Utah Brewery Map

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

2011 the Year of Bottle Shock

A few month ago we told you about the DABC's plans to start placing their high volume beers with local distributors. The move is designed to elevate storage space problems that face the DABC during it's warehouse expansion.

While this seems like a great first step (and it is) to getting high ABV beers out of the states control and getting into the private sector, it will create ripples that are already beginning to affect the consumer.

Look for prices on some of the most popular domestic and import brands to skyrocket in the coming weeks. You may see prices increase as much as $3.00 a bottle in some cases. Keep your eyes on Chimay, Sierra Nevada, Sam Adams, Full Sail, etc.

This will only affect state controlled beer, not grocery store brands, including locals. This may be a good opportunity to get reacquainted with with some of our tasty Utah brands.

The distributors are in it to make money, I get. But there's gotta be a way to ease the consumer into this transition without completely molesting the local beer consumer. Sorry for the bad news.

On the bright side, there is a new poll up....

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

3 bucks! WTF? General and M and M = the Axis of Evil.

mark said...

Actually the $3 increase we saw most recently is on Chimay products which are now handled by Carlson. All the Chimay stuff and most of the Schneider and Aventinus went up over 30% in one order! Chimay red now costs us $12.99 not including tax. When we opened in 2002 that same beer cost $7.35 INCLUDING the tax.

Argh!!!

Mark

Plang said...

I'm not entirely shocked by this. I'm not happy about it, but I'm not shocked either. I'm not entirely sure how they would react if sales declined because of the price.