Northern Brewer - Buyer Beware

[D.B.Moody]

I had no idea that they were owned by a subsidiary of AB InBev

They are not currently owned by AB InBev. AB InBev sold them to ZX Ventures, an affiliate of Blackstreet Capital Holding in 2019.

Edit: Didn't know answer was being posted by @BrewnWKopperKat while I wrote mine.

 

[PCABrewing]

I hate to see NB trashed here because I have nothing but great things to say about them, but I am in the Milwaukee area and only buy from their store in person. Great selection, grain room, and awesome staff. Hard to compare this experience to mail order.

I do know the ownership of NB changed in 2016 and began the mega chain of shops discussed above. I had no idea that they were owned by a subsidiary of AB InBev (linked article below). Guess the big breweries figured out how to capture some of the profit they lost when people switched to craft beer and home brewing.

https://growlermag.com/big-beer-buys-northern-brewer/

At the time of the InBev acquisition I pondered if it could be one move in a conspiracy to crush or diminish the HB market.
Buy the big stores, help them grow resulting in the small LHBS whithering, then squeeze the life (and value) out of the big store while pointing to the failure of the small stores as evidence the the market is drying up.

Obviously this falls into the category of "conspiracy theory", but isn't it possible.
I'm not saying that is what is happening, but it is one reason we have anti-trust laws.
Problem is, our "hobby" market is probably too small to get the attention of regulators.


The defense to that tactic is the proliferation of other successful independent stores.
In that case the market changes but doesn't dry-up.

 

[matt_m]

Pretty sure they're the ones who bought out my LHBS then blew everyone out and closed down the store (online only now). I have zero interest in them, they can go out of business tomorrow for all I care.

Yes, they bought and dismantled AIH.

Apparently Cap N Cork in Macomb county is closing too. I believe that leaves us with just Cadillac Straights in Madison Heights in all of SE Michigan. They actually just expanded their brew supply shop.

 

[Ironbottom]

Northern Brewer is also charging a fuel charge and the charge doesn't appear till check out. You are supposed to be warned of the fuel charge before the check out. It's only a $1.00 Just didn't like seeing it after I checked out without my knowledge.

I ordered on Sept 23 and received my two beer kits on Oct 8. I went back and forth trying to find out when the kits would be shipped and all I got was they are short on manpower. Did not get a $10 coupon. Pumpkin ale to late to brew for Halloween now.

What do you think of MoreBeer.com?

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

@PCABrewing: A couple of observations:

1. Home brew supply stores are a retail operation (commodity process) selling items for cooking that come from multiple suppliers (commodity products). I'm not seeing a profitable reason to attempt to vertically integrated the entire home brewing "industry".
2. Privately held specialty businesses have a 'business lifecycle'. Mrs Fields® Original Cookies Inc may be an interesting example on how a niche businesses evolves through that 'business lifecycle'. Wikipedia has the high level overview.

Spoiler

They didn't crush making chocolate chip cookies at home.

 

[Dancy]

Let's hope they don't.

I take your points after your opening statement but I live in the Twin Cities and there really aren’t small store alternatives to NB and Midwest. I am NOT assuming some nice mom and pop homebrew shops are going to pop up and take their place if they fail. Frankly, if the hobby becomes too expensive, I’ll move on to something else. This hobby has people involved on many levels as evidenced here on HBT, from those on a shoe string to others who spend a lot on the latest equipment and build dedicated spaces in their homes, garages and backyards to brew in. I find it gratifying to brew my own but I don’t brew as often as many of you here because I don’t entertain and I keep 98% of what I brew. The thing is, I drink a beer or two after work, occasionally more and sometimes I skip a day or two and don't drink alcohol at all. As a result, I don’t brew every couple of weeks or even monthly. I might if I didn’t live in a one bedroom condo.

My point is, there are plenty of people like me in the hobby who are not spending as much proportionate to our income as some of you who brew way more often and more than 5G at time. I am not well off, but if I spend $15+ more on ingredients at Midwest or NB than I did a year ago, I really don’t care because I’m not a high volume brewer. I understand that’s prohibitive if you’re a high volume brewer.
I’d like to know the number of home brewers at the upper level of volume and dollars spent all the way down to people like me. Then the question is if the market comfortably supports the small LHBS or is it going to be the big boys? Can they coexist?
I started home brewing in the mid 90s — thank you Charlie Papazian — and left it after 4 years due to a divorce and no space before coming back to it 15 years later thanks to electric brewing. Back then, there was NB and MW as well as a 2-3 (?) small shops (in the Twin Cities where I live). I am sure there were relatively more small (5G) batch brewers than there are today. I think the number of homebrewers spending more on high level gear and brewing with greater frequency has increased a great deal since then. Can the small local shops thrive today? Go ahead and wish NB and MW to fail but will there be a LHBS to take its place or will I have to order online like I do so many other things in my life? I like Midwest as a store and if you ever set foot in it, you’d see it’s pretty nice. I’d like it to succeed.

 

[PCABrewing]

@PCABrewing: A couple of observations:

1. Home brew supply stores are a retail operation (commodity process) selling items for cooking that come from multiple suppliers (commodity products). I'm not seeing a profitable reason to attempt to vertically integrated the entire home brewing "industry".
2. Privately held specialty businesses have a 'business lifecycle'. Mrs Fields® Original Cookies Inc may be an interesting example on how a niche businesses evolves through that 'business lifecycle'. Wikipedia has the high level overview.

Spoiler

They didn't crush making chocolate chip cookies at home.

Who said anything about Vertical Integration??
I was laying out a hypothetical based on the premise that one entity wanted to reduce or eliminate competition from another. Edit; In this case the "other" competition would be the Homebrew Market itself.

I never said it was plausible....

 

[redrocker652002]

I have only ordered a few things from NB and that was a while ago. We have a Morebeer about 30 mins from me,, and the guys that work there are super helpful. One guy is an assistant brewmaster at a small startup in Holister. He invited me to come by and have a look but that is a bit of a ride. I can order what I need online, have it sent to the store free and then look around a bit. One of these days I might bring a bottle or two of my brew in to see what they think but I don't know them all that well yet. Either way, they are good guys to talk to and seem to have a wealth of knowledge.

 

[bike2brew]

I placed an order a week ago online from Northern Brewer and, besides an email that says there's been a "delay", have been unable to get any further update from NB about my order. It's been a week, and the order is still unfulfilled despite their website still indicating that they're shipping most orders in 2-3 business days.

Today, I saw that there were several threads both on HBT and Reddit about the delays brewers have experienced with NB over the past year--some up to two weeks or more!!! I understand that there are staffing issues and other logistics affecting nearly every business, but it makes no sense that NB's competitors can deliver same day while they are struggling in this regard.

For reference, I sent three texts to the textable number provided on the NB website, sent two emails--one for an update, one to cancel the order, and attempted to call the textable number as well as the Milwaukee retail store as there is no number to reach customer service available anywhere that I've been able to find (and I've looked HARD).

Because I've heard nothing back from them, I called my CC company to dispute the transaction. I hate doing this to any merchant, but this lack of customer service and responsiveness makes me lose faith that NB will come through on their promise to either provide the goods I've ordered or refund the money. Quite frankly, I've never experienced such a poor customer service/ordering experience. I'm not the kind of person that expects immediate service or shipping, but I do expect some degree of responsiveness from the merchants I buy from.

I know that there are plenty of quality suppliers out there, and I intend on giving them my business. I'm equal opportunity as I don't have a LHBS anywhere near me, and the one I've always used (Texas Brewing, Inc.) decided to pare down their homebrewing operations and focus on their commercial brewing supplies after covid.

Unfortunately, I have to recommend against anyone ordering from Northern Brewer. My experience was horrible at best. I know that I'm not the only one, and I also know that others have had good experiences, but I need to share my experience to protect other brewers from having a similar experience to mine.

Cooling the wort for a stout using LME obtained from, NB on Friday. Order placed 10 days previously.

 

[kevin58]

Amazon is not doing next-day anymore in some markets. I'm paying for Amazon Prime (I might let it lapse) and lately it's taking a week to get orders, if I get them at all. Then it takes a week to get a refund on an order they never shipped; they just generated a tracking number and abandoned it. I've talked to several people and businesses in this area and they're experiencing the same thing.

Who owns NB now? For a while it was AB InBev (Budweiser). Maybe there's something nefarious going on? I love a good conspiracy theory, but I don't put much stock in them.

InBev sold Northern Brewer in 2019. It was bought by company called Blackstreet Capital Holdings. Blackstreet recently bought Adventures in Homebrewing and Austin Homebrew Supply - closed both stores and now operate online only.

 

[NobleNewt]

Northern Brewer is also charging a fuel charge and the charge doesn't appear till check out. You are supposed to be warned of the fuel charge before the check out. It's only a $1.00 Just didn't like seeing it after I checked out without my knowledge.

I ordered on Sept 23 and received my two beer kits on Oct 8. I went back and forth trying to find out when the kits would be shipped and all I got was they are short on manpower. Did not get a $10 coupon. Pumpkin ale to late to brew for Halloween now.

What do you think of MoreBeer.com?

I ended up ordering from MoreBeer after the NB debacle.

 

[NobleNewt]

FYI. BrewHound in west Fort Worth, and North Texas Homebrew Supply in north Dallas are both good options if you want to buy "local".

That’s good to know. I’ve never heard of BrewHound.. I’m about an hour and a half from FW, so that may be a good option in the future.

 

[bracconiere]

At the time of the InBev acquisition I pondered if it could be one move in a conspiracy to crush or diminish the HB market.
Buy the big stores, help them grow resulting in the small LHBS whithering, then squeeze the life (and value) out of the big store while pointing to the failure of the small stores as evidence the the market is drying up.

Obviously this falls into the category of "conspiracy theory", but isn't it possible.
I'm not saying that is what is happening, but it is one reason we have anti-trust laws.
Problem is, our "hobby" market is probably too small to get the attention of regulators.


The defense to that tactic is the proliferation of other successful independent stores.
In that case the market changes but doesn't dry-up.

agree whole heartedly, wich is why my LHBS store, is a feed store.. my spidy sense got to tingling when i heard InBev's 'creative marketing' division bought NB.... i'm like ****, better start malting my own because i know drug dealers are power mad, well... yeah i saw it comeing, and still am doing my best to fight, keep the chains off me...

 

[z-bob]

agree whole heartedly, wich is why my LHBS store, is a feed store.. my spidy sense got to tingling when i heard InBev's 'creative marketing' division bought NB.... i'm like ****, better start malting my own because i know drug dealers are power mad, well... yeah i saw it comeing, and still am doing my best to fight, keep the chains off me...

What does 50 pounds of barley cost from a feed store? About $30? I assume you have to wash it, (not quite human food grade when you buy it but close) but not a problem because you'll be wetting it for sprouting anyway.

 

[bracconiere]

What does 50 pounds of barley cost from a feed store? About $30? I assume you have to wash it, (not quite human food grade when you buy it but close) but not a problem because you'll be wetting it for sprouting anyway.

6-row, was costing me $13 for many years 2016-2021, now last time i bought a bag it was $23...i figure the devil is desperate.


and yeah i don't really wash it per-se, it's involved in the process of sprouting it, i actually 'wash' it every day for 3-4 days to keep it wet to sprout...

i don't quite understand what about things that make you feel funny gives the devil a foot in the door, but i damn try and slam every time i see them! ain't a nice guy!

 

[Hammy71]

Its a shame actually. I too ordered from them about a month ago. No email confirming purchase or when it would be shipped. After about two weeks I sent an email asking what was up......within an hour I got an email saying my order had been shipped. The next day got an email saying they were sorry for the delay.

Something is amiss for sure.....

 

[NobleNewt]

Its a shame actually. I too ordered from them about a month ago. No email confirming purchase or when it would be shipped. After about two weeks I sent an email asking what was up......within an hour I got an email saying my order had been shipped. The next day got an email saying they were sorry for the delay.

Something is amiss for sure.....

There's a glitch in the Matrix for them. If it was always a staffing and employee issue, then literally everyone in the industry would be taking a week or two to ship orders. Plus, it's been at least 6 months (judging by the other threads I've seen), and they haven't been able to make any adjustments. I have a feeling the investment group that bought NB and subsequent brands thought they were gonna be raking in cash and had no idea how running an online retailer works.

 

[z-bob]

I'm guessing they fired most of the employees, or ran them off with bad management, and now they can't hire replacements because they're not paying enough -- also people have gotten used to working from home or not working at all (just collecting government assistance) and some jobs like warehouse work have to be done onsite and in-person.

Long-running problems with "staffing", I always blame the management. They are paying too little, or poor benefits, or just generally treating the employees like crap so they have high turnover. But if they pay a decent wage, they might have to raise prices and customers will go elsewhere. It's a conundrum. But I'm also hedging my bet here a little because people have gotten lazier since the start of COVID.

I was about to hit Send and I just thought of this; they might have tried to implement just-in-time inventory with little or no warehousing, and that doesn't work when supply chains are disrupted. But you'd think they'd have figured that out by now

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

MN (Aug 2022): 2% unemployment rate: https://mn.gov/deed/data/current-econ-highlights/county-unemployment.jsp

 

[tracer bullet]

MN is doing quite well on the unemployment statistics. And so it is probably hard for them to find people.

BUT - by now, that problem could have been fixed. I find it hard to believe it's anything other than an unwillingness to pay people what it takes. And when you're making as much money as they are it's a bit hard to comprehend the pay thing.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

And so it is probably hard for them to find people.

 

[Teufelhunde]

BUT - by now, that problem could have been fixed. I find it hard to believe it's anything other than an unwillingness to pay people what it takes. And when you're making as much money as they are it's a bit hard to comprehend the pay thing.

^^THIS^^

From my past experience being in companies that have been bought by LARGE investment groups, one of the first things they change is the management compensation. They base their compensation in part, or wholly, on NET profit made by that department/business. The manager has an incentive to hire people for .25/hour if he can get them(and if it were legal). If he has to pay a proper wage to get people to work, he is literally taking money out of his own pocket.

YMMV
Lon

 

[Dancy]

I find it hard to believe it's anything other than an unwillingness to pay people what it takes. And when you're making as much money as they are it's a bit hard to comprehend the pay thing.

Perhaps, but we’ve all been speculating about this for many weeks (months?) now and as far as I can tell, none of us knows the actual facts behind their issues. It doesn’t make sense to me they let these shipping issues go on for sooo long now if it’s just a matter of paying the help more money — particularly if they really “…are making as much money as they are….”.

 

[NobleNewt]

I don’t doubt nor disagree with the labor situation, and everyone here has made good points. Personally, I switched jobs from a high-demand trades job to a counter job at a heavy equipment rental place in large part because of the wages and part due to the physical demands of the work.

I don’t blame anyone for making a move out of necessity in today’s economy. To the point of some in this thread, my new employer wanted to match my pay after I explicitly said I didn’t want to make a lateral move in my interview. I negotiated a better rate, but the fact that they didn’t want to pay me says more about the state of employer pay on a larger scale than it does about a single employer. My boss didn’t want to pay me because it took off of her bottom line and therefore her commissions.

Point is, it’s hard to find good people who WANT to work. When you do, PAY THEM. Granted, this may not be NB’s issue, but if it’s the same excuse they’ve been using, then something needs to change.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

I ended up ordering from MoreBeer

 

[tld6008]

Delta Brewing is my choice, I shopped both NB and Morebeer one of them won't apply free shipping to 50lb bags of grain. Went to Delta and got what I wanted and received in 2 days free shipping via Fedex

Edit: Shipping was UPS

 

[chthon]

That's what you get when you let AbInbev take over other companies.

 

[Steveruch]

Delta Brewing is my choice, I shopped both NB and Morebeer one of them won't apply free shipping to 50lb bags of grain. Went to Delta and got what I wanted and received in 2 days free shipping via Fedex

If you order five 10 pound bags from Morebeer that qualifies for free shipping.

 

[wepeeler]

My girlfriend just got me a $150 giftcard to NB

 

[z-bob]

My girlfriend just got me a $150 giftcard to NB

So use if for something nice that you can wait a month to get.