Today marks a sad day in my life. I ended my relationship today with my LHBS after what I consider to be 'bad business.' It all began last night when my father and I decided to brew up the Bells' Two Hearted Ale clone listed here under the IPA recipes. I buy my base grains in bulk so I had my 2-row on hand. However, I had to pick up S-04, cara-pils, crystal 20, and 10 oz. of Centennial.
It all comes down to the hops. They have charts of current inventoried hops and their respective AA%. I saw that they didn't have centennials so I started subbing out the hops with Cascades x 2 for every ounce of Centennial and some Columbus at a 1:1 ratio. 1 of the 5 employees then told me that they just received a huge shipment of hops today and they have a few pounds of Centennial along with every other hop replenishment.
Fantastic! I can actually do this recipe to clone, without substitution. He fills my 10 ounces of Centennial and proceeds to tell me that if he were the one who agreed to filling my order, that he wouldn't have let me order 10 ounces of the 5 pounds of Centennial in his stock, "due to limited availability." He did fill my 10 ounces but he pointed out that this shipment was showing 8.1%, whereas the recipe I had in Beersmith showed the AA% at 10%. I asked for 2 additional ounces and he said, "No. I can't. It's not a matter of me playing favorites, it's that we have to ration our supplies." I look at him......and the other 6 ounces from the 1 lb bag, andask, "really?" Yep, sorry he tells me.
The conversation got very awkward. I was in disbelief. I couldn't believe I was looking at another 6 ounces of hops and he was denying me an additional 2. The feeling could be equated to stealing candy from a kid. I have been a big spender at this LHBS. I've easily spent over $2000 with them over the past 2.5 years from ingredients every two weeks or so, to a barley crusher, to 4 cornies, to countless parts, valves, minerals, sugars, sanitizers, etc.
They know who I am, but to their dismay, can forget who I am, because I don't agree with the way they conduct business. It's not even worth an effort to express my concerns to them as their are 2 other LHBS's in my vicinity. This particular one was in freehold, nj and I bid thee farewell.
You don't do business that way!
It all comes down to the hops. They have charts of current inventoried hops and their respective AA%. I saw that they didn't have centennials so I started subbing out the hops with Cascades x 2 for every ounce of Centennial and some Columbus at a 1:1 ratio. 1 of the 5 employees then told me that they just received a huge shipment of hops today and they have a few pounds of Centennial along with every other hop replenishment.
Fantastic! I can actually do this recipe to clone, without substitution. He fills my 10 ounces of Centennial and proceeds to tell me that if he were the one who agreed to filling my order, that he wouldn't have let me order 10 ounces of the 5 pounds of Centennial in his stock, "due to limited availability." He did fill my 10 ounces but he pointed out that this shipment was showing 8.1%, whereas the recipe I had in Beersmith showed the AA% at 10%. I asked for 2 additional ounces and he said, "No. I can't. It's not a matter of me playing favorites, it's that we have to ration our supplies." I look at him......and the other 6 ounces from the 1 lb bag, andask, "really?" Yep, sorry he tells me.
The conversation got very awkward. I was in disbelief. I couldn't believe I was looking at another 6 ounces of hops and he was denying me an additional 2. The feeling could be equated to stealing candy from a kid. I have been a big spender at this LHBS. I've easily spent over $2000 with them over the past 2.5 years from ingredients every two weeks or so, to a barley crusher, to 4 cornies, to countless parts, valves, minerals, sugars, sanitizers, etc.
They know who I am, but to their dismay, can forget who I am, because I don't agree with the way they conduct business. It's not even worth an effort to express my concerns to them as their are 2 other LHBS's in my vicinity. This particular one was in freehold, nj and I bid thee farewell.
You don't do business that way!