Pittsburgh/Western PA Group By #9+

[PJM]

March sounds great to me Pat. I'm excited by the prospect of a move to Washington PA. It will cut my normal 120 mile round trip down to about 60.

 

[trimixdiver1]

I know there will be issues for some, but the cost savings should help. Maybe someone here could do a pickup for you? Since Monroeville shut down, you guys are feeling the pain..... I promise you this, it will be worth the drive.

 

[coyote68]

again very generous, but i already drive 40+ miles to get to the phg site. it would kill me to travel from indiana, pa to washington any savings would surely be lost.

 

[attyindaburgh]

Thanks Pat and thanks AM for the space. I am excited to check out the new and improved store location. It will definitely be a longer drive for me so I will just have to make it worthwhile. Not sure if it is possible or not, but I saw that Yakima Valley Hops offers good discounts for group buys. Might be worth looking into. Anyway, time to carpool with you brewing friends or drop off the family at the outlets and make everyone happy!

 

[attyindaburgh]

Coyote, I just realized that you were the one who mentioned in another post about Yakima doing group buys. Maybe you can talk to Pat about that. Hopefully I will need to do the group buy in March, if I have room, I would be happy to pick up yours and you can just meet me at my place, east of the burgh.

 

[Heide264]

Not too bad for me. I'd probably rather drive an hour to Washington than fight through the south side... I'm a spoiled suburb driver with a stick shift, haha.

Do you plan on keeping the 'rolling batch' idea?

 

[trimixdiver1]

Not too bad for me. I'd probably rather drive an hour to Washington than fight through the south side... I'm a spoiled suburb driver with a stick shift, haha.



Do you plan on keeping the 'rolling batch' idea?

Rolling batch?

 

[attyindaburgh]

Rolling batch. I think what it was going to be was as a pallet is filled, one would be ordered. No set time as to when it would happen other than when it was filled. I can think of pros and cons to this method.

 

[bja]

Pat, that's very generous. The 100 mile roundtrip to Washington makes that a pretty significant time commitment for those of us in the east.

Yeah, my 60 mile round trip will jump to 120 miles.

 

[Heide264]

Rolling batch. I think what it was going to be was as a pallet is filled, one would be ordered. No set time as to when it would happen other than when it was filled. I can think of pros and cons to this method.

Yup! Just whenever they fill up ya put the order in... and so it goes.

 

[coyote68]

Coyote, I just realized that you were the one who mentioned in another post about Yakima doing group buys. Maybe you can talk to Pat about that. Hopefully I will need to do the group buy in March, if I have room, I would be happy to pick up yours and you can just meet me at my place, east of the burgh.

Sure i can help with yakima valley. and thanks for the pick-up offer. will definitely have to hook up on that.

 

[clarkwisconsin]

Rolling batch is a great idea. I like the idea of the yakima valley group buys too. I currently don't need hops for awhile between me personally buying some and since Christmas is coming up I have about 11 pounds coming my way.

 

[trimixdiver1]

I was thinking of a quarterly group buy. I will not have time to monitor all the time and do orders all the time. If this isn't acceptable then let me know and you guys can find someone else that has the time and the room.

 

[TheHunk]

I'm confused. Have we lost the storage unit? I thought it was payed up for the year.

 

[attyindaburgh]

A couple of problems I see with the rolling buy is: first, it sounds like it would be a big time suck which is alot to ask of a volunteer, second is that you never know when a pallet is going to fill. So if you need something and you place an order, is the pallet going to fill in a week? three weeks? two months? From what I saw in the most recent round, a quarterly buy might be the ticket. One would just have to do some planning ahead. As far as the distant location, I do wish it was closer for me, but who doesn't want it closer for them? Having the opportunity to pick up a group buy and pick up items at the lhbs at the same time is pretty cool! Now if we can also schedule a trash mtg at the same time, that would be incredible!!

 

[clarkwisconsin]

I'm totally new to group buys and have only done it this last round. It's obviously whatever you guys want to do since you are organizing it all. I'm just stoked that I moved to a city that actually sets up group buys.

 

[coyote68]

A couple of problems I see with the rolling buy is: first, it sounds like it would be a big time suck which is alot to ask of a volunteer, second is that you never know when a pallet is going to fill. So if you need something and you place an order, is the pallet going to fill in a week? three weeks? two months? From what I saw in the most recent round, a quarterly buy might be the ticket. One would just have to do some planning ahead. As far as the distant location, I do wish it was closer for me, but who doesn't want it closer for them? Having the opportunity to pick up a group buy and pick up items at the lhbs at the same time is pretty cool! Now if we can also schedule a trash mtg at the same time, that would be incredible!!

agreed..quqrterly will be better and give you time to set up a brew schedule in advance. also be able to grab the extras from the lhbs that we forget about.
and it would make the distance more reasonable(at least for me) and yes it's a lot of work to set these up with the splits and stacking and stacking...

 

[brewguyver]

I was thinking of a quarterly group buy. I will not have time to monitor all the time and do orders all the time. If this isn't acceptable then let me know and you guys can find someone else that has the time and the room.

Since you already own the space, and it isn't 13x8, quarterly is probably the easiest . Anything more frequent and the ordering can get a bit streaky. The rolling buy is a bit easier for me so I don't have to try and juggle pallets.

I'm confused. Have we lost the storage unit? I thought it was payed up for the year.

We haven't lost the unit, and I'm still waiting on confirmation for the current pallet being closed. Pat (trimix) has been offering to pick up the buy now that he has a stable location. I'm looking at another 150+ days on the road this year, plus building a case for promotion, so my availability could get ugly. Handing off to him for a March start seems like a good hedge to make sure the buy doesn't disappear. I didn't get a chance to reach out to everyone so he's doing it proactively.

Hopefully this approach could cut some of the fees as well. That's especially true if everyone has their own containers and is up for bulk grain (true bin-o-two-row). You can get a tote of CM-2row, golden promise, and a few others for about $5 less per sack.

My one concern (that I voiced to Pat) is that people N/NE of the city have a long way to go. I'm happy to help folks pursue other options (e.g a "North" location) as well, or keep this rolling, but Pat's offer seems more consistent and could save folks some money as well.

 

[trimixdiver1]

Just to make this clear, I will be taking care of the group buy on my own. A&M is just letting me have some space for the pallets.

My hope is someone would step forward to bridge the distance for those that decide the drive is too much.

 

[TheHunk]

@ Kyle - Thanks for the clarity. Good luck with the promotion and thanks for all you have done for the group buys over the years.

@ Pat - Thanks for stepping up to save the group buys. I also like the idea of a quarterly buy. I am coming from the north as well as some others but if you make it "worth the drive" I'll be staying in. Thanks again for stepping up. I know it's a big commitment, one that I would not be willing to take on.

 

[Weezy]

I *may* be able to help with northeast distribution. I have a truck and space at eastern end of Allegheny county. No promises.

 

[brewguyver]

In more immediate news, the current pallet should be picked and packed by Tuesday (fingers crossed) and available as of Friday. As soon as I have the shipping manifest I'll get the grain on the website (and get the new folks on as well).

I took advantage of this buy to get a bunch of stuff people had wanted in the past but we weren't able to close, like British dark and extra dark crystal.

 

[attyindaburgh]

Alright! I'm doing my happy dance and hoping I get my stuff that I ordered. And maybe find some open splits that I can use.

 

[trimixdiver1]

I'm sure Kyle is going to need some help doing the splits. Whoever can, please help. Many hands will make short work of this. I know it being the Christmas season means family obligations, but Kyle has family too.
Let's tear through it and go home and have a great Christmas!

Thanks
Pat

 

[attyindaburgh]

Hopefully I will be available to help out. It was actually fun doing it the last time.

 

[Snicklefritz]

I'd be willing to help again as well.

 

[clarkwisconsin]

I might be able to help a little but I work till 3:30pm.

 

[trimixdiver1]

Thank you for the offers to help!

Im planning on doing the first group buy, starting on Jan 12th 2015. I plan on submitting the order on March 4th. This buy will differ than when Kyle ran the buy. Due to it being the first buy, I was planning on just doing whole sack buys (55lb, 50lb and 10lb). I will revisit the idea of splitting on my end in the future. If you guys want to figure out on your end who will split with who, that’s fine. We will provide the room needed to do so at the store.
The chemicals will have to be split off site due to ORM-D packaging rules.
A 10% discount will be offered to all members of the group buy on in store items on the primary pick up day March 15th 2015.
The group buy will work like this:
Call A&M Wine and Beer Supply and place your order and pay via credit card or via cash at pickup, a receipt will be provided at the time of pickup as well. 724-222-9463

Thanks
Pat

 

[clarkwisconsin]

What is the pick up location for this current group buy?

 

[trimixdiver1]

What is the pick up location for this current group buy?

Same, the southside location as far as I know.