(Chico, CA) – Another domino falls.
Hat tip to Draft Magazine’s Chris Staten for quietly (too quietly?) breaking this news late last month. The news re-surfaced today on Beer Advocate.
Later this year, Sierra Nevada Brewing will can its Pale Ale for the first time. Here are some quote-ables from Sierra Nevada’s Bill Manley:
Our canning line should be in the building near July 4. It will be a couple of moths to get it up and running, but should start seeing Pale Ale in cans in late 2011.
We’re on the fence about what other beers to release, but I think we’ll have a couple of different brews available.
Cans will only be a small part of our output, but we’re excited to see how they’re received.
There are so many places where you can’t or won’t bring glass…up here in the foothills it just doesn’t make a lot of sense to bring a bunch of bottles with you in your backpack! This is really the reason we’re going for this.
Right now we’re thinking can-conditioned. All of our bottle Pale Ale is bottle conditioned so it makes sense. We need to do some serious QA trails of all available options before saying anything for sure.
No chance of bottled Pale Ale going anywhere. Cans are in addition to, not in place of.
At this point, you have to wonder when Samuel Adams will make an announcement about cans. The Boston-based brewer is the last big domino left to fall.
I believe unless I am imagining things Steve Dressler talked about this with the guys on the Brewing Network Sunday Session last year when he was on, in maybe August or September.
You seem to think breweries canning is a bad thing? “Another domino falls.” sure makes it sound that way. As an avid craft/micro beer drinker, I have had many fine beers from a can and they definitely do have their benefits, especially camping and backpacking.
I’m unaware of any negative connotation with that phrase and am approaching it from a purely analytical perspective. I looked up the phrase as an idiom in Google & this is the closest thing I found:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/fall+like+dominoes > “To fall sequentially, as when one object in a line, by falling against the next object, causes it in turn to fall, and that second object causes a third to fall, etc.; the process can be repeated an indefinite number of times.”
The canning movement has picked up such a head of steam that it is only a matter of time until other dominoes fall (or other breweries decide to join in).
@Patrick Actually summarized that interview here: http://beerpulse.com/2010/08/sierra-nevada-hoptimum-bottles-10-growth-and-other-updates/ – i would’ve missed a pretty big nugget there but I guess it’s possible!
I am a fan of The Brewing Network & often give them credit for their work here. 🙂
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Great scoop, I’m stoked. The fresher the better.
I believe on the brewing network Steve mentioned that they had NO plans to can in the future.
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It is official… I lived in Chico for many Years and know people that work for the company… maybe this will shed some light on it: