Stone Brewery Berlin Bye Bye

Stone Brewery Berlin Bye Bye

As probably everybody knows, Stone Brewing Berlin was sold to Brewdog earlier this month. Because of that, founder of Stone Brewing Greg Koch has published an emotional post on the Stone Brewing Blog.

That post is a must-read for any beergeek.

Why?

Because it shows that you can be a successful promoter of beer revolution and still know shit about beer roots and culture.

Let me cite Greg:

“We started Stone in 1996 because we weren’t OK with the status quo of beer in the U.S. We felt Americans deserved better, so we brewed it for them. When we saw much of Germany stuck in a similar status quo of cheap beer, we were convinced we could help. As it stands now, German beer prices are the cheapest in Western Europe. As most of us know from life, the best things are rarely the cheapest.”

This is enough to tell that that guy has no clue what he is talking about.

The situation of Germany and USA was never comparable. German beer culture is one of the most powerful in the world. Quality of their beer is astonishing and the cheapest piss from Aldi or Lidl is still 100x better than the Bud. Reading my other posts, you know that I do not appreciate Germans being closed to almost anything that isn’t Pils. Nevertheless, I can’t complain about the quality.

Whoever does is completely blinded.

Btw. Same goes for other European beer culture – Czech Republic (beer is literally cheaper than the water there, but nobody dares to call them brews bad)

In fact, the rest of the text is full of such ignorant statements.

One more citation:

“Stone IPA was rated the #1 IPA in the country”

Based on the fact that (around) 95% of beers sold in Germany are Lagers, being the best IPA has the same value as being the best vegan dish in Argentina or Brasil. It is a prize that I wouldn't care a lot.

Feel free to comment.