Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

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Anderson Valley Brewery Sold

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There have been rumors floating around for a few months now, and it’s been no secret that owner Ken Allen has been trying to sell his Anderson Valley Brewery for several years. According to the North Bay Business Journal, it looks like a sale is now official. The terms have not been disclosed, but pending the necessary approvals, a sale is expected to close next month. The buyer is HMB Holdings LLC, a company created for the purchase by Trey White, a former VP with United States Beverage. In addition to the USB portfolio, White has also worked with such brands as Goose Island, SLO and Grolsch. Anderson Valley will continue to be brewed at its present facilities in Boonville, California.

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Beer In Ads #66: Tuborg’s Thirsty Man

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Tuesday’s ad is a favorite of a friend of mine, Christian Kazakoff — who’s the head brewer at Iron Springs Pub & Brewery — and is for the Danish beer Tuborg. I got an e-mail from Christian last night about how much he’s enjoying my “Beer In Advertising” series and sharing with me his personal favorite, so I thought I’d feature his choice today.

Founded in 1873, since 1970 Tuborg has been owned by Danish brewing giant Carlsberg. Though founded in 1873, it was two years before they began brewing so in 1900 they sponsored a poster contest to celebrate their 25th anniversary. Though the winning entries were never used, one submission went on to become an iconic image, one that even today is still associated with Tuborg beer, especially throughout Europe. The painting, created by Danish artist Erik Henningsen (1855-1930), is known today as The Thirsty Man and has been used since November 1900 in Tuborg’s advertising.

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It’s original title translated as The Sweaty Man, but since beer was the end product and not deodorant, it became known as The Thirsty Man, which I think you’ll agree has a much better ring to it. According to Just-Drinks, “the poster is still one of the most popular sold in Denmark. The image of the Thirsty Man has also been used to great effect in Germany, where Tuborg is the leading imported beer.” [Or at least it was when they wrote that in 2000.]

In addition, “the popularity of the poster was added to in 1977 when Den Store Tuborg (The Big Tuborg) [in] half-litre bottles was launched using the image as a label.”

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Even now, 110 years later, you can find Tuborg advertising using The Thirsty Man, such as this sign for Tuborg Pilsener.

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They Said It Couldn’t Be Done

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Since it’s St. Patrick’s Day tomorrow and for most people that means Guinness, here’s a little reminder of something in Guinness’ recent past that I imagine they’d rather remained buried. But it’s just too funny not to share. In 1979, Guinness released a low-calorie beer they called “Guinness Light.” According to Ireland Fun Facts, “people here still talk about the advertising campaign, which used the tagline ‘they said it couldn’t be done.’ Apparently it couldn’t. Guinness Light flopped so sensationally it earned the title ‘The HMS Titanic of stout products’ from The Irish Times.”

It’s not hard to see why. I can scarcely imagine something more oxymoronic than Guinness Light. But for true liquid-shooting-out-your-nose laughs, watch the uber-bombastic television commercial that attempts to equate the beer with man landing on the moon. With bonus points for using the sunrise fanfare from “Thus Spake Zarathustra” by Richard Strauss (trust me, you’ll know it when you hear it), I love the editing of the people turning their heads quickly toward the camera and the faux echo chamber voice over. Just hilarious. But put your drink down first. Enjoy.

Beer In Ads #65: Thirsty Moon Beer

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Monday’s ad is an attempt to contrast Friday’s, which you may recall was the Girl in the Moon for Miller High Life. I don’t know much about this ad, though I believe it’s from the 1930s. It appears to be from Germany but looks not at all like a typical ad for a German beer. In this case, instead of the girl being in the moon, she’s instead offering the thirsty moon a drink of beer.

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Beer, Health & Nutrition

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There’s a nice article by the nutrition correspondent for Ask Men, Simon McNeil, entitled The Health Benefits of Beer. There’s no new ground covered, but he does offer a good overview of recent findings showing that beer is healthier for us — in moderation of course — than previously believed. It’s also great to see that message get some play in a mainstream magazine.

Odonata Website Launched

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Sacramento’s newest brewery, Odonata Beer. Co. — recently founded by formed Sacramento Brewing’s Peter Hoey and former DRAFT magazine beer director Rick Sellers — has just launched their new website, which for months has been essentially wallpaper. For updates, there’s also the brewery blog, too. You can also get a look at the now-approved label for what they hope will become their flagship beer, Saison Ale. It’s great to see things moving forward. Hopefully there will be beer to fill the bottles with those label very soon.

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The Cult of Beers Next Session Topic

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Our next Session is a little less than three weeks away, but it’s not to early to start thinking about it. The topic chosen by our host, Beer Search Party, is cult beers; those beers that are in short supply, high demand and often require going to great lengths to acquire.

Here’s how our host, Sean Inman, describes the topic:

With Kate the Great Day a recent memory and the day of the Dark Lord fast approaching, I started thinking about what beer or beers that I would get up at 4:00 in the morning, drive across state lines, stand in a long unmoving line in the cold and rain for the chance to taste with a crowd the size of Woodstock.

So here is my question to you (with a couple addenda).

What beer have you tasted recently (say, the last six months or so) that is worthy of their own day in the media sun?

And to add a little extra to it, how does “great” expectations affect your beer drinking enjoyment?

AND If you have attended one of these release parties, stories and anecdotes of your experience will be welcomed too.

So get cracking, get yourself a cult beer and start working on your own cult of personality. Then reveal it and get found on Friday, April 2 over at the Beer Search Party.

National Action Alert: Help Craft Brewers Reduce Taxes

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If you’re a regular Bulletin reader, you’ve already seen me rant about how unfairly taxes are levied on the brewing industry, who has to pay more taxes than any other product sold in America, except tobacco. With the help and support of the Brewers Association, H.R. 4278 has been introduced into thee U.S. House of Representatives seeking a redress of those egregious taxes. The BA has issued a national action alert, asking beer lovers everywhere to contact their elected officials to ask them to co-sponsor the bill. Here’s the press release:

Federal legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives, H.R. 4278 (link opens a PDF), seeks to enact a reduction in beer excise tax for America’s small brewers.

For small brewers brewing less than 6 million barrels annually, this legislation would cut the small brewer tax rate in half, to $3.50/barrel on the first 60,000 barrels, and reduce the upper tax rate from $18/barrel to $16/barrel on beer production above 60,000 barrels up to 2 million barrels.

Of the 1,525 breweries in America, 962 are brewpubs and 470 are the smallest bottling breweries, which produce volumes of 15,000 barrels of beer a year or less and sell their beers in local markets. Once barrel equals about 13.8 cases of beer.

The original small brewer tax rate of $7/barrel was established in 1976 and has never been updated. Since then, the annual U.S. production of America’s largest brewery increased from about 45 million to 107 million barrels and over 200 million barrels globally (or 1,240,000,000 five-gallon batches of homebrew!). Much has changed and the challenges small brewers face as small American businesses have grown dramatically since 1976.

Why is this a good idea?

  1. A tax reduction will help grow small business breweries and provide greater access to the beers you enjoy.
  2. Harvard University’s John Friedman’s study, Economic Impact of Small Brewers Excise Tax Reduction (H.R. 4278), (link opens a PDF), reveals that H.R. 4278 would also help stimulate job creation quickly and at a low cost:
    • The bill would generate more than 2,700 new jobs over the first year to 18 months, followed by an average of 375 new jobs per year over the following four years.

Please contact your U.S. Representative and ask that he/she sign on as a co-sponsor of H.R. 4278.

We have developed a resource page to give you the information and tools you need to make the case to your Representative for supporting this tax relief measure—and by extension, for supporting the small brewery businesses that are such a vital part of our local communities.

On the resource page, you will find a link to a list of current sponsors of H.R. 4278. If your Representative DOES NOT appear on this list, please take a moment and email your Member of Congress to ask them to cosponsor H.R. 4278.

If your Representative is already a cosponsor, please email him/her a brief thank you for their support of small brewers and you, the craft beer drinker and enthusiast.

Here’s some links to help you find out who your elected officials are so you know who to contact:

Okay, people get contacting. Your brewers thank you.

Food Hates You, Too

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Every Sunday I take the kids to the library. I’m a voracious reader, and I’m grateful to an aunt, and to some extent my mother, for instilling in me that passion for books and literature. So it’s very important to me that I try to do the same for my own kids, and so far they both love books. Last Sunday, my daughter Alice picked out a book called Food Hates You, Too and Other Poems by Robert Weinstock.

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The cover alone was reason enough, but some of the poems are pretty funny. My kids are also following in my food phobic footsteps and are very picky eaters. I’m better now — not exactly cured — but my Mom would be spinning in her grave if she knew all the foods I’ve eaten since I moved out of her house.

So the titular poem Food Hates You, Too is a pretty funny concept about how some of the food we don’t like might hate us, too.

The opening stanza:

If everyone hates different foods,
Then couldn’t it be true
That creamed chipped beef dislikes Gertrude,
And liver gags on Lou.

And here’s the final two quatrains:

If cotton candy, apple pie,
And french fries looked at you
And said, “Gross! Blecchh! Nope, I won’t try.
I’ll never like it. Ew!

I’m sure you’d say, “Hey! That’s no fair!
Give me a chance! You should
Just try me. Pretty please? I swear!!
With sugar on top …? I’m good!”

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There are maybe two dozen fun poems for kids in the book, most of them about food. The Cheese Sonnet is great and so is a short one about two pieces of Toast named Ned and Fred. But I’ll leave you with a final poem entitled Doughnuts.

I go nuts for doughnuts,
All tingles from Pringles
And swoony from bacon,
If I’m not mistaken.

Indeed I do.

Beer In Art #69: Alex Caldwell’s Typographic Beer Destinations

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Today’s work of art was originally created while Alex Caldwell was still in college, a project presumably for one of his classes at Philadelphia University. It’s called Typographic Beer Destinations and tells the story in type of a journey from home to Philadelphia.

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But not just any journey, a trip involving stops at beer destination every ten minutes along the way. And like any great journey, it begins with someone calling “shotgun.” Here’s the story of the work:

This assignment was to simply create a poster with directions from our home (Central New Jersey for myself) to Philadelphia. I themed it around the idea of getting a beer every ten minutes at a different bar along the way. I tried to convey the idea of a drunken night by making it jumbled and somewhat confusing. I also threw in some random things that one might have said in this adventure. All the directions are there though.

Click through to see the image much larger. Especially check out the warning label, which reads:

Government Warning: (1) The artist does not condone drinking and driving. (2) Consumption of alcoholic beverages impairs your ability to drive a car or operate machinery, and may cause health problems. (3) If drinking, get a designated driver and make sure to call shotgun.

You can also buy a copy of the print, in three different sizes.

Caldwell graduated the year after he made this, and freelances at his own Caldwell Designs. You call also see more of his work at his DeviantArt gallery.