The local beer world wouldn't be the wonderful and diverse place it is without the people responsible for bringing beer to life and into your hands. So, as Local Beer Day approaches, we're shining a light on some of them: the brewers, business owners, reps, educators, bar staff, marketing gurus and more.
The Local Beer Legends series kicked off on The Crafty Pint's Instagram and Facebook last weekend, and we plan to run a new Q&A with people in different roles in all parts of the country every day until February 24. They'll also appear on the Local Beer Day website when we launch the full version in the coming days.
Each short and sweet piece offers and insight into just how diverse the industry has become over the past couple of decades – both in terms of the roles required to get beer into drinkers' hands and the people filling those roles. And each of those people we're featuring has their own take on why supporting local businesses – beer or otherwise – is so important, especially in tougher times like these.
We've also opened sales for Local Beer Day t-shirts (see above – third image on the second row), once again in partnership with Perth-based Short Batch who produced the Keeping Local Alive t-shirts. If you'd like to get hold of one, sales are open here until February 2, which will allow enough time for them to be printed and delivered before February 24.
Local Beer Day is supported by the Independent Brewers Association; you can find your nearest IBA brewery member via askforindiebeer.com.au.
Registering Events
Despite stating we wanted to make taking part in Local Beer Day as easy and inexpensive as possible – just get the brewery owners back behind the bar or showcase beers from your nearest brewers, we said – it seems you can't stifle the beer world's creativity!
Already, we've got all manner of exciting events lined up, from laneway parties and community festivals uniting multiple producers, to bus tours visiting multiple breweries, a giant sack race, sensory masterclasses, boilermakers, sour fests, and even some wrestling.
If you'd like your brewery, bar, bottleshop or beer business to be involved, there's still time. Technically, there's no hard and fast deadline as we'll accept additions right up to the day. However, we will be switching on the full site soon, with a PR campaign starting in early February, so the earlier the better!
How Does It Work?
- Head to the Host An Event page on the Local Beer Day website
- Register an account then follow the prompts
- The cost to register is $100 per event ($50 for Crafty-listed businesses; $75 for IBA members*)
- Event hosts can log back in at any time to make changes or add more events
- All paid-for events will appear once we launch the full Local Beer Day site: on the map and homepage, and with an individual event page
- We'll provide digital and downloadable promotional assets to hosts
Keep an eye out for more coverage as the day approaches, and feel free to help spread the word as we look forward to celebrating local beer from local brewers at the best local venues all over Australia. Cheers!
*If you're an IBA member and haven't been sent the special URL to access your discount, let us know.
James Smith launched The Crafty Pint in 2010, two years after moving to Australia from the UK. He was taken to Mountain Goat within weeks of landing in Melbourne, joined their indoor cricket team, and is still navigating the rabbit hole that is craft beer to this day.
The beers that turned you on to good beer:
- Watching pints of McEwan's 80 Shilling settle when visiting family in Edinburgh.
- Pints of flat Bass from the jug at the Cap & Stocking in Kegworth.
- A first Paulaner Hefeweizen when working in Munich in 1998: “This smells of bananas!”
- Castle Rock Harvest Pale – how could a 3.8 percent ABV beer be so good? (It turns out it was an early example of the three Cs – Cascade, Centennial and Columbus – in an English bitter).
- Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA poured through hops at the Sunset Grill in Cambridge, MA, in the company of a man who turned out to be the Beer Nut (while we were both covering a double murder case at the time).
- Ordering a Mountain Goat Hightail on my first day as an Aussie resident as it was local and I’d never heard of it; “A dark Australian beer; well I never…”
- Murray’s Icon 2IPA at Beer DeLuxe Fed Square, recommended by a guy I’d not long known who's now the main man at Fixation, served by Mik Halse, now head of sales at Hawkers. How could an Australian beer smell as good as that?!?
You've got three beers to turn someone else on to good beer; what are they and why?
- Any really good, fresh and balanced West Coast style IPA. Punchy hop aromatics are the most obvious way to capture someone's attention and these IPAs, done well, present the key components in beer (if you're sticking to just water, malt, hops and yeast) in harmony yet with the volume turned up.
- Saison Dupont. Arguably a selfish choice here as I bloody love the broad saison style and dearly hope it will finally take hold in Australia one day. Given a choice, I'd probably crack one enlivened with Brettanomyces like Molly Rose Matilde for myself but, when it comes to turning on someone new, you've got to go with the classic.
- Rodenbach Caractère Rouge. Because if you don't enjoy or can't appreciate this beer, I'll never win you over. And because Filip, the fruit and wood specialist at Rodenbach that designed it, is a beautiful human.
The last beer you enjoyed:
Fixation IPA at The Incubator.
Three things that represent you:
- The Soft Bulletin by The Flaming Lips
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- Golden Plains
NB All articles written by James in the first eight years of the site appear as By Crafty Pint. Today, that's used for collaborative efforts by the wider team.
