Yesterday, Big Rock announced that it is launching yet another new beer series, the Alchemist Edition. The first beer – as of yet unannounced – will be released October 10. This is the latest in Big Rock’s efforts to re-establish some craft brewery street cred, following the Brewmaster’s Edition seasonal series and the Ed McNally Signature Series of permanent specialty beer.
The press release offers big things. The number of exciting adjectives and adverbs was rather staggering. To use their own words, they describe the line-up as their “most innovative”, “ultrapremium and rare labels” released in “intensely limited quantities”. They say the beer will be designed “to showcase our artistry and appeal to a subculture of men and women that value independent thinking, appreciation of art, creativity, intelligence and anything non-mainstream”. Finally, the brewmaster, Paul Gautreau, “ventures deep into uncharted brewing territory to craft bold, small batch beers that pay no heed to the rules of what came before. Adventurous and experimental, these risky brews are their own reward.”
Whoa. I am dizzy and exhausted just reading the release.
I don’t mean to be too facetious (a little, maybe), but the level of hyperbole in the press release worries me. No matter how interesting, creative and well-brewed the beer may end up to be, there is NO way it can live up to that level of hype. I fear the well-intentioned marketing people may have set this beer up, a la Original 16 (read here for the story on that), for failure.
I am in no way pre-judging the beer itself – in fact I am quite curious about what the first one will turn out to be. Plus their hyper-spin has already gotten me to write about it and will likely spur me to write about the beer itself once I try it (so maybe it did what it wanted). I am most asking WHY such an oversell?
I won’t rehash that argument again – as I have made it many times. I believe strongly that part of being considered craft beer is to NOT oversell the qualities of the beer. Be playful, irreverent, controversial even – but don’t mislead the public about what the beer actually is. Maybe Big Rock isn’t exaggerating and these really are going to be blow-your-face-off beer. But are they really going to outdo some of the crazy product put out by Dogfish Head, Brewdog, Mikkeller, and others? I doubt it.
I have actually been favourably inclined toward Big Rock’s most recent efforts to re-craft itself. While the product has been a bit hit-and-miss, the intention is exactly what we need from the prairies’ big regional brewer. I want them trying harder to win beer drinkers over with flavour and different styles. Plus, I think it shows how much the craft beer scene has evolved and grown that Big Rock realized they had fallen behind.
I will try the beer. I will probably write about the beer. I may even like the beer (time will tell). But I think a more nuanced release might have gotten the same outcome from me (I am a pretty easy mark on that front – if it is new and interesting, I am usually there). So, next time, dear Big Rock marketing people, please don’t try quite so hard for shock-and-awe, and go instead for clarity in what you are up to. At least not on my account.
October 2, 2012 at 2:53 PM
A wet hopped beer and a barley wine that has been aged a year before release are the projects over the next months. More details to follow Jason I am supposed to be the brewery here in the next couple weeks.
The one brewer from Big Rock seemed excited about the wet hop beer.
October 2, 2012 at 3:25 PM
I’m sure they’ll figure out a way to make wet hops and barleywine seem dull and boring.
October 2, 2012 at 4:09 PM
If anyone can make a dull barleywine, it’ll be big rock. If Albertan brewers shifted half of their silly PR efforts into say producing an interesting and flavorful beer, we’d be in far better shape. Im not holding my breath here, but hopefully something good will come out of this.
October 2, 2012 at 8:16 PM
The problem, of course, is that Big Rock isn’t a craft brewer, and hasn’t been for a long time. That became painfully obvious when they started sticking giant hay bale beer cans in every farm field in Alberta. The only thing surprising about Big Rock is that Molson hasn’t bought them yet.
October 3, 2012 at 2:02 PM
Seeing as we’re getting on a roll here with the Big Rock bashing, I’ll take it a step further.
Let’s say this Alchemy series really is good beer. I still take issue with a brewery that spends 95% of their time producing garbage beer and doing phony PR, and then tries to claim they are all about flavour and quality because they push out a couple hundred liters of decent beer. If Big Rock really believes in this stuff, and that craft beer is not only profitable, but a fad that is here to stay and will continue to grow, why not improve the quality of your entire lineup and cleanup your image?
Instead, all of these new “series” just reek of TOKEN GESTURES, whether the beer itself is good or bad.
October 9, 2012 at 10:45 AM
It is amusing that someone was paid to come up with that. I would much prefer one or two excellent and consistent craft offerings that I can make my go to beers. The non-stop, one-off releases of varying quality are catching an “intensely limited” amount of my interest these days.