Beer Festivals - The Beer Thrillers

BrewFest for MS

BKline — Thu, 30 Sep 2021 23:31:10 +0000

BrewFest for MS Official Flyer

BrewFest for MS

On October 10th, from 1PM to 6PM at Hysteria Brewing Company (9570 Berger Road, Columbia Maryland) will be the Annual BrewFest for MS. Through a friend who does fundraising for MS here in the greater Central PA area, I found out about this event, and will be going with my friend, as well as my dog (Leela).

Since the event is for a good cause, I thought I would reach out to them and see what I can find out about the event (since I had never been to it before) ahead of going, and I got to have a wonderful phone conversation with Dave Raimist, co – founder and co – runner of the event (along with Jill Eisenberg).

A Lot To Talk About

So there’s a lot to talk about in this article, and a lot to unpack. So let’s get through it all. This article is a shout out to the event and a public notice and to get some attention for a fantastic and great event. I will do a follow up event after the event and after we went to it. So lets get right into this article and talk about the brewfest and the event, and then we’ll discuss what MS is, and go over my phone conversation with Dave.

The BrewFest for MS

The event itself is not a typical brewfest in the vein of say ‘Atlantic City Brewfest’ or the ‘Mount Hope Renaissance Faire’ brewfest, or others similar. This is an event at the Hysteria Brewery with beer, with food, with raffles, with 50/50s, with music, and other fun and games, with the proceeds (all the proceeds) going to the Bike MS fundraiser ran by Jill Eisenberg and Dave Raimist. As I write this, Dave is actually heading or in D.C. doing a fundraising event tonight.

This would be the 7th Annual (or 6th Annual) Brewfest for MS, but the number system got all kinds of screwed up due to COVID last year and them hosting the event virtually last year rather than in person.

The event is held at Hysteria Brewing Company. You can find out more information on them at their Facebook page, and their Untappd page. Hysteria Brewing Company is located at 9570 Berger Road in Columbia Maryland (its about an hour an forty minutes from Harrisburg – just as a reference).

Throughout the day you will have chances to enter raffles, as well as 50/50s and other fun events. While there, from 1PM to 6PM there will be food presented by Bullhead Beef Pit, as well as the beer from Hysteria Brewing Company. There will be ample seating inside and outside, though beer will only be able to be ordered from the inside of the brewery. This is a pet and kid friendly event, so you can bring out the youngsters as well as the dogsters.

There will be somewhere between 35 and 50 items available for raffle and 50/50. (Dave hasn’t gotten the full tally yet.) You also don’t have to be present in order to win the items. They will be posted on a bulletin board at 5PM and then everyone is able to go up and redeem their winners. After that, those items not redeemed, will be checked to see if their winners are present or not, and the winners will be notified.

There will also be two bands that will play live music during the event, both with ties to both organization runners. The first band plays from 1 to 2:30PM and the second band will play from 3 to 5PM.

Some current beers on tap at Hysteria:

Hoodie Season
IPAA Heavy
Krispy Panda
Brew ‘Em Hops Up
I Don’t Remember The Title, But The Cover Was Blonde
Juicy Sour Pink Square Candy
Movie Night
Be Kind, Please Rewind

What is MS?

For those who might not know, MS stands for Multiple Sclerosis.

The MayoClinic has a good concise definition of it:

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a potentially disabling disease of the brain and spinal cord (central nervous system).
In MS, the immune system attacks the protective sheath (myelin) that covers nerve fibers and causes communication problems between your brain and the rest of your body. Eventually, the disease can cause permanent damage or deterioration of the nerves.
Signs and symptoms of MS vary widely and depend on the amount of nerve damage and which nerves are affected. Some people with severe MS may lose the ability to walk independently or at all, while others may experience long periods of remission without any new symptoms.
There’s no cure for multiple sclerosis. However, treatments can help speed recovery from attacks, modify the course of the disease and manage symptoms.
Multiple Sclerosis – Mayo Clinic

This is a horrible disease that affects far too many people, and fundraisers like this (the BrewFest for MS) and others such as Dave’s Bike MS and the various Walk for MS and Polo events in Central PA, go to try and find a cure for this disease.

As Dave was telling me in our phone conversation, his brother in law passed away in 2017 from complications due to MS.

So Come On Out

So please everyone, come on out and support this wonderful fundraiser. There is many ways you can help and donate towards the great cause, from the raffles, the 50/50s, food, beer, etc, as well as just straight up donating. You can also always donate to the various MS fundraisers without even leaving the comforts of your bed by checking out the National MS Society. Their website is: https://www.nationalmssociety.org/

For more Information

Various links to pages for more information:

The Beer Thriller Links

For some similar articles and other various articles on our blog, you can check out:

Cheers!

-B. Kline

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Untappd (Next Glass) Purchases Hop Culture

BKline — Wed, 09 Dec 2020 01:30:00 +0000

Announced earlier today (roughly around 7AM) the parent company to Untappd and Beer Advocate – Next Glass – has purchased Hop Culture. Next Glass also currently owns OZNR a direct to customer sales platform app.

Hop Culture logo

Hop Culture, a popular site that has organized brewfests and events like Beers With(out) Beards, Juicy Brews, and others, is a digital beer (craft beer) website, blog, and brand. Hop Culture LLC is based out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Next Glass is based out of Charlotte, North Carolina. Next Glass has a lot of different software, app, and other systems already in place, and the acquisition of Hop Culture adds to their growing list of websites, apps, and other beer and beverage related brands and products.

Next Glass logo

From the Forbes article about the acquisition: “Hop Culture founder and CEO Kenny Gould says the partnership will help Next Glass develop a suite of business tools — a “cohesive ecosystem,” if you will — to streamline experiences for consumers and provide operational efficiencies for businesses in the beverage alcohol space, from producers to wholesalers to retailers.”

In a long piece that Kenny Gould published to Hop Culture after the announcement, he stated: “But first — know that I’m not going anywhere. Neither is my team. Although they’re not regularly in the limelight, Hop Culture Managing Editor John A. Paradiso and Head of Partnerships Grace Weitz each played essential roles in Hop Culture’s growth and development, and we all plan to continue our work with the company in expanded roles.”

From the PRNewswire press release about the news: “The Hop Culture team has built an engaging and important platform with voices and events that resonate within the industry,” said Trace Smith, CEO of Next Glass. “We’re excited and proud to welcome a brand and team with values and a vision that so closely mirror our own.”

Founded in 2017 by journalist Kenny Gould, Hop Culture got its start promoting small, independent craft breweries via their Instagram and digital magazine. Over time, the company also grew to include a popular merchandise line and event series.

“Hop Culture couldn’t be more excited about this partnership,” said Gould. “At Next Glass, Trace and his team have put together the largest network of beer drinkers in the world, and we look forward to working with them to continue producing compelling content and world-class events.”

Untappd Logo

Untappd was founded on October 22nd, 2010 by Greg Avola. From wikipedia: “Untappd is a geosocial networking service and mobile phone application founded by Greg Avola and Tim Mather that allows its users to check in as they drink beers, and share these check-ins and their locations with their friends” As of 2017 it was estimated that Untappd had 9 Million Users and 125 Internal Employees.

Beer Advocate

Beer Advocate was founded in the early days of the internet (and craft beer) – in 1996 as a website for rating and cataloging beer. It along with Rate Beer (founded in 2000) were the pioneers for beer rating systems, until smart phone technology and apps paved the way for Untappd.

The banner for Hop Culture’s Juicy Brews Valentine’s Day beer fest.

Gould: “Breweries (and other alcohol producers) operating a lot of different systems have to rely on disparate tools, and you start to see why that’s a problem when you look at scale, going forward, they’ll have one company and endless integration for a seamless back end experience.”

Gould claims that Hop Culture will keep its same journalism, with the same editors, and same workers (working from home currently) despite the buy-out. He states that it is a mutual buy-out that will offer Hop Culture and Next Glass much for the future. While Hop Culture gets to stay relatively its own thing, Next Glass gets out of the deal – is someone to oversee branding (both internal and client / external needs), a ready to go team that is already connected to the beer community (and with strong ties to a thriving craft beer scene in Pittsburgh), and a brand that has demonstrated success at hosting small, medium, and large scale events and festivals.

According to the Forbes article (under why the purchase was made in 2020): “Seven-year-old Next Glass has grown tremendously this year, from buying Hop Culture, Oznr and some of BeerAdvocate’s assets, to naming a new CEO, taking in investment from Providence Strategic Growth, and hiring its first consort of executives and managers.

Just as Gould gets excited talking about his newfound ability to draw on a far greater pool of resources than his four-year-old beer-magazine startup ever allowed, Next Glass CEO Trace Smith says the deal with Providence, which went through in March, gives his business the resources to do more in the future, including boosting its presence in Europe; recover from COVID losses; and launch initiatives to help the hospitality industry much sooner.

“We certainly hope this is a temporary speed bump, and we understand that the economic conditions might be soft coming out of it,” Smith tells the Greater Wilmington Business Journal. “But that additional capital will help us regrow more quickly post-COVID-19 and will help us bring more (furloughed) team members back.” For his part, the 30-year-old Gould’s instincts haven’t led him astray. The Pittsburgh son and grandson of entrepreneurs started the Hop Culture website in 2017 as a way to highlight positive stories in the craft beer world. As Gould, who also works as a freelance writer and Forbes contributor, says, “I never set out to start a business. I set out to write about beer.”

Gould is hoping that with the purchase, Hop Culture can expand its efforts to be more inclusive in the beer community. With the goal of expanding Beer Kulture (black / African – American promotions), Beers With(out) Beards (women promotions), and starting a queer beer festival.

About Next Glass (from the PRNewswire Article): “Founded in 2013, Next Glass develops software and creates experiences that connect enthusiasts, retailers, and producers in the beverage alcohol industry. The Next Glass family of brands serves the unique and varied needs of the industry via multiple platforms. Its award-winning Untappd mobile application and BeerAdvocate website are used by millions of beer enthusiasts around the world and its menu publishing software tool, Untappd for Business, enables venues to streamline publication and promotion of their beer, wine, cocktail, and food menus while Oznr, the leader in direct to consumer technology for the craft beverage industry, partners with craft producers to manage their membership programs, can/bottle release pre-sales, and event ticketing. The Company’s recently-introduced Untappd Marketplace enables alcohol resellers to streamline ordering of beer, wine, and spirits from wholesalers and self-distributing breweries. The Company’s Live! division produces world class festivals and events for the Untappd and BeerAdvocate communities.”

Juicy Brews WestFest Promotional Poster

Kenny Gould wrote a long article on his site, giving a history of Hop Culture, as well as telling why he sold to Next Glass. He details the early years, how they became a business, their first festivals (the first of which was in October 2017),

Juicy Brews: Hop Culture Homecoming (photo courtesy of Kenny Gould’s article on Hop Culture, link below)

He goes on to discuss the ‘glory years’, and ‘turning the wheel’, and then goes into the search for his ‘future’ rather than just looking forward to the weekend. As he says in his article: “So I began my search. Luckily, I wasn’t under any sort of deadline. Over the past couple years, the team and I worked against the odds to build an awesome little engine that supported us, our projects, and a great team of freelancers. I could afford to be choosy. I could steward my baby toward a solution that offered the greatest potential for a continuation of the mission, practices, and values we found important.

At first, I thought about approaching venture capital. I gathered my materials and started the research to find a great partner. But before I could send my first email, a Forbes interview changed my life.

Back in 2018, during a Brewers Association dinner at the Union Square Café, I met a Forbes writer who told me her friend in the food and drink section was looking for new contributors. What the hell, I thought. I can always do some more writing. So I threw my name in the hat and started contributing a couple articles a month, mostly highlighting underrepresented voices in brewing and the beer industry.”

You can read more from Kenny Gould at his article on Hop Culture here: “The Next Chapter”.

From his article on Hop Culture, Gould says: “Additionally, thank you. The past four years have exceeded all expectations I had for an exciting life. And I’ve been moved and inspired by every single person I’ve met along the way. From brewers to distributors, from retailers to fans and everyone in between, I’m in your debt. This ride has been nothing short of incredible.

And the best part? We’re only getting started.”

And to think, says Gould, Hop Culture started as a “glorified blog. I was doing it because it was fun.” (This certainly sounds familiar…….. I think I’ve used this line often times when co-workers, friends, and family ask me how my silly ‘blog’ thing is going; I’m just doing it for fun.)

For more information on the purchase, you can check out the following links:

You can check out some of our latest craft beer news, brewery news, and industry news here: “BREWERY / INDUSTRY NEWS”. Including our latest about the BREW – The Museum of Beer, which is set to have an online exhibit opening on December 15th (Tuesday), 2020. The Museum will eventually be open in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

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Thank you everyone for reading. Any comments, questions, or anything you want to discuss at all, just leave a comment and I’ll make sure to get right back at ya. Love chatting with you guys about craft beer and breweries! Be sure to stay safe out there and keep supporting your small breweries and businesses, times are getting tough again, and all your support, no matter how little, can make the difference in a brewery staying open or shuttering their doors for good. Cheers everyone!

-B. Kline

For more information, you can check these references:
www.untappd.com
www.untappd.com/business
www.beeradvocate.com
www.oznr.com
www.untappd.tv
www.hopculture.com
www.instagram.com/hopculturemag

Be sure to check out our other articles on brewery openings:

You can read about more brewery closures here: