Bill Spurr - idiot or incompetent

[jherbin]

I'd love to have a beer or 5 and talk about these points! Different brewers have different objectives and goals and obviously prioritize their operations in different ways. Big brewers trying to co-opt 'craft' is less of a concern to me than 'craft' being inundated with lots of small breweries making so-so or just bad beer. Not exempting myself here though as I'm always looking to improve my own brews and learning/researching/changing recipes all the time. I've got a lot to learn before I'm crafting beer that I would consider 'excellent'. This marketing lingo is my least favourite part of the beer biz though, as I think good beer should sell itself, regardless of the scale its made on. Lots of small breweries wish they were bigger breweries, so size and perceived quality are not these intrinsically linked factors - though keep in mind the varying budgets of craft brewers to assemble proper labs for QA purposes, or surviving the costs of dumped batches (we've all had a few), when you judge their quality standards. I bet a lot of startups have no lab access to pinpoint issues - we've been lucky to outsource this to someone in the city who does. Nobody wants to sell bad beer. Some people sell bad beer and think its great beer. As I've seen written on this forum many a time, the longevity of these new small breweries (ours included) will be determined in the long run by their ability to produce a good product that people want to buy continuously, especially once the 'craft' hype has died down. Every bubble bursts.

[BigSpruce]

Hey guys - looks like the article has generated some talk! Sorry that I don't have a lot of time to check on what is being said, or I may have chimed in earlier. I thought I would throw my 2 cents in now. A lot of you have understood my comments in the article for what they were intended, and that was to say that I just feel there is too much zany brewing out there, meant to capture attention, when it actually isn't very good beer. Obviously words alone, even even properly quoted, cannot provide proper context as to the conversation that was being had when they were said. Hope that clarifies things, and hope to see you all soon over some beers so I can explain additionally if needed! Jeremy