Gang,
On a very rare moment watching local news (Fox local), i caught a segment that featured the Logan Blvd brew club and and new business plan for home brewers to make money off the beer recipes There's a kickstarter going for it, but the plan, as I understand it, is for people to post recipes on a website, and if people buy kits from the site for the recipe, the brewer gets a cut. I have a few thoughts but would love to hear other views.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/993873893/kit-lab-sell-your-own-bee...
First, I'm not optimistic about the plan, but who knows? In addition the the many existing brewing supply store kits, there's tons of forum, blog, and book recipes out there. But, in a quickly evolving, innovating movement, a few great recipes could go viral and take off. And many brewers out there don't have easy access to a Brew and Grow, so more sophisticated, all-grain turnkey kits can be a blessing.
Second, I'm really happy that home brewing has risen to notice for the local nightly news scene - the program even teased it twice. This is a good sign. But I watched it and thought, why are they showing those guys? Good folks for sure, but we should be the face of home brewing in Chicago, right?
Anyone else have thoughts?
Sean
I think it has high potential to succeed, though I won't be using it. Similar services like Blue Apron (for food) are proving the model, and I suspect that Kit Lab will appeal to people the same way that Blue Apron appeals to me: I kind of like cooking, but don't like dealing with any of the prep. I like making beer from scratch, have no interest at all in doing the same thing with food. There are definitely potential brewers who would try it if all the ingredients they need were dropped on their doorstep, ready to go.
Then again, they have 5 days to raise another forty grand, so I don't think it's going to happen.
I think it's a terrible idea. Blue Apron has the advantage that everyone has to eat something, so making a kit so you can make a better meal quicker is a great thing, but homebrew is a luxury not a necessity like eating and it has a very DIY culture built up within it. The people that are in to homebrewing, especially all grain, are people that are going to be purposefully "wasting time" assembling ingredients and building recipes. It's a hobby...the whole point is to take up your time and redirect your mind, something to do besides worry about bills and taxes and rent and stuff. I appreciate things that make my brew day easier and less laborious, but coming home from work and reading some articles or chapters, looking at the water report, doing the math, that is a huge reason why I like to homebrew. The other reason I don't like it is as I said, I put a lot of effort and time into researching and building my recipes, I'll be damned if I'm giving them to anyone, and I don't think I'm the only one that feels that way. I'll share them freely with my fellow chaos members, like my Northern English Brown, but no one else. Maybe that's weird of me. And really what's to stop people from seeing the grain bill and the hops and ordering the same stuff from Northern Brewer or anywhere else that may offer a better price. And really at $1/gallon of kits sold the return on submitting my recipes just isn't there. Also, who is controlling submissions? Because there is gonna be a huge flood of garbage recipes on there, the chances of finding any good ones that float to the top are very slim. Also Also, there are sooo many recipe books out there already....plus home brew talk....it's not like finding a recipe is hard to do to begin with, and the only difference between this service and say, Farmhouse, is that with this service, I make one click and my kit shows up, with Farmhouse, assuming I'm assembling my own from a recipe and not one of the many kits that are already available, I would need to make at least 3 clicks to get grains, hops, and yeast in my cart. I think that my finger can handle a few extra clicks. That's just my opinion and point of view on that service, it seeks to fulfill a need that isn't there and that no one is asking for, it's basically a home brew shop that wants you to do their marketing for them. "Hey bro, check out my sweet recipes on this site". I say nay.
Yeah, what Joe said.
I agree that it probably won't take off but I do like their thinking that it sorta brings Brew Camp and Brew & Grow to people in the middle of nowhere; or even those in urban areas but who do not have a store where you can purchase *exact* amounts of ingredients.
I also agree, Sean, that CHAOS should be the focus of Chicago homebrewing. But, the fact that it was on the local news means that it's catering to the average Joe masses and not to homebrewers like us.
Also, good questions that Joe raises haven't been answered yet. For all we know they have BJCP people vetting the recipes and/or even someone well-known to us.
I saw this a week or two ago and posted it on our FB page. I never really thought this was for the already-home brewer and all the objections voiced above are coming from the perspective of a veteran home brewer. I liked it mainly for the marketing aspect to it and I thought it was primarily: a gateway to getting people who are on the fence about trying to brew at home to actually pull the trigger and try it; remunerating already-home brewers for their recipes; no-waste/pre-measured ingredients; ships right to your door/accessible anywhere and everywhere (at least in the contiental U.S.).
(and, quite frankly, it can only do CHAOS good: people frustrated with measly kits may want to try us out; people who enjoy the kits may want to step up their game and try us out; we may be able to market through them, put a little advert in every order to the Chicago area saying, "Hey! If you had some problems with this kit, CHAOS Brew Club is there to help you refine your brewing and answer any questiosn! If you found it successful but want to step up your game, CHAOS Brew Club is there to help!" Win-Win.)