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Session 99 Craft Beer Festival - June 23

Post details, reviews and recaps of interesting beer events in Ontario and elsewhere here.

Moderators: Craig, Cass

JeffPorter
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Post by JeffPorter »

liamt07 wrote:
JerCraigs wrote:Did people get a confirmation of their Session tickets? I got a paypal receipt but no actual tickets so far. I emailed Jeb but haven't got a reply yet and I am getting antsy.
Got mine in the mail about a week after ordering online...
Got mine soon after too...Is there a number you can call?
"What can you say about Pabst Blue Ribbon that Dennis Hopper hasn’t screamed in the middle of an ether binge?" - Jordan St. John

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JerCraigs
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Post by JerCraigs »

I just called, apparently they will be held at the door, so I can relax :)

Should be fun!

JeffPorter
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Post by JeffPorter »

Does anyone know what one-offs will be there? Is there a list published somewhere or do we just find out when we get there?
"What can you say about Pabst Blue Ribbon that Dennis Hopper hasn’t screamed in the middle of an ether binge?" - Jordan St. John

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lister
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Post by lister »

For those that went, what does the following mean to you:

"This year for the first time, we bring you the "ALL-IN" price which
you will be able to sample approx. 100 different beers, great food,
music, comedy, and unique entertainment all under one roof!"
lister

JeffPorter
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Location: Brampton, ON

Post by JeffPorter »

lister wrote:For those that went, what does the following mean to you:

"This year for the first time, we bring you the "ALL-IN" price which
you will be able to sample approx. 100 different beers, great food,
music, comedy, and unique entertainment all under one roof!"
I don't know where to begin with this and while I'm normally pretty positive and patient with the events and those who work hard to put them on, and I know the organizers tried to improve it from last year, but I had several issues with last night, but I'll just say my biggest point for now, and if we want to discuss other issues we can:

I could go into a long rant about this, but there simply needs to be more water available - to rinse our glasses and to drink. The lack of water was insane, and a sexy nurse giving out bottles of water (I already have a glass in my hand) doesn't cut it. Water stations - it should be a no-brainer.

There were a lot of other huge logistical things last night (25 minutes for the bathroom rings a bell), but those things probably had to do with the venue and sheer amount of tickets they sold (much to the surprise of some of the vendors who ran out of food fairly fast).

A lot of great beer, but I can't see myself going to sessions again unless the some kinks get worked out and/or move the venue for next year.

When I left some guy was really yelling at the staff demanding money back (not drunkenly, either). While that's not my style, I could really sympathize with him.
"What can you say about Pabst Blue Ribbon that Dennis Hopper hasn’t screamed in the middle of an ether binge?" - Jordan St. John

toweringpine
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Post by toweringpine »

Were you guys there in the afternoon or the evening? I had a great time at the afternoon session! The line ups never seemed out of control until near the end when the bathroom line grew a little long. The food lines involved waiting for a few minutes but I started each one with a fresh beer sample and got to the front still with a little beer in my glass. More water stations would have been good. Many brewers had cup rinsers but not all. Not sure if that is something we should blame on the organizers. If a brewery wants to show off their beer at its finest then having a rinser is a must. I had all the beer I wanted and enjoyed food from each vendor too.

I thought it was a great time and a great value.

Really enjoyed Black Oak's Dark Abbey IPA.

eric hasler
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Post by eric hasler »

Now that it has been brought up I to have a few complaints and 1 is NOT the cutie-pie nurse. The mens washroom has 3 stalls and no urinals,thats it...at a freakin' beer event not even a well placed discreet bush for the 'I can't wait' crowd. The food was at best ok and the portions were insulting for the price if you ask me....I mean for almost $50 I expect better...$5 for a 2 bite lobster roll,but as the server said....'it's lobster'(thanks for the clarification as I may have mis-understood it as roast beef). There should have been more glass cleaning stations but if you new where they were you were ok but when a brewer doesn't clean your glass or uses their brew as a 'cleaner' it does raise eyebrows and not in a FZ way of 'give it some eyebrow'. Crowd was good and well mannered as expected and the brewers were awesome as usual. I to will be questioning my attendance next year if things are not upgraded to passable instead of low-rent. To the organizers I do realize a lot of hard work went into it and please take this as constructive critisism with a slight over-cast of humour.
“The person who stands up and says, 'This is stupid,' either is asked to behave or, worse, is greeted with a cheerful 'Yes, we know! Isn't it terrific"

eric hasler
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Post by eric hasler »

Who in their right freakin' mind brings a baby in a rather large and obstructive carriage/cargo plane to beer event?
“The person who stands up and says, 'This is stupid,' either is asked to behave or, worse, is greeted with a cheerful 'Yes, we know! Isn't it terrific"

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GregClow
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Post by GregClow »

I went last night, and had a very good time. I only had one beer that I didn't care for at all, and a few were absolutely outstanding. I rarely had to stand in line for beer, and the couple of times that I did, it was only for 5 minutes or so.

As for the food - I can understand the size of the samples included in the admission price being on the small side. All of the vendors were folks that use high quality ingredients which cost more, and they were probably only getting a couple of bucks from each of the tickets sold, so I can respect that.

However, the fact that the included food samples were going to be small, and that additional food could be purchased on site, should have been made clearer in advance. It was advertised as an "ALL-IN" event, which suggests unlimited beer AND food - that wasn't the case, and the amount of food that WAS included was barely enough to make something close to a meal. I can understand why a lot of people were disappointed, especially given the length of the food line-ups.

Also, when you have an event where there are X number of tickets available for each session, and each of those X people is allowed one food sample from each vendor, there is no excuse for ANY of those vendors to run out of food before everyone gets their sample - but that's what happened with at least one of the vendors last night, who ran out barely an hour into the evening session. Maybe the organizers didn't inform the vendors how many people would be there? Or maybe they weren't being vigilant about checking people's food cards to make sure they weren't scooping seconds? Whatever the case, it needs to be handled better if a similar system is used next year.

And the washrooms... yeah, one men's room with 3 stalls is not nearly enough for an event of that size. Last year, they also had the other half of the building open for cooking demos, etc., and there are larger washrooms in there. I went and used that one a couple of times because I knew about it, but most people didn't - if they had, it would've made a big difference. Plus maybe a few porta-pottys outside.

So yeah, food and washrooms definitely need some work if they are at the same place with the same format next year. But otherwise, I found it to be a great event.

(Full disclosure: I was there on a comped ticket, but even if I had paid $40, I had enough great beer and a couple of good nibbles that I would've felt that I'd gotten my money's worth.)

JeffPorter
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Post by JeffPorter »

I wonder if the food line-ups at the second session were long because it was essentially dinner time and folks hadn't eaten yet. If I would have gone to the first one, I probably would have eaten lunch first. I came hungry to the second session hungry (as I think a lot did) which was my own mistake.

The value was good (in terms of the beer - lord knows I've spent more than $40 at volo and gotten a lot less) - it was a little fiddly with the beer tickets - I don't feel I was ripped off at all, just thirsty, and hungry, and I had to pee really badly. At one point my friends and I contemplated, walking back to the Gladstone to go, but we wouldn't have gotten back in.

The awesome beer made up for it - I was blown completely away by almost everything GLB had. Plus that crazy ice wine chip aged Belgian tripel from Beau's was worth any hunger pangs and an almost burst bladder.

One more (very nit-picky) point: I liked the mugs from last year. The tulips seemed really finicky, and I saw a few slip out of hands and break.

In terms of the food, Brock did seem genuinely shocked that he ran out of burgers. He said he even planned for extra, so I wonder if it was an organization thing.

Anyway, when our wives came to pick us up, we went for pho and all was good.

Just have some water and rinsing stations, guys.

Oh, and big thanks to the guys at spearhead who graciously rinsed my glass several times last night and were very cool about it.

I think the last thing I want to say is that "All in" is great, but I'd gladly pay more (i.e. buy sample tickets) to have a better run event.
"What can you say about Pabst Blue Ribbon that Dennis Hopper hasn’t screamed in the middle of an ether binge?" - Jordan St. John

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Blankboy
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Post by Blankboy »

lister wrote:For those that went, what does the following mean to you:

"This year for the first time, we bring you the "ALL-IN" price which
you will be able to sample approx. 100 different beers, great food,
music, comedy, and unique entertainment all under one roof!"
It certainly doesn't mean what I got, which was 5 bites of food. That's it. Scratch that, I got 4 because one sold out.
"Everything's better with monkeys!"

JeffPorter
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Post by JeffPorter »

eric hasler wrote:Who in their right freakin' mind brings a baby in a rather large and obstructive carriage/cargo plane to beer event?
I bring babies to some beer events, but always in a wearable carrier, and I would have never brought one to sessions yesterday.
"What can you say about Pabst Blue Ribbon that Dennis Hopper hasn’t screamed in the middle of an ether binge?" - Jordan St. John

eric hasler
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Post by eric hasler »

And the washrooms... yeah, one men's room with 3 stalls is not nearly enough for an event of that size. Last year, they also had the other half of the building open for cooking demos, etc., and there are larger washrooms in there. I went and used that one a couple of times because I knew about it, but most people didn't - if they had, it would've made a big difference. Plus maybe a few porta-pottys outside.

This makes it even worse,they have the facilities but don't offer them to their paying customers. Lookie what we have....but you can't use them....assholes!
“The person who stands up and says, 'This is stupid,' either is asked to behave or, worse, is greeted with a cheerful 'Yes, we know! Isn't it terrific"

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lister
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Post by lister »

My impression from the Session 99 website was that it would be unlimited beer and FOOD. It wasn't. We were at the afternoon session.

I did The Stop's Night Market on Wednesday so my impression of how an all you can eat and drink event was largely based off of that (hadn't been to one before.) There you just walked in and helped yourself to everything until it ran out. I was critical about some food running out until it was pointed out that the vendors may have donated their time and food to the event, okay that's fine if that was true. At a paid commercial event the food and drinks should be calculated to hold through to near the end.

Upon entering the event we were handed glasses and nothing else mentioned. We wandered in, took a look around and remarked "That's it?!" not noticing the indoor part which as far as I could tell wasn't marked with signage pointing that out when you walked in. We eventually noticed that when we wandered over to check out the smoking smell from the Green Egg booth. Mmmm...

So inspecting the glass we found a food sheet and food/drink tickets with no explanation of what they are or how they were to be used. I was like "WTF?!" I asked a beer vendor and he didn't have a clue. Since they were still letting in people I didn't want to bother the staff at the front and miss out on any food. My girlfriend was going to get another corn dog when she was told that it would be $2. Um, okay, no dice. I asked a staff member about 40 minutes later what the deal was. We could ask for more drink tickets but the food was limited to the card.

For what appeared to be an "all-you-can-eat/drink event" that was disappointing. Even though the drinking was unlimited I really didn't want to have to fuck around with tickets.

Better rinsing stations would be nice. More accessible drinking water would be nice too. I didn't have any issues with washrooms since for some unknown reason I was a camel that day. The live music suffered from "YOU MUST LISTEN TO OUR MUSIC!!!!!" syndrome and was too loud.

Kudos to most of the breweries that brought more than their usual lineup. Flying Monkeys was great! It was good to try the new brews from Spearhead (bought a shirt and cap.) Bellwoods beer was great as usual. It was interesting to see what sort of traffic the breweries got. Some appeared to be quite light like King and Steamwhistle. King didn't have anything new and I really don't understand why Steamwhistle would be there. With what I would presume as a mostly craft beer drinking crowd who would be familiar with the beer and brand, why be there?

Steamwhistle was at the One Stop Night Market and that made sense to me. There would be lots of people there that are either non-beer drinkers or macro drinkers that would gain from Steamwhistle being there. Good marketing opportunity for them.

Anyways I think given the experience we likely wouldn't bother with Session 99 again next year if it's staged.
lister

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Blankboy
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Post by Blankboy »

I will expand on my one line above.

First, the bad:

- The food was not only a huge letdown but also misadvertised. They claimed one price all-in and it was far from that. You got five one-bite samples (and you only got 5 if you got them before any sold out) and then had to pay for the rest. This event started at 6:00pm, promised six food vendors and the price was all in so I had no dinner beforehand as I (and my wife and friends) expected to get some food at the event. Needless to say I left quite hungry. If I'd paid $50 at the door for this I would've been even more upset then I was.

- The line-ups and crowd. Obviously there were more people here then the location can comfortably handle. My wife waited 30 minutes in line for a tiny lobster taco. Vendors ran out of food and drink. Don't even get me started on the 30 minute wait to go for a piss. So many people complained, and the line up was so huge, they finally decided it might be a good idea to open another bathroom.

- Last Call. I'm not sure they are aware how it works as normally when you announce Last Call that means you have time to go get one more drink (or round) before they close. In this case, they announced Last Call, we headed over and the vendors were already closed.

The good:

- All the breweries and the beer. Every booth I went to not only had great beer but great people serving the beer. Lots of variety, lots of one-offs -- simply great beer.

That's all that was good. I don't feel I got my money's worth at all and unless I am assured things will be very different next year, I won't be back.
"Everything's better with monkeys!"

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