Give Sam Adams Props for Sharing Hops
All craft beer drinkers should tip a pint to Jim Koch and Sam Adams for helping his fellow brewers. Here's why...
There is a major shortage of hops on the open market and many smaller breweries are feeling a major pinch. Larger breweries, with more buying power, have locked contracts with the hop farmers and have insured a steady supply at pre-set prices. Smaller breweries don’t have this luxury and the sudden shortage of hops has placed some in jeopardy. Enter Sam Adams.
Sam Adams (Boston Beer Co) agreed to share 20,000 pounds of their own hops with other craft brewers via a lottery. A Little over six weeks ago Boston Beer sent of notification to the 108 small brewers that won the lottery. This allows them to have share of the 20,000 pounds of hops at a reasonable hops.
"It shows how great the need is and I felt really bad," said Boston Beer Co. founder Jim Koch. "We even fudged it a little and went over the 20,000 pounds, but we just don't have the capability of filling this hole ourselves, but we were able to fill 20 percent of it."
Koch said the company looked at its supply of hops and decided to live up a long established culture among craft brewers.
"We view each other as colleagues not as competitors," he said.
Koch said the shortage became acute last year when the 2007 hops crop came in below average, the third bad season in a row for hops. In addition, increased beer consumption has increased demand for hops, he said.
One small craft brewer said his 88 pounds of hops of Sam Adams hops will last him a year. He'll pay Boston Beer's volume contracted cost, about $6 a pound, much cheaper than the $25 to $30 a pound he'd have to pay on the open market if he could get the German hops Boston Beer is providing.
"It's a great savings, but more than the money, I was not able to get any imported hops this year. I had to reformulate all of my recipes. There's domestic hops but if you're making a German lager you'd prefer to use a German hop rather than an American-grown German variety because there are differences," he said.
This is a class act by a class beer company. The next time you’re at the beer store and staring at the cooler try to decide what 6 pack to buy, think of Sam Adams and their generosity and support of other craft brewers.
Visit TrueBeer.com for Beer Boots.
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