• Please visit and share your knowledge at our sister communities:
  • If you have not, please join our official Homebrewing Facebook Group!

    Homebrewing Facebook Group

Pilsner pursuit

Homebrew Talk

Help Support Homebrew Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
The hype is real, damn!

dJ7zwth.jpg


Thanks JGlitz87!
 
UCBC Lagerfest was a lot of fun. Good food, beer, and music. Ireally enjoyed the stuff from Dovetail, Olde Mecklenburg, and Chuckanut. This was my favorite of the day:
npt7PiQh.jpg


The darker and more malt forward stuff, Vienna lagers and bocks, were able to cut through the palate fatigue better. There were also some cool talks about the history of lager. This one was given by Stan Hieronymus.

ahTUqKEh.jpg
 
I finally was able to try Stammtisch (and the Zwickel) for the first time last week. I'm not sure I'd ever buy anything else if I lived in an area that got Urban Chestnut, especially with the $8 price tag.

At the other end of the price spectrum, has anyone tried the cans of Tipo that B United started releasing a few months ago?
 
I finally was able to try Stammtisch (and the Zwickel) for the first time last week. I'm not sure I'd ever buy anything else if I lived in an area that got Urban Chestnut, especially with the $8 price tag.

At the other end of the price spectrum, has anyone tried the cans of Tipo that B United started releasing a few months ago?
Between those two and Technical Ecstasy by 2nd Shift, we have some pretty solid everyday drinking beers around here.
 
Between those two and Technical Ecstasy by 2nd Shift, we have some pretty solid everyday drinking beers around here.

ccbstl sent me some Technical Ecstasy a while ago, and it was damn good. I was pleasantly surprised to see some 2nd Shift beers pop up in Maryland unexpectedly, so I've been hoping that becomes one of the ones that makes it here. Game changer for my Pils options.
 
I think that's the going rate in most places. It's an amazing beer, but ******* that is a hard price to justify for a pilsner.
Just curious, why should a pilsner be cheaper than another style? Is it because other breweries sell their pilsners for less? Is it because it costs less to make? Don't get me wrong, I love that pilsners are cheaper in general, but given the fact that I'd rather drink a good pils than pretty much any other style, I'd rather pay $20 for a 4 pack of pils than $20 for a pastry stout because I know I'm going to enjoy the pils much more.

People are also complaining about the pils and love fest being $60 because it's "only" pils, yet locally we had a fest of pretty much only IPAs (Day of the Juice) that was $75-$90. Personally, I'd go to the pils fest every day over the juice fest.
 
Just curious, why should a pilsner be cheaper than another style? Is it because other breweries sell their pilsners for less? Is it because it costs less to make? Don't get me wrong, I love that pilsners are cheaper in general, but given the fact that I'd rather drink a good pils than pretty much any other style, I'd rather pay $20 for a 4 pack of pils than $20 for a pastry stout because I know I'm going to enjoy the pils much more.

People are also complaining about the pils and love fest being $60 because it's "only" pils, yet locally we had a fest of pretty much only IPAs (Day of the Juice) that was $75-$90. Personally, I'd go to the pils fest every day over the juice fest.

Valid question. From a materials perspective, a pils costs less upfront as it's typically made with only pilsner malt and a single, common, hop variety. With pastry stouts, you're typically talking a larger-than-normal quantity of grain and with trendy IPAs, you're talking an absurd amount of hops. In terms of only the ingredients, I'd wager the cost to make usually goes: IPA > Imp. Stout > Pils.

That said, with a pils you're also talking lagering which is a time/infrastructure investment on behalf of the brewery, taking at least a month to a month-and-a-half to go from grain to glass. On the other hand, you can turn IPAs around in as quickly as two weeks, and a stout maybe two and a half to three weeks if you push it.

Obviously, every brewery will value that time/fermenter space differently, but I would imagine that for most it still costs less to produce a pils than an IPA or stout. All that is to say, if you're approaching this from the perspective of what it costs a brewery to make a style vs what is charged, one would expect a pils to be priced less. On the other hand, I feel that a brewery should be able to charge whatever they want since, at the end of the day, it's their product.

Setting aside all of that, I'm not certain that we're balking at the $20/4x12oz price because it's a pilsner - I think most people would question that price for most styles if I'm being completely honest. I feel like $20 is on the high end of the spectrum for 4 packs of 16oz cans - you typically only see that price in the "mega-hazebro-canz" or the "look-how-many-oreos-i-can-fit-in-my-fermenter-stouts" territory.
 
Just curious, why should a pilsner be cheaper than another style? Is it because other breweries sell their pilsners for less? Is it because it costs less to make? Don't get me wrong, I love that pilsners are cheaper in general, but given the fact that I'd rather drink a good pils than pretty much any other style, I'd rather pay $20 for a 4 pack of pils than $20 for a pastry stout because I know I'm going to enjoy the pils much more.

People are also complaining about the pils and love fest being $60 because it's "only" pils, yet locally we had a fest of pretty much only IPAs (Day of the Juice) that was $75-$90. Personally, I'd go to the pils fest every day over the juice fest.

100% agree with this post.

While "adjuncts" (Madagascar vanilla bean is at drug prices at the moment) can be expensive, and the desirable hops that are used in a lot of IPA's are pricey, nothing can compare to the opportunity cost of turning out batches of pale ale / IPA / etc... that can be turned in a matter of weeks compared to taking up a tank for months with a well made pilsner.

However, the market is a weird place and consumers seemingly won't pay a premium for those beers compared to the "hot" styles of the moment (pastry stout, NE IPA, over the top fruited kettle sours, etc...).

Half Acre Fader Pils is a phenomenal beer, but I've seen a fair amount of bitching about the price both on here / social media while these same folks are paying $17+ for a 750ml of hazy DIPA from local Chicagoland breweries.
 
This sounds straight up awful.
I chose to volunteer so I got in for free after checking people in for a few hours. To me, all the hazy juicy IPAs taste muddled and similar and mask the distinctiveness of different hops, so I couldn't really tell much of a difference between the different IPAs. There were some non-IPAs on tap to balance things out, which was nice (but no pilsners), and most of the breweries do not distribute to Georgia so it was a chance to drink a lot of beer that I wouldn't normally have been able to try otherwise. And the proceeds went to some good charities. I was able to try all the beer I wanted in about an hour and left happy.
day-of-juice-swarm-comp-v_14b.jpg
 
I chose to volunteer so I got in for free after checking people in for a few hours. To me, all the hazy juicy IPAs taste muddled and similar and mask the distinctiveness of different hops, so I couldn't really tell much of a difference between the different IPAs. There were some non-IPAs on tap to balance things out, which was nice (but no pilsners), and most of the breweries do not distribute to Georgia so it was a chance to drink a lot of beer that I wouldn't normally have been able to try otherwise. And the proceeds went to some good charities. I was able to try all the beer I wanted in about an hour and left happy.
day-of-juice-swarm-comp-v_14b.jpg
What did 2nd Shift bring?
 
That said, with a pils you're also talking lagering which is a time/infrastructure investment on behalf of the brewery, taking at least a month to a month-and-a-half to go from grain to glass. On the other hand, you can turn IPAs around in as quickly as two weeks, and a stout maybe two and a half to three weeks if you push it.

Most midsized breweries are only limited by fermentation space. So you are looking at losing 2-3 turns of product that is easier to sell at a higher price. So it kind of depends on the brewery and if they can afford to "lose" that extra money.
 
AMpqUPu.jpg

I need to visit this thread more often. This beer is amazing.

phenomenal beer. was going to mention how much it cost but others beat me to it.

What do you pay for this? Its on a shelf near me but it's something like $20/4 pack.

where? i'd pay that all day. it wholesales around $4/can.

Just curious, why should a pilsner be cheaper than another style? Is it because other breweries sell their pilsners for less? Is it because it costs less to make? Don't get me wrong, I love that pilsners are cheaper in general, but given the fact that I'd rather drink a good pils than pretty much any other style, I'd rather pay $20 for a 4 pack of pils than $20 for a pastry stout because I know I'm going to enjoy the pils much more.

People are also complaining about the pils and love fest being $60 because it's "only" pils, yet locally we had a fest of pretty much only IPAs (Day of the Juice) that was $75-$90. Personally, I'd go to the pils fest every day over the juice fest.

Valid question. From a materials perspective, a pils costs less upfront as it's typically made with only pilsner malt and a single, common, hop variety. With pastry stouts, you're typically talking a larger-than-normal quantity of grain and with trendy IPAs, you're talking an absurd amount of hops. In terms of only the ingredients, I'd wager the cost to make usually goes: IPA > Imp. Stout > Pils.

That said, with a pils you're also talking lagering which is a time/infrastructure investment on behalf of the brewery, taking at least a month to a month-and-a-half to go from grain to glass. On the other hand, you can turn IPAs around in as quickly as two weeks, and a stout maybe two and a half to three weeks if you push it.

Obviously, every brewery will value that time/fermenter space differently, but I would imagine that for most it still costs less to produce a pils than an IPA or stout. All that is to say, if you're approaching this from the perspective of what it costs a brewery to make a style vs what is charged, one would expect a pils to be priced less. On the other hand, I feel that a brewery should be able to charge whatever they want since, at the end of the day, it's their product.

Setting aside all of that, I'm not certain that we're balking at the $20/4x12oz price because it's a pilsner - I think most people would question that price for most styles if I'm being completely honest. I feel like $20 is on the high end of the spectrum for 4 packs of 16oz cans - you typically only see that price in the "mega-hazebro-canz" or the "look-how-many-oreos-i-can-fit-in-my-fermenter-stouts" territory.

i apologize if the following is common knowledge but since i hadn't seen it mentioned, just some info on Tipopils and probable reasons for it's price.
B. United imports Tipo. They have these temperature controlled tankers that they ship to breweries in Europe and Asia to fill with beer. Then they keg/can it in Connecticut. In the case of Tipo, when B. United receives their tanker full of sweet Italiano pils nectar, they dry-hop it themselves, so that the hops are as fresh as can be when they keg/can. Kegs are also quite pricey.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top