At the recent Beer Boot Camp, a well known South African beer geek asked me an interesting question: what do you do when you buy a beer and find that, having paid your R30-ish for a bottle, it’s undrinkable and ends up glugging down your sink.
It’s a topic that’s been discussed on both the Wort Hogs and East Coast Brewers Facebook pages and one that often comes up in conversation for me. So what do you do? Is it fair to blast a brewer for his or her bad beer on social media? Is it helpful to stay silent?
Clumps in your beer? Not good.
1. Chalk it up to experience
This is probably the option that most people go for when it comes to buying a bad beer. You’ve forked out the extra cash for a small-batch local brew, taken it home, cracked open the bottle and tasted it. You’ve pulled a face, tasted it again and chucked it down the sink. You’re kind of annoyed but maybe you’re not quite sure what was wrong with it, you don’t feel comfortable contacting the brewer, you certainly don’t feel comfortable taking it back to the store and/or you can’t really be bothered to do anything about it. One thing’s for sure – you won’t be risking your wallet on another bottle of the same, or, most likely, on anything from the brewery in question. It’s the easy option for sure, but it doesn’t help anyone – you’ve still lost your cash, the next person to buy the brew is going to do the same and the brewer has no idea that there was anything wrong with his or her beer.
2. Offer constructive feedback
You don’t have to be a BJCP judge to contact a brewer and offer feedback on the beer. You might not be able to pinpoint the exact off flavour or suggest the right fermentation temperature/cleaning procedure/water treatment process to attempt to avoid said off-flavour, but you can still contact the brewer and tell them you couldn’t drink their beer. Give as much info as possible – was the beer flat? What did it smell like? Did it taste at all like you expected? What flavours did you pick up? What did the beer look like when you poured? It’s also useful to let them know when and where you bought it – and to pre-emptively let them know how you stored it (I’ve often been offered, when reporting an off-brew, the old ‘oh it mustn’t have been kept in the fridge’ excuse). I’d suggest offering this feedback via private channels – look up the brewery’s email address or if you’re more of a phoner, give them a call.
Also read: Band Aid Beer.
3. Give the brewer a chance
Sometimes, stuff goes wrong in the brewing process. You might have got the one bottle that failed to carbonate correctly or bought a beer from the one batch that got contaminated with wild yeast. It’s always worth giving the brewer a chance to replace your sub-par beer and I know a few people who will return the brew to its source and request a replacement. Of course, if the second bottle exhibits the same flaws, then you might want to refer to point 1, above, after politely telling the brewer there are some issues with the beer in question.
If your beer does this, send it back
4. Shout it from the rooftops
This is a contentious issue. Should you head straight for your social media platforms to tell a brewery that the beer they sold you wasn’t up to par? Some people feel that businesses are now fair game and that if you have a problem with a service provider/restaurant/brewery you skip the personal contact stage and just go straight to Twitter. Personally I find this a little disrespectful. I always like to give a brewer (or restaurant owner, or even someone as frustrating to deal with as an insurance company or government agency) a chance to defend themselves in private. Of course, if you’ve contacted them via email or phone, or you’ve visited the brewery, bad beer in hand asking for a replacement and you’ve received nothing but excuses – or sometimes just nothing at all – in response, perhaps they don’t care about their brand at all, so Tweet away…
What do you think? If you get a bad beer do you chuck it and move on? Do you think it’s ever right to call someone out on social media? Do you return the bad bottle to the store or take it right back to the brewery? Or perhaps, like Billy Carter, you’ve never had a bad beer at all, in which case I’d say you’re a very lucky bugger and you can order for me next time we’re at the bar…
I’m sure most brewers out there would prefer it if you pick up the phone and say “Hey brewster, your beer is usually awesome but I think this batch may have gone funk, maybe its a good idea to yank it from the shelves?”
I totally agree…though sometimes, just sometimes, brewers don’t want to hear it, alas…
We’re always open to replacing stock for whatever reason (as long as it’s reasonable – had someone ask me the other day if they can still drink a gift pack that they bought from us four years ago! Not a good plan, I said!) – if something happened and it stems from an issue at the brewery, they deserve to have an explanation and fresh complimentary beer (and usually a few extras thrown in to ease the burn).
Unfortunately, once it leaves our hands, the beer is not always handled correctly by the outlets/bars/restaurants, but the blame always aims right at the source. Even then, we more often than not do what we need to keep folks happy, because good service is right up there with creating good beer.
I must say, I find the current trend of naming and shaming on social media before anyone has a chance to defend themselves very destructive. Sure, those people get to vent and feel validated, but all the folks that happen across that post or tweet merely assume that this one flat or off beer is indicitive of everything that brewery produces, and it can have a huge negative effect on both reputation and sales. And once that has happened, the amount of work mending bridges can take an aeon. It is also usually an isolated incident, which makes the aftershock even worse.
I bought a few Cape beers from one of our local Midlands shops yesterday – I cracked one of the bottles, and there was an alarming amount of foam. Once the foam had settled, the beer was a thick, murky brown and extremely sour – not what was implied by the style on the label, and certainly not right. I sent the brewer a mail this morning, explaining what I experienced and await a response. I have another couple of their beers from the same purchase, so I’m reluctant to delve in too quickly.
But at least they get a chance to respond – I assume it was a problem from after it left them, but at least they are aware and can do something about it either way. Nobody’s perfect.
Thanks John – great comments! Hope you hear back from the Cape brewery in question soon…
Anothet great article Lucy! Think you are spot on. Following on from John’s comments about the harm social media can do this is a great TED talk that addresses this issue.
Oops forgot the link https://www.ted.com/talks/jon_ronson_what_happens_when_online_shaming_spirals_out_of_control
Awesome, thanks Wendy – I’ll have a look at that tonight 🙂
Hi Lucy, great topic!! From my experience, and I definitely like to think I am fairly experienced on the topic, being in the distribution chain of craft beer for 7 years now… Most of the time(not all of the time) when the brewer put the beer in the said bottle it was perfect, the issues come in the distribution chain, cold storage and retailers storing bottle on fridge. I can put my neck out and say at least 60% of beers being transported Long Hall are not being transported cold. A number of distributors don’t keep stock refrigerated and the worst culprit, 75% of retailers at not storing stock in fridges.
Hey Dyllan – I wonder if brewers need to be more explicit on their labelling if they feel their beer needs to be kept cold at all times? It’s still a young industry and many liquor store owners/bars/drinkers might not know that the brewer wants their beer kept cold throughout the chain, especially since this isn’t the case with all craft beers…what do you think?
If it’s ours, call, explain the flaw and get it replaced.
Thanks Eric, hopefully all other brewers feel the same way!
We have a huge struggle getting a lot of bottle stores to keep the beer refrigerated. Then we have to battle when they want to return beer…. haha.