GABF

The
24th annual Great American Beer Festival (GABF), the largest
event yet for the Brewers Association, offered beer lovers
an unparalleled sampling opportunity and contained a number
of surprises for brewers as well. The awards ceremony itself
took more than two hours to complete, a perhaps unwanted
record for the organizers. Overall, there were two big
stories at GABF, each meaningfully contributing to a common
theme: the big brewers arrived in 2OO5.

RETURN
of the KING Clearly
the highlight of the weekend, the annual GABF awards
ceremony unites brewers and owners in a hushed union of
nervous anticipation. As the event has grown in size, the
significance of the medals, for purposes of both public
relations and professional fulfillment, has also increased.
The awards process starts slowly, with the announcement of
the winners in the Non-alcoholic Beer category. With only
five entries, the O’Douls line from Anheuser-Busch quickly
takes two medals, including the gold. The assembled crowd,
mainly comprised of unshaved, brash craft brewing types,
politely claps for America’s largest brewery.

Courtesy quickly
turns to shock when A-B wins a silver medal in the highly
competitive Fruit and Vegetable Beer category – the win by
the new 9th Street Market Tuscan Orange product strikes at
the heart of the craft brewing industry, besting perennial
favorite Raspberry Tart by New Glarus. Even more impressive,
A-B went on to score gold medals in the German-style
Marzen/Oktoberfest category and the Classic English-style
Pale Ale category. Craft brewers looked stunned by the
announcements, while A-B’s staffers were
ecstatic.

With A-B’s
recent return to the Micro/Specialty segment of more
flavorful beers, the timing of the awards couldn’t be better
for the brewery. The brewery used the GABF as a launching
point for the release of its new specialty line of beers,
which starts with Jack’s Pumpkin Spice Ale, a seasonal draft
offering. The brewery plans to release a new draft beer
every three months to provide on-premise accounts with an
alternative to craft brewed products. Jack’s is made with
Golden Delicious pumpkins from Oregon, cinnamon, ginger,
nutmeg, clove, and the brewery’s traditional mixture of
Hallertau, Tettnang and Saaz hops.

“Winning medals
at the Great American Beer Festival is a great honor for any
brewer,” said Doug Muhleman, Group Vice President, Brewing
Operations and Technology, Anheuser-Busch, Inc. “The
festival is an exciting celebration of beer culture,
bringing together hundreds of breweries and thousands of
beers to be judged by the some of the most knowledgeable
people in our industry. The expertise and hard work of many
people in our company combined to produce these beers, and
it’s very gratifying to have them recognized. I congratulate
our team for their efforts.”

Anheuser-Busch
is also expanding its bottled offerings under the Michelob
brand name. The Michelob Specialty Sampler Collection will
target grocery and convenience stores and will include the
newly crowned Michelob Marzen and Michelob Pale Ale, along
with Michelob, Honey Lager and AmberBock. A special 18-pack
will include three bottles of each beer, two limited-edition
pilsner glasses, a collection of recipes featuring the
beers, beer mixer recipes, suggested food pairings, and
other tips from Anheuser-Busch brewmasters.

The 9th Street
Market line appears to be another foray into the flavored
malt beverage or malternative category. The series uses a
pilsner beer as the base and brewers infuse fruit flavors
and spices into the final product. The line includes several
flavors, including Blood Orange Grapefruit, Lime Cactus and
Pomegranate Raspberry. The company is presently testing the
product line in several West Coast markets.

While A-B
remains one of the strongest breweries in the world, with
the most technically competent brewers, the specialty
releases on display at the festival were uniformly
under-whelming in terms of flavor. I admit upfront that my
tastings were not done blind, as were those conducted by the
GABF’s panel of judges, and that there is always room for
bias. With that said, I always respond to the shrill, tired
attacks of beer geeks upon macro-brewers in the same tone:
the breweries make the most consistent, technically sound
beer in the world and they could make the best in terms of
flavor if they only chose to do so. Somewhere between the
marketing department and the brewhouse floor, each of these
beers went off-target.

Anheuser-Busch
also released test samples of the first of two new
high-alcohol specialty releases. While the new Brewmasters’
Private Reserve was not yet available, the brewers poured
Celebrate, a limited edition lager brewed with vanilla beans
and aged in oak bourbon barrels. Poured from a 24ounce,
champagne style bottle, the 1O-percent alcohol beer
possesses a lightly fruity aroma with mild oak notes. The
flavor, however, is a let down. Overall, the beer is
over-oaked and possesses an odd cotton candy flavor that
tends towards overly sweet and sugary.

The
award-winning Marzen and Pale Ale also were disappointing
compared to the more flavorful products available at the
festival. I went to Denver greatly anticipating the new
specialty releases and left thinking that A-B had missed an
opportunity to prove itself. While the Marzen lacks
sufficient color and malty flavor to compare with better
representations of the style, it is the Pale Ale that truly
confounds me. Though it won for the Classic English Style
Pale Ale category, one whose hop profile is described simply
as displaying “English-variety hop character”, this possible
lager beer inexplicably employs Saaz, Hallertau and Tettnang
hops. I simply couldn’t believe my eyes when I read the
label. The flavors and aromas of each were very muted but
this beer was anything other than its intended
style.

THE
RISE OF SANDLOT
While Anheuser-Busch failed to impress with its renewed
foray into the high-end, specialty beer market, another
brewery, a subsidiary of Coors, proved again why it is one
of the best brewers of lager beer in America. I first came
across the SandLot Brewing Company, which is attached to the
Coors Field ballpark in downtown Denver, a few years ago at
the GABF after attending a media event there. I later
interviewed head brewer Tom Hail in this publication and
have written about them in several pieces on the GABF.
SandLot has accumulated a number of medals and awards for
their beers. At this year’s GABF, SandLot cleaned house in
the German beer categories and walked away with seven
medals. SandLot specializes in brewing true-to-style pilsner
beers and won four awards. The wins culminated in the
brewery winning the award for Small Brewing Company of the
Year. As explained to me by Tom Hail, SandLot is actually
not licensed as a brewpub, but has a separate brewery
license. The brewery sells its beer in the Denver metro area
and mostly to the pub at Coors Field, where the brewery is
based. That serves as the basis for its small brewing
company classification.

It’s been a long
road to respect for the guys at SandLot. Due to their
corporate ties to Coors, and their dedication to the
under-appreciated cause of lager beers, many beer geeks
simply dismiss the ballpark brewery. While clearly a little
sensitive to the criticism, the SandLot team responds with
humor. At the GABF, they let two humorously named beers make
their case for them. When Chris Swersey, the director of the
judging competition, announces the silver medalist in the
European-style Pilsner category, he does so with a laugh.
The “Most Beer Judges are Bone Heads” pilsner from SandLot
also proves popular with the assembled crowd. While
SandLot’s brewers are on-stage to collect gold and silver
medals in the American-style Specialty Lager category,
Swersey announces the winners in the Vienna-style Lager
category. Unfortunately, SandLot’s delightful “Clueless Beer
Writer” offering does not medal, narrowly missing another
opportunity for poignant humor, but entertains those who
stop by the brewery’s booth.

NEW
ENGLAND BREWERS
While participation in the GABF continues to remain on the
low-side for New England brewers, those in attendance
achieved some impressive results. First-time attendee
Cambridge House brewpub, located in Granby, Connecticut, won
a gold medal in the Cellar or Unfiltered Beer category for
its Copper Hill Kolsch. Moments after the win, co-owner
Steve Boucino beamed like a proud father while he poured his
award-winner. “It feels incredible,” he said. “Only six
months old and we’re already getting recognition.” He
praised head brewer Steve Schmidt, who also works as a lead
brewer at Redhook in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

A few booths
down, the Allagash Brewing Company secured two impressive
medals in the highly competitive Belgian-style categories.
Owner Rob Tod stood confident and proud over his brewery’s
accomplishments. “I feel good,” he said. “We didn’t win the
last few years so it feels good to win a medal. The White is
our flagship and we’ve been brewing that for a long time, so
I’m happy it won a gold.” While Tod considers attendance at
the festival to be a good business opportunity for the fast
spreading Allagash brands, he also enjoys the camaraderie of
meeting other brewers and enjoying the craft beer scene.
“It’s a blast,” he says. “I love it here – think part of the
reason we come out here is it’s just an excuse to have fun
for a weekend – it’s also a nice way for us to expose our
beer to people who maybe haven’t tried it before. Being
two-thousand miles away from the brewery, they may not have
heard of the beers.”

Other winners
from New England include a bronze medal in the Bohemian
Style Pilsener category for the Vermont Lager from Otter
Creek Brewing/Wolaver’s Organic Beers in Middlebury,
Vermont, and a gold medal in the Other Strong Ale or Lager
category for the Wheat Wine from the Smuttynose Brewing
Company in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

SAM
ADAMS RESURGENCE
The Boston Beer Company enjoyed a successful festival,
winning four total medals, including two gold medals for its
Sam Adams Light and Samuel Adams Doppelbock products. The
accolades were the reward for the company’s redoubled
efforts on promoting craft beer and the flavor of its
products. During the initial release of the Sam Adams Light
product, Boston Beer appeared to change its focus from
flavor to hype. The loud, raucous television ads
accompanying the new light beer more closely resembled those
produced by America’s macro brewers. Boston Beer is now in
the middle of a large media buy with a new set of television
ads, done in chapters, which focus on the quality of the
beer and its ingredients. Each new installment introduces
consumers to the brewing process, hops and barley, and
underscores the importance of flavor in beer.

Boston Beer has
also started a new consumer campaign called the Beer Lover’s
Choice program. The brewery has produced two new beers, a
Bohemian Pilsner and a Brown Ale, that it is promoting at
tastings in bars across the country. Tested side-by-side,
consumers will learn about the two very different styles of
beer and then be given the opportunity to choose which beer
should appear in the upcoming mixed 12-pack, to be called
the Brewmaster’s Collection. While the pilsner has a
beautiful, deep golden hue and a light peppery flavor from
the sharp Saaz hops, the big, malty Brown Ale, rich with
Marris Otter malt flavor, re-energizes an otherwise moribund
style.

THE
REST OF THE STORY
The Brewers Association also took the opportunity of having
assembled dozens of members of the beer press to announce
craft beer production numbers for the first half of 2OO5.
Paul Gatza, Director of the Brewers Association, announced
that volume for the craft beer industry increased by 7.1
percent in the first half of the year, while imports
increased similarly and macro products are down nearly 3
percent. “The most interesting piece of news I have seen of
late is that imports, after a strong spring for sales to
wholesale, tanked in July, down 6.5 percent from last July,”
he said. “That puts the 7-month growth at 4.5 percent, with
estimates that it will finish at 2 percent once the year is
over. The large domestic brewers should also get closer to
level. It was a strong summer, but Katrina will dampen the
progress made there.”