Calling all homebrewers. The American Homebrewers Association invites your thoughts on the future.

[julia_1]

Happy summer, all. The AHA is thinking about the future*. We’ve compiled a 2024 survey to learn how you brew, what resources you love, and what you think is needed in homebrewing.

The details:
• Responses are anonymous
• It’ll take about 10 minutes
• The survey closes on the evening of July 19th
• We send a summary of the results to survey respondents who request it. Expect results in September.

Click here to take the survey: https://sprw.io/stt-haCHm

Thank you for helping us make the homebrewing community even better.

Cheers, Julia Herz - American Homebrewers Association Executive Director

*Your valuable time behind this survey contributes to AHA's strategic planning. For more check out my Midyear AHA update on this process.

 

[Airborneguy]

With all due respect, we should be the ones asking what the AHA's plan is for the future.

 

[julia_1]

With all due respect, we should be the ones asking what the AHA's plan is for the future.

Hello @Airborneguy. My midyear update is hopefully helpful information, and the more information we have from homebrewers the more that will inform future plans. Cheers.

 

[Airborneguy]

I completed the survey. Good luck.

 

[julia_1]

I completed the survey. Good luck.

Rockin'. Thanks so much.

 

[Witherby]

I filled it out, but I forgot to ask the one question that drives me nuts: why is the AHA website locked down tighter than my bank? Why can’t I stay logged in on my personal computer?

 

[Bobby_M]

I filled it out. It's not positive.

 

[MaxStout]

Filled mine out yesterday. The survey goes into some depth and asks some insightful questions. My responses were a mixed bag.

The number of people engaged in the hobby has been in decline for well over a decade, for a number of reasons. No doubt, AHA membership tracks that. I'll be interested to see how AHA adapts to the market changes going forward. I plan to stick with membership a while. I'm concerned that AHA will become the ugly stepchild of BA, now that the two are joined at the hip.

 

[bkboiler]

Filled it out. Glad to see the AHA is taking the community aspect to heart.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

And it will be interesting to see how HomeBrewTalk adapts to those same changes.

---

Earlier this week, MoreBeer (after a number of years of R&D) launched their line of Flash Brewing™ kits.

Very short brew day, relatively low cost to get started, no internet appliances, apparently with yeast strain(s) produce good results over a range of "at home" room temperatures.

As of this morning, two of the kits are listed as "sold out" on the web site.

---

I see a future of new ingredients, new ways to package ingredients, and creative ways to use them to accomplish goals. The result: innovative flavors, shorter brew day, etc.

MoreBeer is looking forward, not looking back.

 

[corncob]

I filled it out. Somebody should have tested the ui--the scrolling menus on the demographic questions didn't work on my android phone. So they got some noise in that data....

 

[JohnDBrewer]

The drop down menus didn't work for me either.

 

[Witherby]

I'm concerned that AHA will become the ugly stepchild of BA, now that the two are joined at the hip.

This is pretty much what I said. It has been this way for too long. The Zymurgy poll of best beer in America was just the BA taking advantage of homebrewers and a waste of magazine space. Homebrewing is its own thing. The AHA should be by homebrewers for homebrewers. If it has to scale back, so be it. It would at least be more authentic.

 

[Yooper]

I appreciate you asking. I was a member of AHA until 2020, for many years. The changes seemed to begin with "HomebrewCon" when the conference turned into a party atmosphere and I haven't been really interested in coming back after going most years since 2008.

 

[bwible]

I don’t attend conferences and I haven’t entered any competitions in probably a decade. I have never taken advantage of any offered discounts except free books when renewing membership or something like that.

To me, the AHA is a magazine subscription to Zymurgy. If they ever did away with Zymurgy I would have no reason to be a member. I look forward to reading Zymurgy every issue.

I uderstand they are supposed to be spokespeople for our hobby. Have they fought legal battles or anything like that? The organization exists kind of in the spirit of uniting homebrewers and sharing knowlege. I get all that. But the biggest benefit I see is still the magazine.

 

[passedpawn]

done

 

[palanole]

I filled out mine as well. I appreciate the AHA at least asking the questions. All of the insights on here have been enlightening. I think the AHA needs to develop a distinct strategy from the BA. Not an easy job especially with limited resources. I have been a member for about a decade and have no plans of giving up my membership. I like the webinars they have started doing and read Zymurgy every month.

 

[MaxStout]

I filled out mine as well. I appreciate the AHA at least asking the questions. All of the insights on here have been enlightening. I think the AHA needs to develop a distinct strategy from the BA. Not an easy job especially with limited resources. I have been a member for about a decade and have no plans of giving up my membership. I like the webinars they have started doing and read Zymurgy every month.

I'm basically in the same camp. The webinars and educational materials are big points for me. Zymurgy is always a good read, though I think it's lost some focus in recent years and tries too hard to go all over the road. Membership includes online access to the back catalog of Zymurgy--peruse a few of those from 15-20 years ago and you will see a whole different animal. More true-to-form brewing topics addressed. Today's magazine seems to have a lot of filler, and a few things that jump the shark. I do look forward to the equipment reviews and that's a big seller of the magazine to me.

AHA's recipe section is good, although I think HBT has a larger selection of good recipes (with discussion that brings more context). And some dogs from time to time. Remember BrewGuru?

The advocacy and lobbying AHA has done is important. We have laws in our favor that have likely been helped along thanks to AHA.

@BrewnWKopperKat made a good point: how will HBT adapt to these same changes? This is a great forum, but it's not nearly as active as it was a decade ago. I don't have any answers, though we might want to watch how AHA adapts to these changes.

 

[julia_1]

I filled it out. It's not positive.

The glass is both half full and half empty right now with the future unscripted.

 

[julia_1]

I filled it out, but I forgot to ask the one question that drives me nuts: why is the AHA website locked down tighter than my bank? Why can’t I stay logged in on my personal computer?

Going to DM you more about this. Cheers.

 

[julia_1]

Filled mine out yesterday. The survey goes into some depth and asks some insightful questions. My responses were a mixed bag.

The number of people engaged in the hobby has been in decline for well over a decade, for a number of reasons. No doubt, AHA membership tracks that. I'll be interested to see how AHA adapts to the market changes going forward. I plan to stick with membership a while. I'm concerned that AHA will become the ugly stepchild of BA, now that the two are joined at the hip.

Thanks for filling out.

 

[julia_1]

I filled it out. Somebody should have tested the ui--the scrolling menus on the demographic questions didn't work on my android phone. So they got some noise in that data....

Sorry about that. I've sent this to our survey team. Responses are in the hundreds and counting for two days in so hopefully this is isolated.

 

[julia_1]

The drop down menus didn't work for me either.

Weird and have noted to look into.

 

[julia_1]

I don’t attend conferences and I haven’t entered any competitions in probably a decade. I have never taken advantage of any offered discounts except free books when renewing membership or something like that.

To me, the AHA is a magazine subscription to Zymurgy. If they ever did away with Zymurgy I would have no reason to be a member. I look forward to reading Zymurgy every issue.

I uderstand they are supposed to be spokespeople for our hobby. Have they fought legal battles or anything like that? The organization exists kind of in the spirit of uniting homebrewers and sharing knowlege. I get all that. But the biggest benefit I see is still the magazine.

Here is a recent summary on much of what the AHA offers.

 

[julia_1]

I filled out mine as well. I appreciate the AHA at least asking the questions. All of the insights on here have been enlightening. I think the AHA needs to develop a distinct strategy from the BA. Not an easy job especially with limited resources. I have been a member for about a decade and have no plans of giving up my membership. I like the webinars they have started doing and read Zymurgy every month.

Here to here to Zymurgy Live!

 

[madscientist451]

I did the survey, I’m not a member of AHA, although I’ve thought about it several times. Would have liked to go to homebrew con when it was in various locations, but having it in high cost/horrible crime areas like Baltimore made me skip it. I’m not interested in going all the way to Denver to talk about homebrew.

 

[Kickass]

Survey completed.

I’m not a member. I’ve thought about it for a while but ultimately have never pulled the trigger for the following reasons:

Don’t plan to travel for homebrew con.

Not really a magazine guy.

Don’t enter competitions.

Don’t have a LHBS to utilize the the discounts.

Buy my grain in bulk from a local brewer.

I’m thankful for the hard work the AHA put in to legalizing homebrewing but at this point it don’t really see value in becoming a member.

 

[madscientist451]

I plan to stick with membership a while. I'm concerned that AHA will become the ugly stepchild of BA, now that the two are joined at the hip.

As far as I can tell the BA and AHA have always been part of the same organization.
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/membership/american-homebrewers-association/

 

[dmtaylor]

Have they fought legal battles or anything like that?

They did indeed, for many years under Gary Glass, who they later laid off. Gary was instrumental in getting homebrewing, and/or the sharing of homebrew at festivals, legalized in the last dozen or so states where it was previously illegal.

 

[505-Brewer]

I filled it out. Surprised. It didnt ask me how much my rent/mortgage was