Crested Butte Ambivalent of Whatever
A small Colorado ski town may, in fact, not be up for “Whatever.”
While some residents of Crested Butte support the idea of Anheuser-Busch taking over the town, temporarily transforming it into a moneymaking fantasyland dubbed “Whatever,” others worry such a corporate affair would damage its image.
Building off its Up For Whatever ad campaign, Anheuser-Busch plans to fence off and paint Elk Avenue and its lampposts “Bud Light blue,” and have buskers perform outside pop-up bars — that serve only AB products — that line the street, according to the Denver Post.
Scheduled to take place over the course of the first weekend in September, AB also plans to convert the town’s Mine Ice Arena and the Center for Performing Arts into “Whatever” venues.
The whole event is costing AB $250,000, a low-ball figure, according to perturbed townies, the article adds.
Oskar Blues Sells Crowler Machines to other Breweries
Fitting considering its affinity for aluminum, Oskar Blues introduced the Crowler, a 32-oz. can that can be filled with beer at the source like a typical glass growler, back in January.
Though Ball Packaging trademarked the Crowler name, which refers to the container itself, it was Oskar Blues that developed the prototype for a machine that could actually seal the growler-sized can. And now the Longmont, Colo.-based company is selling it to other breweries.
According to Denver Westword, Oskar Blues has sold about three dozen machines to breweries all over the country in the months since, including Tampa Bay’s Cigar City Brewing and Arizona’s SanTan Brewing. On top of that, the brewery has been buying Crowlers in bulk from Ball and reselling them in smaller amounts.
“We want to be as accommodating as possible. The whole purpose of this is to get more cans into more places,” Jeremy Rudolf, who spearheaded the Crowler initiative, told the website.
EcoGrowler Pursuing Brewer Partnerships
The guys behind EcoGrowler, a reusable growler made with 100 percent recycled materials, are currently building partnerships with breweries big and small to supply them with their environmentally friendly pouch-like containers, according to Sactown Magazine.
Currently, the article adds, the company is in talks with Deschutes Brewing, Out of Bounds Brewing, Two Rivers Cider, and Yolo Brewing, as well as various retail outlets, including grocery store chains and sporting goods stores.
“You can take it a lot of places glass can’t go—the river, camping, the pool, a golf course,” Nathan Andreatta, EcoGrowler co-founder, told the site. “You can throw it in your backpack and even fold it up into your pocket if you wanted to.”
More Colleges Look to Sell Beer at Stadiums
A growing number of colleges outside of the major conferences are selling beer at their athletic stadiums to create a new stream of revenue.
According to ESPN, North Texas, SMU, and Troy University will begin selling beer inside the stadium this football season.
Typically, college game day drinking has been relegated to pre- and post-game tailgating activities, but today, the 21 on-campus stadiums that sell beer are more than twice the amount the did five years ago.
Troy, for instance, has estimated that beer will bring in $200,000 this season, or more than $33,000 per game, over the course of its six home games.
“Every institution is looking at how they can increase revenue streams, and alcohol is one of those,” Jeff Schemmel, president of consulting firm College Sports Solutions LLC, told the site.
Brewery Incubator Closes After Naked Twister
A Houston, Texas-based bar and brewery incubator has shut down due to, in part, a game of naked Twister it hosted on premise after hours.
The League Brewpub received an eviction notice earlier this month from its landlord, citing late rent payments and other “misuse[s]” of common areas, including, most notably, the naked game of Twister.
“Indeed, I had agreed to host a naked game night: a completely private event that takes place at bars all over Houston regularly. We covered all the windows and had someone working the door,” wrote League Brewpub co-founder Lucrece Borrego in a statement. “Only one thing went wrong: an employee of the architectural services firm next door that has access to our hallways was working long after business hours and stumbled up a game of strip Twister in the hall. Whoever this person was, he or she had clearly never seen the naked male body before and took great offense to the incident, crying ‘public nudity’ to the landlord.”
Wait, these things happen regularly in Houston?