The Bar Towel

Kentucky Bastard down 55 cents again...

Jerk_Store wrote:Kentucky Bastard down 55 cents again...

News to me...

Nickel Brook Brewing ‏@NickelBrookBeer 41 minutes ago

"Just a price error with submission and took a week to process"

Masterplan wrote:IMO, unless you are buying beer just to get drunk, ABV should have no impact on the calculation of value.

Imagine that! Put me in the drunkards' camp. Also, ABV determines serving size, so it would be a valuable metric to include. 500 ml of pale ale is one serving, 500 ml of RIS is 2.

S. St. Jeb wrote:If the only data you were going to give was a combination of cost and rating, it wouldn't be so valuable.....to me

Agree 100%

beerstodiscover wrote:

Masterplan wrote:IMO, unless you are buying beer just to get drunk, ABV should have no impact on the calculation of value.

Imagine that! Put me in the drunkards' camp. Also, ABV determines serving size, so it would be a valuable metric to include. 500 ml of pale ale is one serving, 500 ml of RIS is 2.

Yes, that is why i thought it should be included, just didnt explain it as well. thanks!

beerstodiscover wrote:

Masterplan wrote:IMO, unless you are buying beer just to get drunk, ABV should have no impact on the calculation of value.

Imagine that! Put me in the drunkards' camp. Also, ABV determines serving size, so it would be a valuable metric to include. 500 ml of pale ale is one serving, 500 ml of RIS is 2.

S. St. Jeb wrote:If the only data you were going to give was a combination of cost and rating, it wouldn't be so valuable.....to me

Agree 100%

It also correlates to production price. I guess that shouldn't really matter, but it could be interesting or something.

A wrote:

Blasphomet wrote:

MatttthewGeorge wrote:Or maybe we've reassessed our costs and realized the beer cost us more than we originally thought.

Also, many LCBOs at this time of year will put the beer on clearance. Guess who eats that clearance price? We do.

Happy to hear you drink our cans however I'm sad to hear you think we're purposely trying to rip our customers off. I get that it's expensive (out of my price range too, tbh) but ripping on us for false assumptions is uncalled for. Maybe next time just ask why?

Sorry, I don't think consumers should have to foot the bill for Nickel Brook's financial/cost misjudgment. That should be something that is sorted out well in advance and if it isn't then it's complete amateur hour in my opinion. You're not rookies. Jacking the price of a seasonal beer that has been on shelves for two months is ridiculous in my opinion, and is a panic move made in hindsight.

The brewery can charge whatever they want whenever they want, and you are free to buy it or not. That's it.

S. St. Jeb wrote:If the only data you were going to give was a combination of cost (per 100ml?) and rating, it wouldn't be so valuable....

Yes I agree, and why would they exclude price-per-100ml and score? It's all useful.

I believe Quality-price ratio can be the one real tipping point for a lot of in-store purchase decisions, all other things being equal. We often don't mind spending more when we get more. It's slightly annoying to calculate everything on the spot.

If award-winning Side Launch Wheat in a can has a way better QPR than a pretty ordinary Ontario Weissbier in a pricey 750ml swing-top, maybe that's a crystal clear choice.

GtownRandy wrote:thanks for the input guys, i forgot another factor is the ABV of the beer. for example 2 beers with the same price/mL and rating, but one is 10% ABV and the other is 7%, the 10% should be more value should it not?

Not so sure. ABV tends to increase LCBO price anyway (working against it) & the accompanying higher gravity tends to bias the ratings higher (working even more for it.) So without even factoring ABV you already factored it - to the extent those stronger beers are already perceived as better.

The trouble is the 'two beers' in your example are not the same beers, and ABV may be irrelevant to comparative value. Rochefort 8 is not La Trappe Quad, and while both are very good and the Trappe Quad is stronger I would say the Rochefort is still a better beer and better value. 2¢

It would be fun having all that data on different beers to sort of see what the best/worst values are.
I know some breweries shy away from certain beers because of the time it takes to brew them...another factor in final cost to consumers...but pretty much impossible to know.
That big double/triple IPA or high gravity beer might take 4-5 weeks before it is ready to bottle/can instead of 2 weeks for other beers....

Just thought I'd share: stopped in @lcbo in meadowvale shopping centre in Mississauga since I was in the area. The place seems to be a little bit of a gold mine, just on a quick browse I. Iticed there's lots of good stuffthat seems to be sticking around longer than most other stores. Lots of rodenbach vintage,lots of JP bam bierre,lots of old Rasputin,plenty of rochefort 10/8, dubble. Pretty much every stone beer that's available in Ontario. A shit tonne of double bastard,lots of verticle epic,a couple dozen RIS and xocoveza. The best part is that it's actually all away from the windows and refrigerated. Seems like someone in this store knows their stuff. Wondering if there's not too many people in the area that drink these kinds of beer. So if anyone's ever in the area, may be worth sliding in to check out what they have.
I grabbed a couple Rasputin, a stone ris,bam bierre,and a couple xocoveza(although this worries me after reading some people's comments about how sweet it may be)

That's been a great store for many years sofaking....used to go there regularly when I lived out in oakville area and found myself in mississauga often. Would often be the closest store that had stock in some of the beers with low distribution.

Masterplan wrote:

GtownRandy wrote:thanks for the input guys, i forgot another factor is the ABV of the beer. for example 2 beers with the same price/mL and rating, but one is 10% ABV and the other is 7%, the 10% should be more value should it not?

IMO, unless you are buying beer just to get drunk, ABV should have no impact on the calculation of value.

True in some ways, but let's not kid ourselves - higher ABV well done micro brews generally tend to have more complexity and taste than lower ABV micro brews, even one's which are well executed. Of course, this does not hold true in every case, but to suggest there's no correlation between taste and higher ABV (let's say 6% and up) is pretty wishful thinking. There is just so much more, in terms of taste and complexity that you can do to an 8% beer that you simply cannot with a 4% brew. So hell yeah, ABV can definitly be related to value as it often co-varies with taste and complexity among well done craft beers relative to well done, but lower ABV craft beers.

Suitably higher alcohol in beverages typically adds body (in more ways than one!) and a feeling of viscosity.

I believe a higher level of alcohol in a well-made beer positively enhances the RB ratings already. If you factor the beer site ratings, you are already taking into account the better value for the higher ABV, when it exists. Faxe 10% is still awful - so why say it's better value.

Belgian wrote:Suitably higher alcohol in beverages typically adds body (in more ways than one!) and a feeling of viscosity.

I believe a higher level of alcohol in a well-made beer positively enhances the RB ratings already. If you factor the beer site ratings, you are already taking into account the better value for the higher ABV, when it exists. Faxe 10% is still awful - so why say it's better value.

Exactly, high ABV means squat in terms of quality. It just informs the drinker how much alcohol there is. Also, a more complex beer isn't necessarily a better beer. I've drank my way through too many hot messes to know, that a well made lager can definitely be better value than that year old cherries/coffee/vanilla bourbon barrel quad with orange peel that had to be drain poured.

The only real reason ABV could be used to add value to a beer, is if you want to get drunk on the lowest priced beer. A race to the bottom IMO.

Masterplan wrote:

Belgian wrote:Suitably higher alcohol in beverages typically adds body (in more ways than one!) and a feeling of viscosity.

I believe a higher level of alcohol in a well-made beer positively enhances the RB ratings already. If you factor the beer site ratings, you are already taking into account the better value for the higher ABV, when it exists. Faxe 10% is still awful - so why say it's better value.

Exactly, high ABV means squat in terms of quality. It just informs the drinker how much alcohol there is. Also, a more complex beer isn't necessarily a better beer. I've drank my way through too many hot messes to know, that a well made lager can definitely be better value than that year old cherries/coffee/vanilla bourbon barrel quad with orange peel that had to be drain poured.

The only real reason ABV could be used to add value to a beer, is if you want to get drunk on the lowest priced beer. A race to the bottom IMO.

I agree with most of the comments in the past few posts, and years ago (when I had too much time) I did do some calculations on LCBO prices per ml, and ratings I had given beers. I imagine this is something we all do in our heads whenever we pop into a store - there's certainly a lot of well-regarded beers I've never tried because the price seemed inhbitive when I know a great option is on the shelf for a fraction of the cost.

However, I do sometimes see ABV as a value add. In general, the stronger beers last longer for me, so the value is that I might only be consuming one beer in an evening, when otherwise I may have gone for two. Of course, the value here is purely monetary and might affect whether I think something is worth the expense or not. Sours also fall into this category for me - they tend to be stupid expensive, but that's moderated by the fact that I can't knock them back at the pace of a pils or IPA.