New Arrivals at LCBO & TBS

[sofakingdrunk]

Couldn't agree more with your final paragraph

[jeremyg]

i dunno about most here but i don't even really consider bellwoods overpriced. most of their beers are $5 a pop. for a 500ml bottle thats not too shabby at all.

[napoleon]

i dunno about most here but i don't even really consider bellwoods overpriced. most of their beers are $5 a pop. for a 500ml bottle thats not too shabby at all.

I agree…although I do fondly remember the days when all their beers came in 650 ml bottles for the same price they do now.

One thing to note is that Bellwoods doesn't benefit from the same economy of scale that brewers do that are big enough to send stuff to the LCBO. While I don't know the details, I imagine these bigger brewers have much more serious bottling equipment. At Bellwoods, the guy working the retail desk is putting the labels on one at a time. I think that definitely contributes somewhat to the cost.

[northyorksammy]

"They're making arguably the best IPAs in the province and if you're quick, you can grab them in tall cans for $3.50(ish) at the bottle shop. Even if you miss out on the cans, $6 at the LCBO for the 650ml bomber is still pretty good."

GL makes consistently best hoppy beers in Canada.

[Belgian]

You just can't throw Bellwoods under the bus for any reason in any debate, period. I'm not a fan of everything they do (Roman Candle, WitchShark are not my thing) but they do delivery highly on intrinsic quality, very careful bottling and quite artistic labelling. I'm opening 2-year-old bottles with zero issues, and I would trust their cellaring guidelines implicitly. I do sometimes marvel at their relatively high pricing (one of the no-holds-barred things they model on Mikkeller) but we are all in fact voluntarity supporting the existence of a pretty unique club, and I for one will take it.

Bellwoods for all they do is an island apart.

… but pricing in Ontario is terrible all around. Breweries like oast house and Bellwoods that only sell out of their store front have pretty brutal pricing as well(I realize that oast is in the lcbo, but their pricing has been fucked since before then and still is for their growler fills). I'm not sure, but I doubt the lcbo tells Bellwoods to price their beers the way they do...

Oast House Hefeweizen aged in white wine oak, seven $ a pint at Thirsty & Miserable right now. Insane good value. I'm pretty sure it's a mystery how to efficiently package beer in Ontario, same applies to Lake of Bays, who I only ever buy on tap.

[ckoop]

Hey don't get me wrong, I love bellwoods, i only used them because of the ire that the price of princess wears girl pants is getting while the similarly priced bellwoods gets a pass (refering to their ipas). regardless of how people personally feel about the quality of either breweries beers, i seriously doubt that the cost to produce either of them is much different. but i honestly have no idea as i'm not a brewer and have no clue how much this stuff costs them to brew.

one thing i will say about bellwoods pricing is that their BA offerings while seemingly high priced are a decent price when you look at stuff being put out by many of the sought after breweries in the US. any of jester king's fruited sours in 500ml are 16 usd and their BA saisons have been creeping up and range from 14-20 usd for 750ml.

[Belgian]

I love bellwoods, i only used them because of the ire that the price of princess wears girl pants is getting while the similarly priced bellwoods gets a pass (refering to their ipas). regardless of how people personally feel about the quality of either breweries beers, i seriously doubt that the cost to produce either of them is much different.

Depends what you mean by 'costs to produce', factoring the location and limited square footage and scale of the operation, overheads basically. Would we not like an excellent 'boutique' brewer to even exist to make a beer like Skeleton Key or Mötley Crüe, I do hope we would, to wit my remarks that Bellwoods is in my view at least for the time unimpeachable. 2¢ and I'm not really arguing against your view either, and the market will bear as it will clearly bear in this case ya dig.

[darmokandjalad]

Drinking a can of Girlpants right now. I like it about as much as I did last year (a fair bit), but I still probably wouldn't have bought it if the staff had bothered to put a price tag on the shelf (at least 5 days and counting, still no tag, rabble rabble, boo to the LCBO, etc.).

If GLB can release some of the best IPAs in Canada in six-dollar bombers then I don't see any reason to bother with this one for like $5.25 a tallboy.

Just because it has a high abv and uses Belgian yeast doesn't mean it's worth paying more for. Especially not when the low abv "session beers" absolutely do not cost less than regular-abv options, but I digress.

[atomeyes]

I love bellwoods, i only used them because of the ire that the price of princess wears girl pants is getting while the similarly priced bellwoods gets a pass (refering to their ipas). regardless of how people personally feel about the quality of either breweries beers, i seriously doubt that the cost to produce either of them is much different.

Depends what you mean by 'costs to produce', factoring the location and limited square footage and scale of the operation, overheads basically. Would we not like an excellent 'boutique' brewer to even exist to make a beer like Skeleton Key or Mötley Crüe, I do hope we would, to wit my remarks that Bellwoods is in my view at least for the time unimpeachable. 2¢ and I'm not really arguing against your view either, and the market will bear as it will clearly bear in this case ya dig.

people forget the following:
1. we're in toronto (rent)
2. we're in Ontario (high minimum wage)
3. LCBO doesn't make selling stuff overly profitable

[spinrsx]

new:

ALL OF NOTHING HOPFENWEISSE
Canada | Underdog'S Brewhouse Inc.
LCBO 417543 | 473 mL | $ 2.95

[walz22]

I see the LCBO still struggles with getting the names of beers right...

[jeremyg]

You just can't throw Bellwoods under the bus for any reason in any debate, period. I'm not a fan of everything they do (Roman Candle, WitchShark are not my thing) but they do delivery highly on intrinsic quality, very careful bottling and quite artistic labelling. I'm opening 2-year-old bottles with zero issues, and I would trust their cellaring guidelines implicitly. I do sometimes marvel at their relatively high pricing (one of the no-holds-barred things they model on Mikkeller) but we are all in fact voluntarity supporting the existence of a pretty unique club, and I for one will take it.

Bellwoods for all they do is an island apart.

agree with this 100%

[spinrsx]

new I think..

SWEETGRASS GOLDEN ALE
LCBO 420356 | 473 mL can
Price $ 2.75

[ercousin]

No sign of the full Orval rollout yet? Been checking drinkvine but nothing yet...

[alsiem]

I'm checking everyday for the Orval.

As to Oast House pricing, I think their location in wine country is the cause of their pricing. If you have been driving around buying $20 bottles of wine, then $8 bombers may not seem expensive. I found Silversmith to be similar in pricing. Also, I think they are doing a decent restaurant trade for people that want to drink local products and will pay a premium for a Niagara experience.

However, removed from that context I don't know why I would pay $11 for a Saison when Dupont is $8. Good luck.