Fat Tire rolls into town
Local beer lovers will have another craft brew to choose from starting in August. Last week, Henrico distributor Specialty Beverage signed a deal to bring Fat Tire and the family of beers from Colorado-based New Belgium Brewing to Richmond.
Local beer lovers will have another craft brew to choose from starting in August.
Last week, Henrico distributor Specialty Beverage signed a deal to bring Fat Tire and the family of beers from Colorado-based New Belgium Brewing to Richmond.
Specialty Beverage distributes other craft beers locally, including Dogfish Head Ale and the Vermont beer Long Trail.
“The craft beer segment is probably the fastest-growing category in the entire alcohol beverage industry,” said Michael Brazel, vice president of sales and marketing for Specialty’s parent company, L. Knife & Son.
Brazel said he hopes to have New Belgium beer in convenience stores and super markets in late August. The first of the company’s beers to arrive in Richmond will be Fat Tire – and only in 22oz bottles
starting out.
Like other craft breweries, New Belgium is growing fast. It has plans to expand its Fort Collins, Colo. facility. The company also said it is looking at an East Coast brewery and will likely decide on a location by the end of 2011.
Aaron Kremer is the BizSense editor. Please send news tips to Editor@richmondbizsense.com.
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Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
This makes me SOO happy! Grew up with this beer out west. can’t wait until Sunshine Wheat and Blue Paddle make their trek accross country too!
I’m pretty stoked on this.
I can’t wait! This beer is so so good!
yum!
Best news!
I hope the arrival of such a fashionable craft beer in Virginia doesn’t overshadow any of the new breweries and brew-pubs that are starting up in Richmond.
New Belgium makes some small batch beers that have a good reputation and probably don’t make it out of Colorado, but the line that they make for wide distribution aren’t very impressive, if you ask me. Fat Tire is the most over-hyped beer on the market. If you swapped in a Yuengling, most wouldn’t know the difference.
The Fat Tire neon sign will look cute in bar windows and people will feel as cool as a track bike rider when drinking the stuff, but your local craft brewers is where your support is actually going to be needed and deserved.
I would know the difference. The water in Fat Tire is much better than the puddle water they use for Yuengling, the hops are more present and the finish is much cleaner. For 8.99 a six pack I probably won’t buy fat tire any more than I would buy any other craft brew, but New Belgium Beers are available in NC and SC already, just makes sense that they would expand. Also the Ranger IPA is glorious.
@Jason G — I’d hope that the better and more diverse our distribution gets in town, the better our local beer scene will be. Rising tide, etc.
I just spent a weekend in Asheville drinking a keg of Fat Tire and while it isn’t my favorite beer there isn’t anyway I’d confuse it with Yuengling!
Well, I guess I just love the heck outta some Yuengling, while being confounded by the adulation for Fat Tire. The whole employee-owned alternative energy powered thing, tho. That’s right up my alley. Gimme Lagunitas in every convenience store, personally.
@ Jason G – there’s the nail…and there is you hitting it right on the head. Fat Tire’s allure is that it’s unavailable. Once it becomes available it will cease to be over-rated, then I will go back to my normal life.
I will second Jason G and T, like so many things new to Richmond, the hype FAR outweighs the reality. Fat Tire is one of those beers that dudes who hang out in beer stores would drop to one-up other patrons. “Yeah, such-in-such is good, but I was drinking Fat Tire all weekend in OBX. You don’t know good beer ’til you’ve tried Fat Tire.. blahblah” So after years of listening to that hype, when it finally hit Richmond I had to see what the hype was about……. but that’s all it is: a boring, hyped up brew.
Southern Tier “Gemini” or most anything from Lagunitas is more interesting than Fat Tire.