The Silence of the Blog
Wow. I just noticed my last (admittedly pathetic) post was a full two weeks old. I realize the whole concept of a blog is fresh, dynamic content delivered on a daily basis and I apologize to everyone who expects us to stay on top of the new beer announcements and other news. In my own defense we've been ridiculously busy for the last 2 months, and it doesn't show any signs of letting up until after the holidays. Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that we're being discovered by more and more people every day, but I don't have nearly as much time to spend ruminating on things, describing new beers, or finding humorous beer-related stories on the web.
On the topic of new beer notes and reviews; I expect to be receiving a few new things tomorrow, and I'll supplement that post with a round up of other recent arrivals that may have slipped under the radar, but I have something else in mind for today.
Public Tastings
We're having some difficulty finding distributors and brewery reps to lead tastings here at the BierCafe, so we're going to start hosting more of our own. I was hoping that the following questions and discussion points would generate some input from you, our loyal customers and blog readers.
Discussion Point #1: Free Tastings
Honestly, we'd love to give beer away, but the fact of the matter is that beer is a very low-margin product, and on our small scale we simply can't afford to do that on a regular basis. If we were a giant grocery store selling a huge volume of beer things might be different, but (thankfully) we're not.
One option we had considered is charging a nominal fee (say $3-5) and then offering people a voucher or coupon good for $3-5 off a purchase of $25 or more on beers featured in the tasting. This would allow people to basically have "free samples" as long as they turned around and purchased a few that they liked, and if it turns out that you don't like any of them at least you've only spent a couple bucks to educate yourself on things to avoid in the future.
The other option would be "beer fest style", pricing the samples individually based on cost and allowing people to buy as few or as many as they were interested in.
Any comments or other thoughts on how we can keep the tastings free or reasonably priced without losing our shirts in the process?
Discussion Point # 2: Themes
How would you like to see the tastings laid out: by brewery, style, region, or some other method we haven't thought of?
There's value in each scenario: Sampling a range of things from the same brewery can teach you a thing or two about "house character." Secondarily, sampling a wide range of styles as interpreted by a single brewery and mentally comparing them to others in that style that you had in the past can be enlightening.
Similarly, sampling by style or region can be an eye-opening experience when you realize just how much variation there is between ten different Belgian Dubbels or India Pale Ales.
Discussion Point #3: Time and Day
We've been running most of our tasting on weeknights from 5 to 7 on the assumption that people would enjoy getting off from work and stopping by to sample a couple things and grab a beer or two for the evening. Several people have commented that they'd prefer the tastings to be later so they can eat first, and other people have said that they'd like for tastings to be held on Saturday or Sunday afternoon when there's not much else going on. What would you prefer?
Thanks in advance for any comments or suggestions you feel like offering up! Since the blog format isn't very conducive to forum-style conversation and rebuttal I've posted this on PortlandBeer.org as well. If you haven't been there yet I highly recommend it. There's a large contingent of beer geeks in PDX, and a plethora of events, so by all rights this site should be hopping, but at this point it's still pretty quiet. It's everything you want to know about our local beer scene in one handy spot.
Let the flood of comments begin...
13 Comments:
I’m glad to read this blog.
Glad to see you're back posting.
Regarding the tastings, I think I would prefer weekends over most weeknights.
Thanks
As a daily reader, I was certainly aware of your blog's activity. ;-)
On tastings, I think a nominal fee is fine. There are a lot of expensive beers, and you're usually investing at least five bucks for a single bottle--and sadly, just because it's made in Belgium or England doesn't mean it's a great beer. So an opportunity to sample would be fine.
I would like to see themed tastings--krieks, milds, the beers of Wallonia, whatever. It makes more sense to do it by style in my book, because then you're comparing apples and apples.
It would also be cool to do contrasting tastings, so you could see what distinguishes beers, too. Like bohemian versus German pilsners. Or several pale ales that rely heavily on a different hop (learning to distinguish between Chinooks and Centennials is pretty easy and makes you look like a badass with your friends).
Glad you're busy. The alternative scares me.
I echo the sentiments of the last comments. A nominal fee is fine - $3.00 to $5.00.
Timing and dates are good, there is plenty going on during the weekend so weekday is good. If you want to do anything you might stretch it out a bit.
In addition to grouping beers by styles and countries of orgin you might also try food pairings. There are plenty of specialty food vendors and "floating" chefs that would be glad of an opportunity to show their wares or strut their stuff. A couple of years ago I participated in a beer/cheese tasting at RockBotton downtown. If I recall correclty the fee was $20.00 and included tastings from 6 beers and matching cheese. You might also query the BrewCrew for suggestions. Even though I dont brew yet I've found them to be extraordinarily creative when rolling out new beers - maybe you want to mirror their monthly style.
In any event I love the new digs, so much so that I'd rather go there on a Tuesday and drink a $10 Don De Dieu than head over to my local pub, 5th Quadrant for $2.00 Tuesdays
The wine and (sometimes) beer tasting scene at John's Marketplace on Fridays has a loyal following due to a couple of key factors -- 1) it's reliable, i.e. happens every week; 2) same reasonable price pretty much every week; 2) there's always variety, price-wise and taste-wise; 3) Mike the Wine Nerd (who just stepped down recently) sent out an e-mail with plenty of good descriptions without fail every week.
Sense a theme there? Build an institution, provide it with regular care and feeding and it will become self-supporting.
I'm hosting a "Basics of Belgium Tasting" in my basement bar in September. I felt the need to help educate the public on Belgian beers. In the long run, this will help local Beer Shops like Belmont Station, as well as, peak interest for locals to ask for more Belgian styles from our local brewers. Everybody wins!
I'll be purchasing 10 different belgian beers to provide tastings for 15 people. I'll provide a Introduction to Belgian Beers and tasting notes that will help the tasters understand how and what they're tasting. Plus, I'll provide some snacks.
This is a non-profit venture for me, just a public service for locals. I will charge about $25 for the tasting. Same as what you guys are talking about. Also, I will be noting to those in attendance that these beers can be acquired at Belmont Station and the like.
Any questions or interest? Email me at dirtydrunkdoctor@yahoo.com
Thanks for the comments so far, it's good to see I didn't lose all our readers during my hiatus.
Jeff - Thanks for the kind words, the thought of not being busy scares me too...
Anon - I appreciate the input. You're right that having a regular time for tastings can build loyalty, but that loyalty can become a double-edged sword. I've heard horror stories (from people who used to work at the Station before me) regarding awful behavior during free tastings.
They used to conduct tastings every Friday at the old store, and so many loyal "customers" came in for the free beer that it became too crowded and frustrating for those who actually wanted to purchase something. Since very few of the tasters purchased anything, sales actually decreased during tasting days. As I was told, the final straw that ended the weekly tastings was a misguided sense of entitlement that led people to start complaining about the free munchies that were being provided!
I'm not saying anything is wrong with the John's Market model, just that it caused problems for the store in the past and I assume the owners aren't keen on repeating the experience.
Thanks again, and feel free to pass this post on to other local beer lovers who might have input. After all, these are public tastings, so the more comments we can get from the public the more we can do to make the experience more enjoyable.
~Chris
Dr Wort - Would you be interested in holding these educational sessions in the cafe? I was actually just working on a post about "Beer 101", a series of beer education lectures that we've been thinking about offering. The plan is to invite local brewers and other knowledgeable folks to discuss whatever theme they wanted, be it differences in various yeast strains or the "Basics of Belgians" that you mentioned.
Jeff - You'd be a good candidate for something like this as well, if you'd be interested. Perhaps a discussion on how to describe beer (for all the aspiring bloggers), or how advertising effects people's choices, or anything else beer-related you might want to talk about.
Ponder it and get back to me: hopstar at gmail dot com
I like the nominal fee + discount coupon pricing scheme. No one who shows up is expecting free beer, anyway.
I've only made it to one tasting, though, because of that 5 pm timing. It's just too early. Later works. So do weekends.
Thanks for asking!
Getting a host is a good call--whether rotating or fixed. I like Anon's idea of sending out email. If you had a sign-up, people could get on a listserv with the regular updates. I believe those are good for increasing regularity. Also, as Anon said, a regular day would be good, too.
(I think I should not be the host--there are people in this town who know a lot more about beer than me.)
I think charging a small fee is the way to go. It helps weed out the people who are just there for the free drink and the people who are actually interested in trying/buying new beers. If I was in the area I'd attend as often as possible.
On another blog note... I personally, as a daily (2 or 3x) reader, would like to see a new beer post and/or page. You don't need to taste the beers before you post them, just let us readers know whats new.
Kyle
P.S. if I saw a beer I couldn't live with out trying I'd come from Hood River to buy it plus a bunch of others while I'm their!
Kyle
I like dirtydrunkdoctor@yahoo.com Belgian tasting idea and would be willing to participate. It occurred to me another model for tasting could be loosely described as a beer circle or "potluck". Belmont creates groupings of 4 to 6 beers by style or region of origin and sets a date for the event [weekday early evenings is fine] Folks sign up, when the requisite [4-6] number of participants is reached a tasting is set. The difference is rather than paying a fee, each participant purchases ONE of the listed beers and collectively agrees to sit down to sample the others. The only overhead for the cafe would be housekeeping [simple Google calendar would do] to set it up and glass ware. If a case of the "sample" glasses found in most brewpubs could be purchased 6 - 750 ml bottle should easily be divided up between the members of the group. This happens all the time in homes, at parties or even the Brew Crew meetings the only difference being you would meet new people and would not have to schlep it home. At least it would be more or less self supporting and interest driven rather than simply passively attending an “event”
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