Cheers!

Your happy USABeerTrends Team

This week, the inquiring minds at USABeerTrends want to know How many batches of homebrew did you brew this year, and of those, what was your favorite recipe?

Tell us by shooting us an email: trends@usabeertrends.com or click here to go to our super-groovy surveymonkey survey thingy.

Were looking forward to your responses!

Cheers!

Your slightly woozy USABeerTrends friends

Here is what you had to say:

Who responded?
80% Male
20% Female

27% are age 21-30
40% are age 31-40
13% are age 41-50

20% are age 51-60

33.3% of you live in California
26.7% of you live in Texas
The other 40% of you are spread out evenly between New York, Maryland, Oregon, Massachusetts, Ohio and Illinois.

Traveled strictly in the name of beer tourism in 2009
6.6% did not at all
20% did 1-2 times
20% did 3-5 times
26.7% did 6-10 times
26.7% did 11 or more times. Nice.

Slipped away to a brewery, brewpub or beer bar while on business travel or family vacation in 2009
0% did not at all
47% did 1-2 times
26.5% did 3-5 times
26.5% did 6-10 times
0% did not

Your favorite states for beer tourism in 2009 were:
California 34%
Wisconsin 13%
Pennsylvania 13%
Oregon 13%
Delaware, Indiana, Colorado and Canada (technically, not a US destination, but what the heck,eh?) round out the rest evenly with a combined 27%

The list of favorite places visited in 2009 is long, but here are the highlights:
Stone Brewing, Dogfish Head, McMenamins, Three Floyds and Hangar 24.

This was a fun survey and we’ll definitely do it again next year. If you have a funny/interesting/good brew tourist story you’d like to share with our readers, please submit it to trends.

Happy Trails and Cheers!
Your Slightly Soiled USABeerTrends Team

Cheers!

Cheers!
Your Official USABeerTrends Stuff Reviewer

2009 November 17

tags: Beer, beer geek, beer tourism, Beer Tourist, brewery, Brewing, casks, home brewing, publican, taps, USA Beer Trends
by admin

We’re getting some decent feedback on beer travel. One note came from Julie W. at a web site called pubquest.com. She wanted to let our readers know about a cool site that helps you locate breweries and brewpubs most anywhere in North America. Just click on http://www.pubquest.com and it will show you a map with beery points of interest in the U.S. and Canada.

Coolness. Thanks, Julie.

So, we could still stand to hear from some of you on your beer travels in ‘09. Where was your favorite beer town/region. Ready, set go:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=PMwqAWlQRrcm4I1L8UoZ4w_3d_3d

Cheers!

Your slightly sideways USABeerTrends team

Coffee Porter, IPA, or me?

Beer geeks are a curious and wonderful group. We like to talk about everything from hops and malt and yeast, to food pairings, to different styles of beer, to the kind of glassware used – and on and on.

Something else we beer geeks love to do is travel to try beer – or at least plan our travels to include some kind of beer tourism – sometimes to the eye-rolling chagrin of our travel mates (or spouses). Whether it’s a full-on tour de breweries, or just making sure we hit the cool beer pub in that travel destination, beer figures heavily in our decisions for that trip.

So, with that, USABeerTrends wants to know about your beer travels. Our Question of the Week (actually, it’s 3 or 4 questions) seeks to understand if, and how often folks’ travel plans include “beer tourism”.

Jump to our QoW link and let us know. We’ll post the results next week.

Oh, if you have any cool beer travel stories you’d like to share with our USABeerTrends readers, submit them to trends@usabeertrends.com.

Cheers!

Beer is doing OK. The American craft brewing scene has seen tremendous growth in the last decade. In the United States, as of July 1, 2009, there were 692 brewpubs, 456 microbreweries and 64  regional craft breweries. 1,525 total US breweries.*  There was a huge spike in the late 90′s through this year. Small and independent craft brewers have propelled the number of U.S. breweries from under 100 to over 1,500 in 30 years.**

No fizzy.

Throughout the relatively short modern history of American craft brewing, there have been trendsetters. Brewers who stepped outside the “yellow fizzy” comfort zone to brew truly unique beers. Marketers who took on the “big three”, establishing a niche for their craft brew brethren. Distributors who took a chance with that quirky new brewery and got their products on the shelves. Folks who had dreams of doing exactly what they love to do, and then made those dreams come true with long nights in the brewery and hard days beating the streets trying to get shelf space and tap handles. Business folks who knew a good thing when they saw it and lent a hand (and maybe a few bucks) to help the industry grow. Association folks and journalists who beat the craft brewing drum day and night. Publicans who moved a mega-brand off a tap to make room for that new brewery down the street.

Magical casks of mystical liquids.

Craft Brewing Industry Trendsetters.

They are out there and USABeerTrends wants to know who you think they are for 2009. Send us your nominations along with a quick word or two telling why you feel this person (or company, or association) is a trendsetter.  We’ll gather the nominations and then let you put them to a vote. The top 5 vote-getters will be the 2009 USABeerTrends Top 5 Trendsetters in the Craft Brewing Industry.

Maybe we’ll figure out between now and then what kind of groovy swag or certificate we can put together for our Top 5 (because everyone likes swag). But before that happens, we need your nominations.

Send your nominations to:

trends@usabeertrends.com with the word “Trendsetter” in the subject line. Or, if you feel queasy about sending us an email, click HERE, or copy and paste this link
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Dp4t9rs0NiXGDikPl6I9ow_3d_3d  to be taken to the Trendsetter Nomination page.

We’ll accept nominations until midnight, November 30, 2009. Voting will take place in December (ending at midnight, December 31, 2009) and we’ll announce the winners on January 4, 2010.

Now ain’t that just all trendy and such.

Cheers!

•According to the Brewers Association, http://www.brewersassociation.org/pages/business-tools/craft-brewing-statistics/number-of-breweries
**According to the Brewers Association, http://www.brewersassociation.org/attachments/0000/0517/100-Years-HR.jpg

Looks like folks tried a variety of fest and Marzen beers this year (and some just sent us their favorites of the season). Here is a partial list from our responses (in no particular order):

Saint Arnold Oktoberfest

Ft. Worth's Rahr & Sons Oktoberfest

Minhas Berghoff American Pale Ale

Boulevard Bob’s 47

Bob's 47 from Boulevard

New Holland Cabin Fever

Duck-Rabbit Marzen

Live Oak Oaktoberfest

Rahr & Sons Oktoberfest

Water Street Brewery Oktoberfest

Weihenstephaner Festbier

Not a bad bunch o’beer.  Now, here are the Top 5 answers to our question of the week:

None! As in zero. That’s right some folks decided, for one reason or another, to skip the Marzen and Oktoberfest beers this year. Oh well, more for everyone else.

Left Hand Oktoberfest

Mmmm, Left Hand Oktoberfest.

Victory Festbier Which is different from Feist-beer.

Paulaner Oktoberfest Marzen

Victory Brewing's Festbier

Spaten Oktoberfest

Two American craft breweries, two traditional German breweries, a group of zeroes. Burp.

Keep an eye out for this week’s Question of the Week, right here, Friday.

Cheers!

Ahhh, Oktoberfest. Photo:DDP from Welt

In the spirit of our Question of the Week regarding Oktoberfest beers, we thought this article might interest you – “Oktoberfest beers and cheese”. And, if you haven’t yet let us know about your favorite Oktoberfest beer of 2009, please jump over to this quick 3 question survey and let us know. We’ll post the results on Thursday.

Cheers!

P.S. Oktoberfest survey is over. Results coming soon.