Musty ale?? I missed that one. Awesome branding, that name.

The Governor was out of the country during one of The Incursions and took some heat for it—though honestly there was nothing to be done that couldn’t have been done from London. When your own federal govt threatens an invasion, there’s not a lot you can do except issue a stern condemnation.

Two places that love a good beer!

Really? If I’m not drinking alcohol, I want to drink something tasty. And this is NA beer’s Achilles heel.

6. Since Athletic debuted, breweries have been able to target a premium craft tier of pricing. But you can only grow so far when customers can turn to something that’s half or less the cost. I will *always* choose a Spindrift over an NA beer—it’s just better. And a lot cheaper.

Rant completed.

5. It does not surprise me in the least that NA companies are looking at the market and deciding that if they want to grow past that market I describe in the fourth part of the thread, they have to look at all NA beverages as competition, not just beer.

4. Now, I get it. Some people can’t drink alcohol and they love the flavor of beer. I understand how a wan imitation of a thing can scratch an itch when it’s the best you got. (I was a burger-loving vegetarian for ten years.) But for everyone else, there are tons of other, much-better NA drinks!

3. Forty bucks a case is a *lot* of money for a product about which we say, even for the very, very best NA beers, “it actually tastes pretty close to regular beer.” In other words, world-class NA is the equivalent of below-average regular beer.

2. Let’s start with the item:

“Avg NA beer prices down 72 cents, almost 2% for 4 weeks, while category $$ sales still up 15%…. That includes a nearly $1 per case drop for Athletic & almost a $4 per case drop for Heineken 0.0. Athletic is still ~$42 per case and Heineken NA is at ~$39 per case.”

Thanks!

I think there’s a connection there with American antipathy. Not only did the early brewers make some amateurish and off-flavory beer, but they were making pretty buttery English ales. I suspect a lot of people reacted against that.

That’s more like my first visit to Czechia in 2012—I only distinctly remember it in Urquell, and there it was pretty variable. Which is why I was so surprised when I was there in early ‘24 to find it in so many.

Bless you my son for using the high holy book!

I accept death metal in a brewery. If you’re playing it in your taproom, you’re actively trying to cull your audience.