[Update #2: Peter Egelston, founder of Portsmouth Brewery, has released the FULL details of the release at the brewery blog. There will actually be 900 bottles of Kate the Great, not 540 as mentioned on the blog two weeks ago! And it will stay $10 a bottle! Amazing! (For the record, when we said it was "allegedly going to be $20," we pulled it from this poster who said he heard it "straight from the horse's mouth": Rixbeer at Beer Advocate.) Regardless, between KTG at $10/bottle and the Oatmeal Stout at $4/bottle, this brewery has been criminally generous!]
[Sunday AM June 1 Update: Tyler Jones, Portsmouth Brewer, posted yesterday that all bottles will be sold on day 1. 540 bottles will certainly be sold out in one day. Tod Mott, Head Brewer, noted in a post some days back that it will back again in January 2009.]
(Portsmouth, NH) – Booked a flight to Portsmouth next month? Planning to sell the beers on eBay? In either case, you may be disappointed. The brewery put it to a vote and, barring any unforeseen changes, will limit each person to two bottles of Portsmouth Kate the Great for the upcoming June 24 release. Not only that, they will no longer be filling growlers of it either.
The policy represents a stark change from years past when the beer, though difficult to find in bottles, was readily available in the form of growler fills when on tap. The brewery allowed six bottles and two growler fills per person during last December’s release. This June, the price will allegedly increase to $20 a bottle and “distribution” of the beer will be especially limited. The new price comes at a time when oil, hops, and malt prices have been skyrocketing. As The Portsmouth Brewery has learned though, there can sometimes be a fine line between running a profitable business and appeasing beer fanatics.
The changes to this release may frustrate beer people from far away who were hoping to make a day of it on June 24 (we don’t yet know if ALL bottles will be sold that day). They will certainly meet mixed reaction with local drinkers as well. After all, the beer was previously a bargain at $20 a growler ($5 a pint) and cheap at $10/$12 a bottle considering its status as #2 beer on the planet. However, a supply that was supposed to last a few months lasted only a few weeks last December. If that trend were to continue this June, the “KTG” tap lines may have dried up in just a few days.
The brewpub, a small operation, in a small New England city that is quiet much of the year, faced a tough decision. Word about the beer spread like wildfire in the last several months and there was already talk about early-morning lines forming for the Tuesday afternoon release (yes, lines on a Tuesday for a beer release). But the Market Street sidewalk isn’t nearly as spacious as the Three Floyds property in Munster, IN (not the same animal as the Dark Lord Day release but just to illustrate). The street is also in shambles at the moment as the city is doing a lot of construction. A Kate the Great release, without the new limits, may have been a disaster waiting to happen.
The new measures should help curtail some of the expected traffic though. It will also accomplish a number of things. For one, limiting purchases of Kate should lead to purchases of the brewpub’s other selections. Most have probably never heard of Portsmouth Oatmeal Stout, #6 in the style at Beer Advocate [Ed: this was available in the store at $4/bomber at one point which I still find remarkable]. How about the Portsmouth Wheat Wine, a 2007 GABF medalist that is locked up in a battle with sister company, Smuttynose Brewing, for title of best wheat wine on the upper East Coast. Come to think of it, the same could be said for the battle between Portsmouth Imperial IPA and Smuttynose Big A IPA. It is doubtful that these beers will be on tap for the release, but it shows that Head Brewer, Tod Mott, has a lot more in his arsenal than a single imperial stout. The brewery keeps an updated tap list on the blog site for those attending on June 24.
Restricting the beer on tap will also keep people returning to the brewpub, not that extra business is hard to come by during the late June tourist season. And for anyone who has witnessed a growler pour, a lot of beer is wasted depending on the care taken during the pour.
Love it or hate it, the beer is no longer a diamond in the rough. With these last two releases, the beer community has firmly established Portsmouth Kate the Great among other frenzied special releases such as Three Floyds Dark Lord and Surly Darkness. In line with these great expectations, this year’s Kate will be bigger than it has ever been before at 12% ABV.
For those going to the brewery for the release, there is a parking garage that charges just 75 cents an hour and is just a short walk from the brewpub. That short walk may just seem a little longer than usual on June 24.
