Poll: Could a Brewery Succeed if....

[landhoney]

A recent thread reminded of a question I had. I like the idea of becoming a commercial brewer, but the idea of brewing the same beer over and over again with only the occasional seasonal does seem like a problem. My question is this: Could a brewery succeed if it had no regular beers?
Like a glorified homebrewer, brewing different beers all the time, with the occasional repeat. If they produced great beer wouldn't you keep trying/buying even without knowing what you were getting the first time.

edit> To make it clear, I'm talking commercial brewery not brew-pub. Feel free to give opinions on both though. This is all very hypothetical, but I think at this point I'd rather brew at a small commecial vs. brew-pub. The later would be more likely though.

 

[ohiobrewtus]

that's a tough question. I would imagine that it would make it rather difficult without a regular lineup to bring people back. Just when you get people in and they find a beer or two that they like, they may have to wait 6 months or more to see it again.

I'd recommend a minimum of 2 or 3 regulars and rotating the rest.

 

[EdWort]

Consistent regular beers, plus seasonals are the way to go IMHO

 

[Ryanh1801]

I really think that you would want atleast three beers that are always on tap. Such as Pale ale, wheat, and a light beer.. Then play around with a few others to have on tap. This is what the brew pub did that I used to work at...

 

[magno]

Ive seen brewpubs that have no "regular" beers.

Im not sure if a microbrew could make it doing it that way. I agree with Ed, a couple regular beers, with a variety of seasonals is the way to do it. You can get peoples attention with the regular beers, and keep their interest with the seasonals.

 

[Beerrific]

I voted yes, but for some reason I thought you were talking about a brew pub. I think a commercial brewery (distributing to stores, etc.) would need at least one 'flagship' beer and it needs to appeal to a wide variety of drinkers. This beer would the hook people to try others. In the case of a brewpub, the hook is that they are already there and are coming back because they have had good beer/food their before.

 

[Brewer3401]

ZEA's in Metairie, Louisiana. No siht beers at all. Good brew pub beer (Patrick was the brewmaster)The food is extremely good and extremely consistent. They have a company that portions out spices from what I've heard.

In Slidell, Louisiana, Laughing Pines had good beer, but the food was siht. They closed.

I guess I just made the question as clear as mud.

I think you need both. Unless you opened a low end brew pub that did short order food and made blonde ales and lighter beers. If the patrons bought the beer, you'd do well on the brewing profit center. As long as the food wasn't horrible, it may work.

 

[DeathBrewer]

i would love a place like that myself...as long as i wasn't dissapointed too many times and they stuck to styles so i knew what i was getting.

but it wouldn't get too many regular customers, I'm afraid.

 

[mrk305]

It better be a good resteraunt first, though. Ninety percent of your customers will see it as a resteraunt with beer and most of them will be BMC drinkers who don't know much about micro-brews anyway.

 

[DeathBrewer]

that's not always true around here. some of the brewpubs don't have the greatest food, but they have awesome brews on tap. and zero BMC

 

[howlinowl]

Commercial brewery, I don't think so. You have the 3 tier distribution system, and just trying to get the distributor to push your "regular" product over BMC is probably a bit of a uphill battle. Why would they when they know that Bud will sell? Imagine trying to get them to push a new brew every freakin' time....

Sammy Adams has quite a selection of beers, but if they didn't have the ole Boston Lager, that they've been brewin' and sellin' since, hell....1985 or something? they probably wouldn't even get any of the others on the shelf.... Here in my part of Florida, you usually see Boston Lager and maybe one other.. unless they are part of a Mix Pack

Allan

 

[Brewer3401]

It better be a good resteraunt first, though. Ninety percent of your customers will see it as a resteraunt with beer and most of them will be BMC drinkers who don't know much about micro-brews anyway.

ZEA's: When I lived in Metairie, would frequent the place. I've heard guys say, I want a BMC. Their answer, is "try this". IMHO, if you drink that siht, you don't deserve to be here anyway. Most of them "tolerated" the beer. Bottom line: they were there for the food.

Hey guys, this is New Orleans. Only thing we got down here is welfare and the P&P (poor and pitiful). Lucky we get BMC.

 

[TheJadedDog]

For a brewpub no problem, for a micro, I doubt it. People aren't going to plunk down money if they don't know what they are getting. A brewpub is one thing, people are typically there to try something new, but walking into a liquor store to buy some brews for the weekend is another matter.

 

[jeff]

I voted "other." I think you could do it without commercial beers, but you better be prepared to always have on tap a "light" ale, a hefe ( a cross-over favorite) and a cream ale or light lager. If it were me I would try to do this, but have a couple cases of BMC and corona in the back. Unadvertised but available if requested. You can't convert everyone to good beer, but you should still have a means of taking their money!

 

[krispy d]

I vote no, because you clearly state you are talking about a micro and not a brewpub. If you were talking about a pub having no regular dedicated taplines, well that happens all the time. I know of a number of great bars that might not have any of the beer they had the week before.

 

[Rhoobarb]

No way. Micro, brewpub - doesn't matter. If you don't have at least 1-2 'flagship' or 'house' beers that are go-to beers for the masses, you won't get anyone but beer geeks like us. And there aren't enough of us in the world to keep a place in the black. You're fooling yourself if you think otherwise.

 

[david_42]

I don't see that model working. Distributors would run away, bars would get tired of taking a chance on each keg. You would have extreme difficultly in building any product recognition. "Is Joe's stout any good? Don't know, never had it before. His IPA was great! Yah, but a stout's a whole different story. Let's get Ron's Red, it's always good."

 

[Evan!]

Rhoobarb is spot-on. People are creatures of habit, and they love to have a cachet of standard brews that are their favorites, that they can always depend on...rather than having to guess every time they go to the store. A lot of this is psychological---people like brand identity and loyalty, and they extend this to the individual products. Yes, you're fooling yourself, unless you somehow built this place in some alternate dimension where everyone is like HBT'ers.

 

[jeff]

I don't see that model working. Distributors would run away, bars would get tired of taking a chance on each keg. You would have extreme difficultly in building any product recognition. "Is Joe's stout any good? Don't know, never had it before. His IPA was great! Yah, but a stout's a whole different story. Let's get Ron's Red, it's always good."

Sorry I misread the OP and thought we were talking brewpub. I agree with David, there has got to be at least some consistancy in the supply chain.

 

[WortMonger]

Bulk should be consistent, and then you can pilot some taste trial beers. Just my opinion. I ran into this the past week when I visited the brewpub I used to work at. Nothing was the same, and he must really like Belgian beers. I couldn't even finish the 4 oz sampler of his Belgian golden ale. My friend thought it was skunky, I thought it smelled like the delicious kellerbier they brewed my last visit and tasted like it had something wrong with it but know this isn't the case. I just can't place the taste to reference, but it sure wasn't my thing. All the beers they were brewing before the name change are non-existent, so I did feel like I was limited to the stout. They had a very smoky scotch ale (in a land of BMC drinkers), and two Belgian beers (the before mentioned golden and a cherry ale). The others were a new honey brown, and a new stout. Both good, just not old house recipe. I was not impressed this trip, but then again some people don't like my beer so I damn sure am not going to knock this guys (who is an excellent brewer, just not my style).