As many have stated, online prices are usually cheaper but shipping almost always kills the deal and my LHBS is a pretty easy detour on my commute home.

 

Of course not.. I should have explained better. I am mainly talking about yeast and LME.. Don't forget to read the "Best if used by" dates.