The Beer Thread • Page 222

I really need to make it out that way to go to Treehouse. The beers that @BlueEyesBrewing sent me were incredible and I've been wanting more ever since haha

 

So lame.

 

no idea - I've just seen people post it in the Tree House Brewing Enthusiasts group before. and it usually starts a conversation on the morals behind doing something like that.

the lack of distribution or somebody buying a ton of it and turning a profit while tree house can't do anything?

 

The latter.

 

yeah, agreed. it's super lame and really sucks that it would be too much of a hassle for Tree House to do anything.

 

To be fair, on the tree house website it does say “contact us” to purchase kegs to for draft distribution. Might be a case of the retailer or distributor having an agreement with treehouse. Most likely it’s illegal shady shit though.

Was just talking with my girlfriend about potential trips and I said I want to do Portland, Maine and then spend time driving around New England. Tree house absolutely would be a stop.

 

I wonder why they don't distribute since there seems to be a good market for it.

 

They make so much money as is. And I know Nate is very very specific about wanting the quality to be consistent as well as for people to drink it as fresh as possible and choosing to distribute it puts both of those things at risk

 

They already make a killing selling direct to consumer and likely couldn’t handle the volume increase needed to satiate demands. That then makes retailers/bars unhappy with you and in turn customers unhappy with retailers/bars who’ll then blame you to the customers. That’s what happened with Old Nation here in Michigan until they contract brewed a fuck ton of M43 to meet demands.

Also, unless you’re REALLY moving kegs there isn’t a ton of money to be made as a brewery, especially compared to selling the product in your own brewery. It would be a good source of income but it comes with A LOT of headaches. Not to mention having to hire sales reps because that brand would need to have reps pushing the product along side distro reps to make sure the hoppy beers don’t sit on the shelves.

 

true, although I'm pretty sure no one gets any Tree House besides Armsby Abbey and even then, I think they only got three kegs in the last year for special events. they also sold Sap and Alter Ego at a Patriots game a few weeks ago.

so, like you said, that beer store is most likely shady.

 

Whenever they get it in they get a good amount it just goes fast so I feel like it would be weird for someone to buy that much beer without them knowing maybe they will resell. They also claim they keep everything cold the whole time so they must have some refrigerated vehicle or something unless they're lying. Who knows I hope it's some agreement rather than them being shady but I don't know for sure. Maybe if I become more of a regular ill ask the dude there.

 

What they're doing is definitely illegal. Whether or not anyone will do anything to stop them is another question. I could see the state getting mad at them if they aren't paying the proper taxes. They get a good amount because the limits for what you can buy there now are upwards of 10 cases per person so if the owner goes with someone they can get a hefty amount to take back. I'm sure Treehouse knows that people are making a profit off of them but there's not a whole lot they can do about it to stop them.

 

lol damn i didn't know people pick up and distribute tree house that way. i feel #blessed to live near so many good breweries though, if anyone is ever going through boston area the places worth checking out are definitely these imo: tree house, lamplighter (cambridge), exhibit a (framingham), mystic (chelsea), and i guess i have to put trillium on here but their labor practices were called into question recently and i'd rather not buy their beer when there's so much other good stuff around. night shift (everett) used to be up there for me but have been lackluster recently compared to their neighbors

 

Are the stages up there three tier states for distribution?

 

Not completely. I don't know each state's laws, but for NH you can self-distribute if you are licensed as a nano-brewery (<2,000 BBL annually) but I'm not sure if your license is for micro-brewery if you have to then use a distributor or not. And then I know MA has some sort of farmhouse brewery license that requires you to have a certain percentage of ingredients come from within a certain radius of the brewery. Not totally clear on what that license is but I know Aeronaut in Sommerville has that.

 

Fuck, what weird rules. In Michigan anything under 1000 BBLs you can self distribute. I constantly forget that even though Michigan has some weird laws, we're really good in regards to beer. That MA law sounds ... restrictive.

 

It's crazy how different each state's laws are. I know the nano license helped spur a ton of new breweries opening in NH because it's cheap ($250) and allowed for self-distribution. I believe you have to have some sort of hot food option available, though, if you want to serve full pints in the taproom. Some weird restriction like that.

I looked up that farmer license and it isn't as restrictive as it seems. Apparently there is no requirement for how much of the ingredients must be purchased in state. But it allows for self-distribution and on-site pours.

 

I just spent an insane amount of money on beers last Saturday but this is dropping tomorrow and, uh, yeah I’m gonna need it.

 

Did not expect to see Icarus get posted in here.

 

I'm there all the time. Best brewery in Jersey.

 

Interesting. Part of me wants to go the nano route but good lord the amount of brewing required to keep up on, say, a 3 bbl system is absurd. And if there’s even an elevated demand for your beer above what you anticipated, you’re basically brewing around the clock.

 

All the stuff I’ve read has said that anything less than 7bbl is extremely difficult to make any money on or keep up with demand. I know some people do it less but I don’t know how they’re making much money without doing taproom only sales and working around the clock.

 

I love lamplighter. One of my favorite bar crawls I would do when my girlfriend was going to grad school at Tufts was State Park, Cambridge Brewing Co, Bukowski Tavern, Lamplighter.

I used to go to Night Shift a lot too, never had a beer from there I didn’t like.

 

Every time I go to Treehouse I see people leaving with the max amount of beer they let you buy on dollies. And then there’s me getting a few cans of what I want because I’m just buying for myself.

 

It’s crazy to watch people leave a brewery with like $1000 worth