The headline pretty much says it all. Belmont Station has decided to pre-sell tickets to buy this most over hyped of all beers Russian Rivers Pliny The Younger that I already blogged about here along with its more common uncle Pliny The Elder.
For $15 you get both beers by the glass only. 10oz I believe.
Price gouging you say? Belmont Station is going to donate half of the ticket price to Mercy Corps so maybe you feel that makes up for it a bit.
In the email from Belmont Station they say:
"Since we are a very small establishment we cannot accomodate the rush of folks who would arrive simultaneously if we announced that we were tapping our limited amount of this much sought after beer at a certain time."
That is probably a true statement. If they announced it ahead of time and hyped it up like last year then it would no doubt be packed. Orrr here is a crazy idea, you just put it on tap like any other beer without the hoopla!! Sort of like every other beer bar has done in Portland like Horse Brass, Saraveza, County Cork and Henry's Tavern. I was at a few of these places and while the beer geeks did come out none of the bars got all that slammed and they still sold out the beer within a couple of hours. Hyping this beer up and making you buy tickets does not serve the consumer whatsoever. Naked City Taproom in Seattle actually pre-sold their PTY too and the beer geeks showed up only to find the keg kicked within minutes because of all the presales and they had a lot of pissed off people. BS does seem to be avoiding that by not offering this at all to the public if they have not bought a ticket. I hope they dont open this up for sales day of.
Strangely I received this email from Belmont Station at 5:56 PM on Monday and in the email they announce that tickets would be on sale that day at 5:45 PM. What is up with that? Probably will cause a mad rush of people trying to get to Belmont Station after work for tickets thus defeating the purpose.
I also think its highly possible that people will just pass on this deal because they have gotten their tastes or will soon.
My final thoughts are if you dont mind spending $15 on 2 glasses of beer and want to donate to charity then I suppose this is a good idea. There are worse ways to spend your money and not a lot of better ways to donate. But I cant help but think this is some hype and marketing gone wrong and would rather just donate my money outright to Mercy Corps.
The full BS email below:
"Pliny the Younger on draft. Since we are a very small establishment we cannot accomodate the rush of folks who would arrive simultaneously if we announced that we were tapping our limited amount of this much sought after beer at a certain time. So we have a plan that will enable those most interested to get a taste, avoid being overcrowded, and raise some money for Mercy Corps at the same time. Here goes:
Today at 5:45PM Tickets will go on sale. The ticket will guarantee you a glass of Pliny the Younger and a glass of Pliny the Elder simultaneously, anytime between 3PM and 10PM Tuesday March 16. Once you have a ticket you don't have to rush. You can come in anytime that day and you'll get your beer as we will only sell as many tickets as we have glasses of beer available. The price is $15. they go on sale at 5:30PM today. CASH ONLY (yes we have an ATM). 50% of each ticket will be donated to Mercy Corps.
We will tweet when they sell out so watch our twitter feed or www.belmont-station.com. Each person may buy two tickets but nobody will be served more than one glass of each beer. I will also ask for the name of the person who will use the ticket. They may not be resold. If I see any craigslist silliness or anybody attempts to copy the tickets we will check each ID and refuse service to any that don't match.
We have a fantastic Ninkasi tasting going on tonight from 6-8PM so your trip here will be doubly fun!
Belmont Station
4500 SE Stark St.
Portland, OR 97215
503-232-8538
www.belmont-station.com"
"[I]f you dont mind spending $15 on 2 glasses of beer and want to donate to charity then I suppose this is a good idea. There are worse ways to spend your money and not a lot of better ways to donate." - I think that says it all.
ReplyDelete"Strangely I received this email from Belmont Station at 5:56 PM on Monday and in the email they announce that tickets would be on sale that day at 5:45 PM. What is up with that?"
ReplyDeleteProbably just that the tubes were a little clogged.
In seriousness, most bulk mailers don't churn through emails all that quickly (intentionally; sending too fast tends to get you blacklisted by the big mail providers). I got mine at 5:50. I don't know how large their mailing list is, but it wouldn't be abnormal for them to only be sending out a couple emails a second.
$15 for two glasses of beer is a lot to pay. However, since 50% of each ticket will be donated to Mercy Corps, it's really $7.50 for two glasses of beer and a little extra for charity. $7.50 for two hard-to-find glasses of beer is a pretty good deal, actually, and any money towards Mercy Corps is money well spent.
ReplyDeleteOr everyone could stop buying into the hype, skip both Tickle Me Elder and Furby the Younger, and just pick up some RR's overshadowed Blind Pig.
ReplyDeleteYou won't have to make a special trip to buy a ticket, another on a particular night to enjoy your beer and you will have plenty of cash left over to make your Mercy Corp donation.
Cheers!
Kevin
beerandcoding.com
We were pretty much in a "damned if you do, damned if you don't situation" with this beer, especially as the other places in town drained their kegs and people knew we were the last ones sitting on it.
ReplyDeleteIn the last 6 weeks I've received well over 100 emails and we've fielded countless phone calls regarding PtY. If we had simply put the beer on tap without mentioning it we would have been doing a disservice to the 2000+ people on our email list who subscribe in order to hear about stuff like this.
On the other hand, if we had announced the tapping time and not sold tickets in advance we would have had more people in the bar than we can legally hold, and chances are a fair number of people would have walked away frustrated and empty handed.
No matter what we did we were bound to upset some people, but this seemed like a good way to get the beer out to the people who really wanted to try it, reduce the stress and chaos for both customers and staff, and help a great charity at the same time. I haven't been paying attention to the online chatter (until this morning), but most of the people I've spoken to in the store seemed to think it was a good idea, and many expressed thanks that they'd be able to come down at their leisure after work and be guaranteed to get a glass.
Was this the best solution? Who knows. All I know (and you should know this too Ezra), is that we don't need a repeat of last year.
Chris,
ReplyDeleteI think I was pretty fair on this and if people are into it then so be it. Most of the comments here are pro but I got a lot of people upset by it commenting on twitter but of course I know you cant please everyone.
I do have to disagree about it being a disservice to if you did not spread the word to your mailing list. After all Saraveza tapped it as normal and they put it out on twitter but that is it. I hear it got pretty busy but not crazy and no one was upset by it. I am sure there are lots of beers people want to know about when they go on tap, but you cant email about them all and their is not some big backlash.
And yeah I mentioned what happened last year in my previous post about PTY which is linked to at the beginning of this post. That was out of hand last year but it could easily be streamlined as we have done at upright. More then 2 bartenders. Dont allow food or samples. Maybe take a ticket to wait your turn for the glass of beer...etc
I live 70 miles from Portland and was elated with this setup; purchased a ticket on Sunday afternoon, March 14, and will enjoy every sip tonight. The alternative was probably to go to Santa Rosa in Feb. and wait in line for 2 hrs. $7.50 per glass is a lot cheaper than a 1200 mile RT road trip. Thank you BS!
ReplyDeleteI wish I could complain about this. I pay 9$ for a bottle of good beer, when it's available twice a year. Beer loving sucks in Canada
ReplyDelete