MdV:
Merchant du Vin beer e-newsletter – Wednesday Nov. 12,
2008: Beer Etiquette
Samuel Smith’s Winter Welcome Ale & Samuel
Smith’s Selection Box are here now
Winter
Welcome: The nineteenth edition of Samuel Smith's Winter
Welcome - the 2008 - 2009 bottling - is in great stores, bars and
restaurants across America now. The original imported winter ale, this
hearty brew greets the change of the seasons each fall - it's full-bodied,
honey-amber colored, with great depth & richness; it gains impeccable
character from fermentation in open-topped stone vessels known as
"Yorkshire Squares." (Yes, stone: locally-quarried slate!) We
have a news release on our website as a 379 KB .pdf, right here. The
illustration on the label
changes each year; the current 08 - 09 art is entitled "Fishing
Buddies."
The Selection Box: You know lots of
people that love beer, and the Samuel Smith's Selection Box is the perfect
gift for those folks. It contains three "Victorian Pints"
of benchmark ales - Samuel Smith's Oatmeal Stout, Nut Brown Ale, and Old Brewery Pale
Ale - as well as an authentic Smith pint glass, two brewery coasters, and
a brochure that lists styles, brewery history, and food-pairing
suggestions. The box was redesigned in 2008 in glossy black with
metallic gold and now has die-cut openings to display the contents. Give
the gift of flavor inspiration!
This month's MdV beer accolades
& news
Merchant du Vin's benchmark imports continue to gain more attention in
the media:
Epicurious.com's Top 5 Holiday Beers include Samuel Smith's Winter Welcome Ale; the article is by noted beer author & speaker
Stephen Beaumont.
Ayinger again had
the highest rated wheat beers in the World Beer Championships, as reported
in the Nov. '08 All About
Beer magazine: Brau-Weisse earned a
97-point Platinum medal, and Ur-Weisse a 95-point
Gold.
Modern Brewery Age gave Pinkus Jubilate Organic Dark
Lager a five-star review and "best of the tasting" on October 27,
'08; the review is a 247 KB .pdf right here.
The Fall '08 issue of Beer Northwest magazine gave Green's Gluten-Free Belgian Ales high marks in an article by
Peter Bronski. The full article is a 555 KB .pdf
right here.
Great beer on national TV! On Monday October
13, '08, The Today Show featured Food & Wine editor Ray Isle discussing
& tasting fall beers - among the fine beers tasted were Ayinger
Oktober Fest-Marzen and
Lindemans Pomme lambic.
Watch the video right here.
A full current news listing is always on our news page; you can also check local beer tastings, dinners
and festivals on our national events page and read previous html versions of
this newsletter at our e-news archive. If you are interested in beer
glassware, clothing and collectables we also have an online e-store.
Bottled and Draft Beers
Remember to ask for the bottled beer list next time you are out at a pub or
restaurant.
Draft beer is great: some beers are only available in kegs, the packaging is
reusable, and look at the money that breweries spend on tap handles: the
wacky shapes, the lights, the full-figural full-color artwork, the motion
features, the extreme materials . . . they want to catch your eye!
We just want to point out that every beer account should also have a
selection of bottles, for several good reasons.
Variety: It's quite easy to
add a bottled beer to a bar's offerings - the management doesn't need
to bump off a beer, as they must when adding a draft beer.
Opportunity: Customers benefit
from the chance to try something different - maybe something very special that
might not sell enough volume for a draft line. And the bar has the
opportunity to sell something that not only makes the customer happier but yields a "vertical selling
opportunity" - a higher selling price. A
benefit to the consumer and to the bar owner? That's a win-win.
Style: Sometimes a draft beer
is just different from the bottled variety. It may be the conditioning
(carbonation level) or it may actually be a different beer in
composition. Plus, the carbonation level in a keg is affected by the
draft system's dispense pressure, especially as the level in the keg
drops. Some styles - especially those with very high or very low
carbonation - are more reliable in a bottle.
Drama & presentation: Many
bottles of beer have labels that are information-packed, or that have really
great art on them. Other bottles may be fine custom glass; they may be
cork-finished; they may have a foil capsule; they might have a fun or quirky
crown cap. In the case of a bottle, the customer has a personal
interaction with the brewery's effort, hard work and magic: by
holding the bottle in their hand, they hold a little piece of the
brewery.
Bottle-conditioning: A tapped
cask-conditioned keg has quite a short shelf life, maybe only a day or two at
peak. Bottle-conditioned beers - consumed at one sitting - have a very
long shelf life. Some bottle-conditioned beers improve with age.
Portion control: Sold and
counted in units, bottles are easier to control at the rare pub that has
"inventory shrinkage" issues . . .
Offer
the benchmarks: When customers want to
compare a new beer to a classic, why not make it easy for them? We think
every bar in America should probably have Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale, Ayinger Celebrator Doppelbock,
and Lindemans Framboise Lambic .
. . but we may be biased. If you operate a pub or restaurant that
doesn't offer these beers, we have the solution for you: simply order in a case
of each and make sure your server and bartenders know they are
available. Then your customers will let you know what they think of these
beers, via their big tips and big smiles.
If
you are reading this newsletter for the first time, check our archive at:
http://www.merchantduvin.com/pages/1_about/enews_archive.html/
and sign
yourself up for e-news at:
http://www.merchantduvin.com/pages/1_about/guestbook.html
Merchant
du Vin, America’s Premier Specialty Beer Importer
Since 1978