This week, I’ll report the findings of my brewer compensation survey. Those numbers don't mean much, though, unless we ask: compared to what? If a brewery pays its shift workers $20 an hour, is that good or bad? Read on to find out how to assess wages and benefits.
Read MoreHappy Labor Day, everyone!
Read MoreThe dregs of summer are here. And with them, a couple news stories to close out the season. BrewDog and the Brewers Association are back in the news, and perhaps not for the right reasons.
Read MoreWhen it was founded back in 1997, Ommegang was one of the most unusual breweries in America. In some ways, it is today even more unusual. In a hop-crazy country, Ommegang favors yeast character; in a time when hyper-local is hot, the brewery looks to Belgium. Let us consider its unusual ways.
Read MoreA recent study by The Lancet finds that the risks of drinking alcohol are far greater than previously reported. In fact, the study says, the only safe amount of alcohol is no alcohol. But if you look more closely at the study, the data don’t support that conclusion.
Read MoreJürgen Knöller was born in Bavaria, trained there as a brewer, and began his career there before relocating to Missoula, Montana to become the master brewer at the newly-founded Bayern Brewing--a company he bought in 1991. I interviewed him in 2013.
Read MoreAn update on the brewer compensation survey and an appeal for 180 more responses. The data are rich and interesting, and I think this will be something valuable to those of you who work in a brewery. Please fill out the survey if you havent.
Read MoreTwo centuries ago, Americans drank all day long. Two generations ago, they toasted each other with three-martini lunches. Today the median drinker sips just a couple drinks a week. What happens if these trends continue?
Read MoreAs workers, one of the strongest tools you have in bargaining is information, and knowing what your peers make is valuable info. In advance of Labor Day, I’m surveying brewers about what they earn—and I hope you will spend a few minutes helping me out.
Read MoreWe do so much of our living online that we sometimes forget that our physical environment colors what we think and feel. It has been the hottest summer on record in Portland, and that has a whole city freaked out.
Read MoreFriends, Americans, countrymen, loan me your eyeballs. I come to bury Two Hats, not to condemn it. Actually, I do condemn it. But more, I observe how its tombstone stands as a sentinel of warning—and not just to big, industrial breweries.
Read MoreOver the weekend, I was visiting Brewery Ommegang for an annual event I found unusual and intriguing. On Saturday, I had a moment to sit down and reflect on what I was seeing.
Read MoreA few interesting things happening in and around my life. Well, I think they’re interesting. More travel, book updates, plus a new project.
Read MoreA troubling case in Iowa illustrates the power imbalance between owners and workers. Customers, though, have the final say.
Read MoreDuluth, Minnesota’s new breweries have been credited with helping spark a revival in this lovely town at the tip of Lake Superior. I discovered on a recent visit that this wasn’t the first time a brewery had helped the town get back on its feet.
Read MoreAs the 31st Oregon Brewers Fest arrives this year, it is shadowed by an existential question. What is the role of the beer festival in a city with 75 breweries within a country that has 6,500? More pointedly, is the model of the beer fest itself obsolete?
Read MoreDos Equis is planning to launch a Mexican-inflected pale ale in September. Mexican imports have been in a serious growth cycle for years, so this new beer allows us to test the market. Do people like anything that’s Mexican, or do they like lagers?
Read MoreIn the final installment on my report about Guinness’s new $80 million Baltimore brewery, I look at the brewers and their approach in creating “American Guinness”—and how reproducing the way beer used to be made at St. James Gate might point one path to the future.
Read MoreThe brewers who formed the vanguard of what would one day be called “craft brewing” did so as a way of returning beer to its traditional, no-additives roots. Let’s check in on where it is today.
Read MoreHow many breweries are there out there, further than an hour and a half from a major population center, that have beer that would be buzz-worthy in a large city? My visit to Astoria, Oregon and Reach Break Brewing made me wonder how many others we’re missing.
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