365 Bars in 365 Days

March 11th, 2010

We don’t normally post about other blogs going on, especially if they are not beer-centric. This one, however, was just so appealing that I couldn’t go on without letting all our loyal fans know about it. Marty Wombacher is on a mission to visit a different bar everyday and post some information and pictures of it the next day. The rules from his website are pretty simple: he must spend 1 hour a day in a bar for 365 days; if he misses a day, he must start over; and he cannot visit the same bar twice, with the exception of his favorite which he may go back to on the 365th day.

Today is day 60 in his adventure and he hasn’t missed one yet. He has been garnering a fair amount of press lately, mostly good, but some bad. After a recent trip to the House of Brews, which had advertised beers on their website that they didn’t actually have, he wrote them a less than glowing review, though very colorful. Although the proprietor of the House of Brews was not pleased with the review, the general reaction seems to be he is doing people a service by giving honest opinions and reviews of the places he visits. One thing Marty said that I really liked was his comments about why people actually go to bars.

“My ideal New York bar is a dive bar with really interesting characters,” said Wombacher. “If you have the coolest bar in the world, but it is filled with jerks, then you will have a rotten time. Who wants to drink in a room filled with jerks?”

He is definitely right. Many of my favorite places are my favorite not because of the type of beer they serve (they are rarely the ONLY place where I can get the brew) and more to do with what sort of interactions I have there. Whether is it a free drink from a portly bartender who chats you up about the latest Griz win or just another patron who smiles at you, these sort of people actually draw customers because they are fun to be around, regardless of what you are drinking.

Keep up the good work Marty. For those of you who don’t have enough interweb time wasters, go ahead and favorite aguywalksinto365bars.com to keep updated on his lasted adventures!

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Beer Distributors Unite to Educate (and sell beer of course)

December 21st, 2009

A conglomeration of beer distributors, led by Fort Worth-based Ben E. Keith Beverage, the nation’s third-largest beer wholesaler, has formed to create GreatBrewers.com, a website aimed at education about beer, as well as user reviews and a beer finder.

In the past decade, a thriving beer culture has blossomed in America, which now boasts the most stylistically diverse lineup of beers on earth. But with such great variety comes the inherent challenge of consumer education, particularly at the point of purchase. Responding to this challenge, pioneering beverage wholesalers have joined forces to provide brewers with a central marketing platform, deemed Great Brewers. The mission of Great Brewers is to bridge the gap between the world’s great brewers and the consumers who enjoy their products, with a paramount focus on education and on enhancing beer distribution practices through the sharing of information.

The idea behind it is great, and being run by distributors, it should be able to tell us where to go to find the beer we want. I have only spent a few moments going around the site, and it seems you have to register to use a handful of the features, such as the Great Beer Test (I scored a pitiful 55%). Also, if distributors near you are not members, then the beer finder feature may have troubles finding what you want. It is also a fairly busy website that can be difficult to navigate and do what you want, but it has only been going for a few weeks now and hopefully as time passes it will become more user friendly.

They also released a new Iphone app called BeerCloud, which is designed to help people pair, locate, and learn about beer. Best of luck to these folks in their venture and I hope it becomes a great resource for beer lovers across the states.

Check out the full article at Houston Press.

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