Such Important Issues

I was leaning towards doing a small write-up concerning sandwiches paired with certain beers, but over the past two weeks I've kept seeing the Charlie Papazian "Do You Care Who Makes Your Beer?" polls/articles/tweets. I figured that the subject would hold much more importance over beer consumed with few sandwiches. In case you're really interested in what I was going to initially write about, you can head on over to CraftBeer.com to see my inspiration for what I originally wanted to write.

My only mission is finding good beer.

I've also constantly seen a lot of bickering over the purchase of Goose Island through various social media entities. While, I don't know all of the details to involve myself in such an argument, I will share the Papazian article (with a link to his semi-annual poll) I came across to spread word of this.

It all does come off as a pretty important issue. We've seen some local breweries be purchased by the big American major companies i.e. Latrobe Brewing (I know a Canadian company bought it in the 1980's, but you get my point). So, we have a gist in this area of the issue of who actually brews our beer.

I do care who makes my beer - to an extent. I am partial to some breweries and that includes some local ones due to the fact that I'm proud to be from this area and I want them to do well. On the other hand, beers like Leinenkugel Sunset Wheat and Hoegaarden were some of my favorite beers during my transition of typical beers you come across on college campuses. Those were gateway beers, so to speak, before I found more craft-like offerings and I still hold them in high affinity.

I do realize that they are owned by some of the American majors in some form, but those beers are still part of my story as a fan of beer and if you know me I'm not one that believes we should erase/forget history.

Again, I'm not an expert on beer economics, but I sometimes lose sight on what this craft beer fight is for. Isn't it just a pursuit of great beer? At least that's what I thought it was. I agree, that most of the beers the big companies make are produced for just the sake of mass production and not quality, but I sometimes enjoy trying their seasonal offerings just to check things out.

Sometimes I get a good laugh because I know that the company exists strictly for putting a product out there (regardless of it's quality) and bringing in money. Sadly, there are just bland beers out there like Bud Light and Coors Light, etc. Even worse is the fact that they somehow sell like hotcakes. Then again it's still possible to find a beer you enjoy and have it made/owned by one of these dominant companies. If you ask me, this will be one of those battles that will never end. Many views out there could be different than my take, but this is just how I see it.

I originally intended this post to just be a few paragraphs, but it ended up pouring out onto the page like this. Much apologies. Thanks if you actually spent time reading until this point.