Calgary and craft beer

[zane9]

Great article in the Globe and Mail on the craft beer scene in Calgary, here.

[boney]

Nice article. Interestingly, they only mention roughly half of the new beer bars that have recently openes in Calgary.....with more on the way. Nice to see Charcut get some love. Fine dining with an equal beer list.

I do take issue with the number of 3000 beers available in the province. That's just not true. We have a lot, but we'd be hard pressed to hit 500.

The only problem with all these new bars is, for the most part, they all offer the same beers, which are also availible far cheaper at the local bottle shop. I predict a market correctuon/contraction coming on.

I wish media outlets would stop referencing "hipsters" in the same sentence as craft beer. Hipsters wouldn't be caught within 100m of a real IPA. Uggg. Lazy pop culture journalism.

[markaberrant]

Yeah, that article did not seem to be researched very well.

The pretenders will fall by the way side in due time.

There are likely 3000 beer skus registered in the Connect database. 50 different packagings of Bud, Canadian, Blue, Pil, Coors Light, etc would make up a large chunk, as would all the single one-offs and seasonals. Adds up pretty fast, but certainly doesn't mean there are 3000 different products available at any one time.

[screw2000]

Just got back from a short stop in CGY.

Craft Beer Market (mentioned in the Globe article) has about 100 on their tap list , but I had the same problem I do at TO places like West 50 -- by trying to cover everything, you end up with a lot of duplicated middle-of-the-road stuff. Far more interesting was their list of ~10 rotating tap selections -- I had the Deschutes Inversion IPA.

Beer Revolution at 11th Ave and 8th St SW (same building as Brewster's) has a excellent rotating selection. Four taps from Mikkeller and, much to my surprise, two from Baird! Also love the airport-style screens for the tap list (including keg size and expected blow date).

[Bytowner]

In Calgary on business. Interesting scene.

A handful of impressive beer bars, but, as already covered, the tap lists are all kind of underwhelming. Loads of imports but, by and large, they're not particularly exciting and prohibitively expensive.

The bars have great staff and decent food, but I find myself grasping at anything that sounds remotely interesting.

Having said that, in light of the astronomical import prices, the locals are cheap (and, frankly, more interesting). On a Tuesday you're looking at between 3 and 5 bucks a "pint". Which brigs me to my next point: what's with the near universal adoption of the 16oz pour Calgary!?

Heart's in the right spot, but still a long way to go. This is all about the drinking scene obviously, we all know about the liquor stores.

[markaberrant]

In Calgary on business. Interesting scene.

A handful of impressive beer bars, but, as already covered, the tap lists are all kind of underwhelming. Loads of imports but, by and large, they're not particularly exciting and prohibitively expensive.

The bars have great staff and decent food, but I find myself grasping at anything that sounds remotely interesting.

Having said that, in light of the astronomical import prices, the locals are cheap (and, frankly, more interesting). On a Tuesday you're looking at between 3 and 5 bucks a "pint". Which brigs me to my next point: what's with the near universal adoption of the 16oz pour Calgary!?

Heart's in the right spot, but still a long way to go. This is all about the drinking scene obviously, we all know about the liquor stores.

Pretty good summary.

I offended a few Albertans a year ago when they were bragging about how great the Alberta beer scene is... I said, "if you are only known as a place that caters to imports, then you really don't have much of a scene, do you?"

[Torontoblue]

It really is a shame that our brewers in Alberta just won't step up to the plate and brew beyond their perceived safety line. They appear to be happy with mediocrity!

I'd love to support local brewers more, but when all that is brewed in Edmonton is a fruit wheat, amber, pale ale, lager & an out of balance pumpkin ale, then there's not much to keep me interested apart from the seasonals.

Plus, the fact that a 6 pack of Anchor Porter, Liberty & Steam is cheaper than a local 6 pack, I know what I'm buying!

[boney]

Calgary, and all of Alberta, is certainly unique in Canada. Prohibitively expensive brewery start ups due to minimum production capacity means there’s less room for potentially risky experimentation, at least right off the bat. Not arguing that they can’t succeed with more dynamic products, but it’s hard to convince investors. That said, I’m not overly critical of Alberta brewing, on the whole. There are the same proportions of great, average and poor breweries everywhere in the world, Calgary just doesn’t have the number of breweries to have 1 or 2 great ones, for the reason above.

As for the import scene, the quantity is different, but the quality is the same…..a few really bad beers, most are average and a few are outstanding, both in bottle shops and on draught. The prices do seem steep when you come from out of province. I see this as being for 2 reasons. The first is super high taxation. The second is that everything is more expensive, at least in Calgary, from beer, to produce and furniture. It’s a city with a very young, urban, professional population, with a ton of disposable income. Retailers and bars can charge ridiculous beer prices without consequence, especially for trendy products like craft beer. Because of that economic environment , competition through privatization didn’t materialize in the liquor stores. For bars, they can all sell the same 20 craft beers still fill the joint every night.

When I moved back to Ontario last year from Calgary, I was dreading loosing the private bottle shops because “the LCBO sucks, the local breweries only produce gateway beers” etc etc. Coming back was a great surprise. The LCBO still has issues, but the Ontario brewery scene is unrecognizable from when I left 4 years ago. I probably could drink locally, and happily, most of the time if I needed to. All and all, I don’t miss Calgary that much…….however, they did just get a shipment of some pretty great 3 Fonteinen this week. That might have stung if I didn’t still have some contacts back home

[Torontoblue]

We have a flat tax system for alcohol in Alberta, along with a 5% sales tax across the board, hence a lot of people from BC come across the 'border' for some of the higher end alcohol products. High prices of products are down to gouging from bars, liquor stores and some agencies.

How any bar can justify $9.75 for a 300ml glass of Houblon La Chouffe IPA Tripel is beyond me! The average price for a 16oz glass in most bars is around $9.00. That's before tax & tip. Unless you wanna drink the BMC stuff, and then you can get a 400ml glass for $5.75.

I did buy one of the large format 3 Fonteinen beers that have just come in, as it's the only one of the 4 I haven't tried. That price killed me though!! But, as long as there's suckers like us, they'll keep charging what they want.

[boney]

We have a flat tax system for alcohol in Alberta, along with a 5% sales tax across the board, hence a lot of people from BC come across the 'border' for some of the higher end alcohol products. High prices of products are down to gouging from bars, liquor stores and some agencies.

GST only is nice.

Isn't there still a mark-up based on alc %.

Of hand, Sid, or anyone, know of a good source for provincial liquor tax comparions? I'd be interested to have a look.

[Derek]

Of hand, Sid, or anyone, know of a good source for provincial liquor tax comparions? I'd be interested to have a look.

Page 6:
http://cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/publications/dm- ... -6-eng.pdf

BC sucks.

[screw2000]

Just got back from a short stop in CGY.

Craft Beer Market (mentioned in the Globe article) has about 100 on their tap list , but I had the same problem I do at TO places like West 50 -- by trying to cover everything, you end up with a lot of duplicated middle-of-the-road stuff. Far more interesting was their list of ~10 rotating tap selections -- I had the Deschutes Inversion IPA.

Quick update from a recent trip to CGY.

Tap selection at Craft was a good mix of imports and some of the newer local breweries (Village, etc...).

Next door is National on 10th -- downstairs has a pretty good selection of 15-20 taps; upstairs is a speakeasy-themed room with a solid bourbon list.

The fun part (depending on your view) was how crazy both places got on a Friday night. Felt like the club district with better beer.

Also got to see Stone on tap at a few places. Nice to have, although something I would have been way more excited about 5 years ago.