Rising beer prices could leave you tapped out

MSNBC.com ^ | By Alex Johnson

[DeaconBenjamin]

Small brewers line up to pay premium prices for scarce ingredients

Double-whammy shortages of two main ingredients are threatening to send the price of beer significantly higher, just in time for the national drinking holiday known as Super Bowl Sunday.

* * *

In September, Martin paid $4 for a pound for hops. By late October, he said, it was $50 a pound. Likewise, barley prices have almost doubled in the same period.

Just a few weeks ago, George Peterson, owner of Central Coast Brewery in San Luis Obispo, Calif., spent $160 to brew a batch of beer equal to eight kegs. Last week, he was spending a staggering $920 per batch.

[DeaconBenjamin]

In September, Martin paid $4 for a pound for hops. By late October, he said, it was $50 a pound.

I'm not worried. There's no inflation in the US. BLS tells me so.

[rellimpank]

-—thank ethanol-—

[raybbr]

Yep. I doubt that barley and hops are included in the CPI. Just too volatile.

[o_zarkman44]

Sounds like a very good market for barley and hops.

Or is it inflation driving up the cost?

[Empireoftheatom48]

You got that right!

[skipper18]

We may as well -drink ethanol-, it sounds cheaper.

[knews_hound]

Pinging the Homebrewers for sympathy and comments.

My Local Home Brew Store (LHBS) has a notice that they will only sell 6 oz of Hops per customer and the price of 50 lbs of Malt has gone up to almost 50 bucks.

No IPAs in my future I'm afraid.

On or off this low volume Ping List let me know.

Cheers,

knewshound

Homebrewing 1A (Homebrewing for beginners)

Homebrewing 101 (for experianced Homebrewers)

[Gondring]

The price change isn’t inflation; it’s supply and demand.

Fewer barley fields -—> higher prices.

[SW6906]

Hops grow like weeds around where I live (outside Seattle). Maybe I should start growing and harvesting them.........

[SampleMan]

-—thank ethanol-—

Why, are they double hopping the ethanol now?

[-=SoylentSquirrel=-]

Makes me wonder if there are common household ingredients I could use in lieu of the expensive ingredients.

I tried to brew Kvass a few months back. The main ingredient was bread. It did not turn out too good.

[Stentor]

Hops grow like weeds around where I live (outside Seattle). Maybe I should start growing and harvesting them.........

Let me know if you need a picker. I could use some sleep.

[Recovering Hermit]

In September, Martin paid $4 for a pound for hops. By late October, he said, it was $50 a pound. Likewise, barley prices have almost doubled in the same period.

Is this just another example of "screw the little guy", or do the mass-producers of that gut wrenching panther piss they call beer get pinched like this as well?

I believe that they may have an amount of hops and barley in their concoctions, however small.

[snowsislander]

In September, Martin paid $4 for a pound for hops. By late October, he said, it was $50 a pound.

My first instinct on reading that is there will be a lot of farmers that would be very interested in growing hops if you can get $50 per pound, but then reading on in the story in the subsection "Changing the recipes", it appears that the amazing change in prices is due to flooding in Europe and a disastrous fire in a major warehouse housing hops.

Neither of those circumstances should be a factor in a year or two, so we probably won't see a large number of additional farmers looking at growing hops, and we should see the price drop from the stratospheric $50 per pound area.

[sionnsar]

Brewers blame a variety of culprits.

... High demand for corn-based ethanol has persuaded many farmers to devote more of their fields to corn and less to barley, creating a shortage...

... Rain in Europe and drought in Australia also withered barley crops. ...

It’s been even worse for hops... Flooding has driven down European yields for the last two years just as historically low prices have led many domestic farmers to abandon the crop.

... also slashed the crop in the Pacific Northwest, where the vast majority of domestic hops are grown. ...

[SW6906]

?

[bmwcyle]

Repel all taxes.

[Thebaddog]

Reach for the hard stuff, parndner. And what state in the Union is the biggest consumer of Brandy?

[Recovering Hermit]

Why, are they double hopping the ethanol now?

LOL!

I suppose many hop farmers have turned to corn farmers due to this whole ethanol craze, leaving a shortage of hop farmers.

Hopefully, they will all go back to hops, leaving a corn shortage.

Then, we can drill ANWR for oil like we should have done 10 years ago.

[CH3CN]

There were also several kiln fires.