One of the US’s finest craft breweries has announced in the last few minutes that they are looking to launch a brewery in Europe.
Stone – whose beers include Arrogant Bastard and Ruination IPA – are constantly receiving requests to get more of their beers sold in Europe, and have decided the best way to do this – to ensure delivery of fresh, quality beer – is to open a brewery on this side of the pond.
Where, with whom and how is not yet clear. In a video announcement, the brewery’s Greg Koch explains that they’re floating it as an idea to see what response it has. If a brewer approaches them and says “here’s a brewery we no longer want – you can have it” that would make things very easy. But they haven’t yet decided what country to brew in, let alone what kind of site.
The whole thing is a tease – this announcement is a toe in the water to see what the response is. Clearly, they can’t just come here and build a brewery from scratch on their own.
I hope and believe that there will be a deluge of interested potential investors, partners, landlords – and I’ll certainly be at the front of the queue of loyal customers.
So if you fancy being part of what could be some of the best brewing news of the next couple of years – Greg wants to hear from you
I have wondered why there is not more of this and have even participated professionally in a study of doing a similar thing between Canada and the USA. And even if they do not buy a brewery, could they not license their beers under close brewing control?
If you don't mind, I will copy and paste the comment I posted on Pencil&Spoon on this very same subject:
"I don't know…. One of the things that micros have managed to do is to reclaim the sense of regionalism of the beer, as opposed to the macros that sell a brand, not a drink.
If it's true that Stone is planning to up shop in Europe (and provided they do it under the same brand name) they would risk becoming a bit like, say, Guinness in the eyes of many.
Of course, they could also set up a Stone Co. London or whatever and brew a completely different range of beers than what they brew in the US.
IMO the best move would be to operate under another brand name, very much like wine makers do."
Would love to know what you think of this.
I always thought the eco side of shipping beer around the world is really dodgy.
There's a certain cool microbrewery currently planning to expand into a new hi-tech eco-minded brewery, but they export a great proportion of their beer (i.e. moving heavy beer & glass around the world). Seems a bit odd to me.
In other news I had a superb 'bomber' of Stone IPA last week – so much Yank-hop flavour, but really balanced with alco, malt & bitterness – big, but in proportion, just yummy.
Alan, if you listen to what they say in the video, contract brewing is something that's out from the start as a matter of principle as not compatible with their way of doing things.
Word on the streets over here is that they're thinking of merging with Brewdog and calling themselves Stonedog. I'd imagine their new logo would look something like this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/garyroyer/3612388912/
Hmmm, interesting stuff…. Think it's at all possible that they meant Australia, rather than Europe? A pretty big brewery is about to set up in Melbourne – bikes (AKA New Belgium), American brewer… If not Stone, then another US micro…
Yeah, great news. We have so few breweries here in Europe. And almost none of them brew innovative beer of the Stone kind.
I got all excited for a minute then. I thought stones bitter was back to £1.83 a 4 pack at tesco, after the thieves put up to £2.58
Different Stones Cookie
The pubs side of a big, new & technologically advanced Yorkshire brewery seems to be struggling at the moment, maybe a partnership with Stone could help them out?
http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/Roundclock-bid-to-restructure-pub.5940362.jp