Recently it was announced that Ken Allen, who founded the brewery in 1987, is selling Anderson Valley Brewing to Trey White, a former USB executive. The response on the series of tubes we all know and love as the internet was swift and surprisingly negative. Also, there was quite a lot of speculation that was simply untrue. Even the local Anderson Valley Advertiser detailed some of the negative reactions. So I spoke with Trey White this morning to clear up some of the misinformation swirling around and get to the bottom of what he has planned for his brewery when he takes over next month, after the sale closes.
First, the biggest piece of misinformation, which I didn’t even need to talk to him about to correct. A number of negative comments took the form of “how sad, another case of a big business swallowing up a smaller one.” Wrong. White is a former VP with USB. That means he doesn’t work there any more, and in fact hasn’t for several years. I, and most of the accounts that mentioned his former job did so to show that he brings beer industry experience with him. That’s a good thing. It means he knows how the industry works. As I learned when I spoke with White, the business will be family-owned, just White and his wife. No big company in the background, just a mom and pop operation.
Here’s what else I learned about his plans for the brewery. White first visited the brewery three years ago and immediately fell in love with the place. He and Ken Allen have been discussing the purchase for nearly that long. He’s committed to its success and it wasn’t just a quick flash in the pan decision.
White and his wife currently live in downtown Chicago, ironically walking distance from the Craft Brewers Conference which will take place the first week of April. For the first six months to a year after taking over, the Whites will spend about 75% of their time in northern California. All of the current staff and brewers will remain in place and no changes will be made to any of the recipes. The first year, some of the packaging may be changed and it’s possible some additional styles and/or special releases will be created.
The Boonville Beer Festival will be unchanged and the planning for it will continue apace and it will be held, as scheduled, on May 8. The Disc Golf Course will also remain on the brewery grounds.
While the brewery continues to hum along, White will turn his attention to what he knows best: marketing, merchandising and selling. He’ll immediately begin working to increase distribution and get Anderson valley beers into a greater number of chain locations, making it even easier for fans to find the beer in a wider array of outlets.
Ken will be the first to tell you that his passion for the brewery has not been 100% over the last few years and he’s been looking forward to taking a much needed rest from running the business. Ken had this to say, in the press release:
“I have enjoyed immensely growing the Anderson Valley Brewery from a start-up operating a modest brew pub in Boonville into a world class regional craft brewery. The people and friends I have made in the industry will last a lifetime. I want to thank the many customers and brewery fans who have become key parts of the Anderson Valley Brewery family.
I have looked long and hard for the right person to whom to entrust our legacy and I could not have found a better partner in Trey White. His passion and knowledge of the craft beer industry, coupled with his respect for the brands we have developed, will make him the ideal person to take the Anderson Valley Brewery to the next level within the growing craft beer industry.“
So I can’t help but think this will a positive step for everyone, from Ken Allen, the new owners and fans of the brewery’s beers. In talking with Trey White, he has that passion that can propel the brewery to the next level. He seems sincere in his reverence for the brands Anderson Valley has created over the years and has no plans to alter them in any way. He has the right experience and contacts to grow the business successfully while keeping it true to its roots. Let’s wish Ken a happy retirement and Trey good luck with his new job as a small brewery owner.
The changing of the guard: new owner Trey White, at left, with founder Ken Allen in the Anderson Valley brewhouse.
Today is one of my favorite author’s birthdays, John Updike. He grew up in the same small Pennsylvania town that I did — Shillington — and we both escaped to a life of writing. Though I think you’ll agree he did rather better than I did with the writing thing, not that I’m complaining. I once wrote to him about a harebrained idea I had about writing updated Olinger stories from the perspective of the next generation (his Olinger Stories were a series of short tales set in Olinger, which was essentially his fictional name for Shillington). He wrote me back a nice note of encouragement on a hand-typed postcard that he signed, which today hangs in my office as a reminder and for inspiration. Anyway, I couldn’t find any beer quotes from Updike, but I did discover this little gem he wrote for the The New Yorker in 1964.
Beer Can by John Updike
This seems to be an era of gratuitous inventions and negative improvements. Consider the beer can. It was beautiful — as beautiful as the clothespin, as inevitable as the wine bottle, as dignified and reassuring as the fire hydrant. A tranquil cylinder of delightfully resonant metal, it could be opened in an instant, requiring only the application of a handy gadget freely dispensed by every grocer. Who can forget the small, symmetrical thrill of those two triangular punctures, the dainty pfff, the little crest of suds that foamed eagerly in the exultation of release? Now we are given, instead, a top beetling with an ugly, shmoo-shaped tab, which, after fiercely resisting the tugging, bleeding fingers of the thirsty man, threatens his lips with a dangerous and hideous hole. However, we have discovered a way to thwart Progress, usually so unthwartable. Turn the beer can upside down and open the bottom. The bottom is still the way the top used to be. True, this operation gives the beer an unsettling jolt, and the sight of a consistently inverted beer can might make people edgy, not to say queasy. But the latter difficulty could be eliminated if manufacturers would design cans that looked the same whichever end was up, like playing cards. What we need is Progress with an escape hatch.
Now that’s writing. I especially like his allusion to the beauty of the clothespin as I am an unabashed lover of clothespins.
In case you’re not as old and curmudgeonly as me — and who is? — he’s talking about the transition to the pull-tab beer can (introduced between 1962-64) to replace the flat punch-top can that required you to punch two triangular holes in the top of the can in order to drink the beer and pour it in a glass.
The pull-tab (at left) replaced the punch top (right).
Originally known as the Zip Top, Rusty Cans has an informative and entertaining history of them. Now you know why a lot of bottle openers still have that triangle-shaped punch on one end.
So essentially, he’s lamenting the death of the old style beer can which most people considered a pain to open and downright impossible should you be without the necessary church key opener. He is correct, however, that the newfangled suckers were sharp and did cut fingers and lips on occasion, even snapping off without opening from time to time. But you still have to laugh at the unwillingness to embrace change (and possibly progress) even though he was only 32 at the time; hardly a normally curmudgeonly age.
Yesterday Charlie Papazian had an interesting post about recent production numbers of brewers worldwide and how the top Four brewing companies control 50% of the world’s beer. That’s due to the increasing mergermania in the brewing industry, with the recent purchase of Mexico’s FEMSA by Heineken but not including the announced acquisition of Grupo Modelo by Anheuser-Busch InBev. According to a UK Reuters report, the Top four brewers make up half [the] global beer market. The supporting data comes from a researcher for Plato Logic, a beer industry analyst company in Great Britain that produces their world beer report each October. Presumably his statistics are preliminary, taking into account changes in ownership that have taken place since the last report.
But roughly, here’s what his data shows in a chart I made, using the estimates given for millions of hectoliters produced by the top five beer companies. It shows the relatives sizes of them, and how the top four are so far out in front that it’s almost ridiculous and frankly, you can make that same argument for the top four or the top three. There’s a lot of separation, but one big merger and the deck gets shuffled again.
Though the production numbers aren’t given for the bottom half of the top ten, here they are by rank.
- Anheuser-Busch InBev
- SAB Miller
- Heineken
- Carlsberg
- Tsingtao
- MolsonCoors
- Grupo Modelo
- Beijing Yanjing Brewery (China)
- Kirin
- Asahi
Estimating world beer production (it’s not given in the article) from the Beer Institute’s Brewer’s Almanac, I made the chart below to show how the top four do indeed account for just north of half the beer produced in the world.
And finally, including number five Tsingtao, here’s how the overall picture looks.
Wednesday’s ad, since it’s St. Patrick’s Day, is for Guinness, but I wanted to pick one that wasn’t by John Gilroy. This one is a spoof of Alice in Wonderland from I don’t know when. The art is similar, of course, but it seems later. Beginning in 1903, numerous films have been made based on Lewis Carroll’s surreal story, but the Disney version from 1951 probably did more to popularize the story than any other, especially for kids. So based on that I’m just guessing this was before that since the artwork looks more inspired by the original illustrator, John Tenniel, than Walt. Anyway, the text spoofing the scene with the Mad Hatter is pretty funny. Happy Stout Day.
Why Was the Hatter Mad?
“Have some Guinness!” said the March Hare.
“I don’t see any Guinness,” Alice replied.
“There isn’t any” said the March Hare.
“Then you must be mad to offer me some!” said Alice indignantly.
“It’s after hours,” said the Hatter, “and we can’t get any. That’s enough to make anyone mad.”
“But surely you could have ordered some to drink at home,” said Alice.
“There!” said the March Hare. “We never though of that. That just shows how mad we must be.”
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