Brewers on Television

The news for the Sam Calagione/Dogfish head Craft brewery sitcom on FOX came out more than a month ago, but last night I had an entertaining thought. What if it were a Pittsburgh brewer or brewery that was lucky enough to have such an opportunity? Which one would it be? Which one would you like to see depicted?

The choice was easy in my mind. It'd have to be Full Pint Brewing in North Versailles. There are multiple brewers that run the place. Each of them are awesome characters in their own right. They're sometimes hanging out in the tap room if you've ever visited the place just off of Route 30. The television networks would be able to put together one hell of a cast. Sometimes they've modeled themselves as characters on their own beer labels. Just an entertaining group.

The Full Pint story is an interesting one as well. Five brewers basically going "All In" to start a brewery. One of their first brews even took on that name. Full Pint has already taken a dip into Pittsburgh pop culture by releasing the new 3-2-1 Win Beer with Pittsburgh Dad on it.

I realize that this is unlikely because not many brewers around here have yet to secure such national acclaim as Dogfish has. Still, it's special that in some way we're all close to the people that make our beer here in Western, Pa.

A Long Time Ago in a Brewery Far, Far Away

I sure hope you get the reference in the title I chose for this post. If you don't, we might have to have a sit down and watch a few of my favorite movies. It wasn't that long ago that Dogfish Head Craft Brewery Owner Sam Calagione went off on a few Beer Advocate message board geeks about overrated breweries.

Well, we have yet another edition of angry craft brewers as Lagunitas Brewing owner/founder Tony Magee had a bit of a Twitter tirade towards Miller Coors and A-B InBev earlier this week. You can read all about it over at Beer Pulse.

I love it when someone in a higher position makes their voices be heard sometimes, but I'm not totally sure Magee has anything to stand on with this one. Maybe it's just my opinion. Who knows?

I'm not totally sure the big-time American brewing corporations are completely against the smaller craft brewers anymore. I think that they are fully aware of how fast some of these breweries are growing in size and popularity and that they know they need to maintain somewhat of a good relationship with them. It could be that or you could say that maybe all of the recent purchases of breweries by the big boys might mean the exact opposite.

I'm certainly not an economic expert on the beer industry. That's for sure.