I told you homeboy u can't touch this
Yeah that's how we're livin' and you know u can't touch this
Look in my eyes man u can't touch this
You know let me bust the funky lyrics u can't touch this

The heat wave may be over but we’re still smokin! . . . . Brewsletter Time!

Greetings and Salutations! If this email was forwarded to you, might we suggest visiting the Devil’s Canyon website and Joining the Mailing List? Mercy bow coop.

If you are that cool person forwarding this email to your unregistered friends, risking carpal tunnel - hat's off to you!

Here’s whats up:

New Subscriber? Beer Friday Info!

Devil's Canyon Brewery is a brewery and is generally not open to the public. We sell our beer to bars and restaurants up and down the peninsula. Here's the current list of locations.

On the last Friday of the month we open our doors to the public and have 2 or 3 live bands. There is no cover charge. Your first drink of the night is $7.00. You get to keep the Devil's Canyon pint glass. After that, drinks are $4.00. Wine, Soda and water are also available.

The Rising Cost of Beer – and the $4 Beer Friday Pint

Prior to 2006, Beers at Beer Friday were $2 and served in 14oz cups. In 2006 we raised the price to $3 a pint and increased the glass size to a full 16oz. pint. The reasons for the change were expressed in an email and most people understood the necessity. Here we are in 2008 and the beer world landscape has changed again. Our Beer Friday mailers usually don’t have such a somber introduction but the decision we had to make was not a pleasant one for our staff and we want to explain to our loyal patrons and fans why we are raising the price of our Beer Friday pints to $4 this month.

First off – it’s not because we are rolling in stacks of cash and have gone mad with greed and power. There is a serious economic hardship affecting all small breweries world-wide. Take a look at a Google Search for Rising Beer Prices. We raised the prices of our kegs a few months ago hoping that would help the financial bottom line. It did to a degree. We bought larger brewing equipment so that our costs for raw materials would be lessened. That helped as well. We changed some recipes – slightly – another small financial victory.

But the international beer market is in a world of hurt. Microbreweries around the world are really struggling to make ends meet. This has never been a big profit business and that’s not why we are in it. We love making high end, award-winning hand crafted beers. We love getting together with our customers and friends once a month. We are in this business because we love what we do. But at the end of the day, it is a business and we need to make ends meet.

Devil’s Canyon Brewery is more fortunate than some others. For a few examples of just how brutally the craft beer industry is getting hit economically, take a look at a few quotes we gathered:

MSNBC:

After water, the biggest components of most beers are malted barley, whose sugar starches are fermented into alcohol, and hops, which add the bitter tang. In recent months, both have been in increasingly short supply, and when they have been available, their prices have leaped — by as much as 500 percent in the case of hops.

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.

Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

New contracts for hops, the vine that adds aroma, flavor and a balance of bitterness, have been running well above $21 a pound, Budd said. "Two years ago, hops were $2. Now, buying hops — even at $5 a pound — that is a dream."

The calculation is similar for most brewers.

Barley is up 82 percent since last year, aluminum for kegs is up more than 20 percent and bottles cost 18 percent more, said David Guender, director of sales at SweetWater Brewing Co., another Atlanta brewery.

San Francisco Examiner

As a result, the price of hops has jumped from $5 a pound to more than $20 a pound, Ward said.

Ward said prices are already starting to be passed on to the consumer, and beer drinkers can expect a six-pack of craft brew to rise by up to $1 in the next few months. Prices for mainstream beer will also rise, though not as sharply since major brewers have reduced the amount of hops in their beer over the years.

Local brewers say they are already feeling the effects of the shortage.

“As soon as I heard about it, I pulled out my credit card and cleaned out the local supplier,” said John Wonder, brewer for San Francisco’s Wunder Brewing Co. Wonder was lucky. Two months later, the cost of his $300 supply had shot up to $1500.

Those are very sobering numbers – add to those factors the rising cost of fuel (We distribute all our beers ourselves) and you begin to get an idea of what the craft beer industry is up against. And did you catch the Bill Anheuser-Busch is try to get passed?

A bill sponsored by Anheuser-Busch, Assembly Bill 1245 is being voted on in committee this Tuesday, June 24th. This bill would significantly expand the limits on what a brewer can give away to a retailer. Currently, a brewer can only give away small items of minimal value to a retailer or consumer. The law now in place helps create an equal playing field for both small and large breweries. This law has helped the craft brewing industry flourish in California.

Anheuser-Busch wants to increase the limit 1,600% so they can use give-ways as an inducement to gain placements in stores, bars and restaurants. Craft brewers - because we are small, independent businesses which brew with passion and typically do not have large marketing budgets - cannot afford to compete with the big brewers on this level. Passing this bill will allow large corporate brewers to “buy” retail placements at craft beers expense.

Unfortunately, the bill passed the committee yesterday by a vote of 7-1 and has now moved to the Senate Appropriations Committee. This is just another example of the many pressures small breweries face and why your support is so important to us.

Retail outlets have begun to resort to some interesting tactics to combat the rising prices. You may have heard about “Falsies”:

Wall Street Journal

Some restaurants have replaced 16-ounce pint glasses with 14 ouncers -- a type of glassware one bartender called a "falsie."

Discussion on Falsies at The Consumerist - Google Search for Beer Falsies

The falsie glasses look like full pints but in reality, the glass on the bottom is about an inch thicker.

We informally polled some long time patrons about raising the prices and it was generally felt that $4 for a craft beer is still very reasonable. Add to that the fact that we do not charge a cover charge for Beer Friday and we bring in several bands and hopefully you will agree that Beer Friday is still really a great value.

We have also been asked – “Hey, you are the manufacturer. Isn’t it cheaper for you to pour pints right there at the brewery?” That’s a valid question. Here’s what goes on behind the scenes that you may not be aware of: We are a indeed manufacturing facility. A working brewery. In order to pull off Beer Friday every month we need to shut down production 2 days prior to and 2 days after the event. We need to clean and prepare the facility for the public, and we need to staff up. Beer Friday is not “free” for us, but we love doing it. It’s a chance to connect with our growing circle of friends, talk shop, solicit ideas, hear some great music and act a fool.

So please understand that this was not a decision that was made lightly. We had a very sobering (excuse the pun) staff meeting discussing the why’s, how’s and what if’s of the decision.

In the end, our biggest concern was that we not ostracize our patrons. How do we raise the price and not tick people off or look “bad” doing so?

We decided to do it the way we strive to handle all of our affairs at Devil’s Canyon: By being honest and transparent to you, by thanking you for your support, and by letting you know that each and every customer is important to us.

Thank You for supporting your local brewery.

Now back to the newsletter:

Beer Friday On-Site Chair Massage

Do $4 pints have you feeling down? We gotcha covered: Local Massage Therapist, Karen Alderete will set up her massage chair for Beer Fridays in June, July, August and September. Karen specializes in Sports Injury and Rehabilitation Therapy as well as Deep Tissue and Swedish Massage.

She has a private practice in Palo Alto and works with a local Sports Massage Team, Bodies in Motion, at sports events around the Bay Area. At $1 per minute, Karen brings convenience, accessibility and affordability in combination with her therapeutic touch to Devil's Canyon Beer Fridays this summer. Mmmmmm. . Beer and a Massage!

Devil's Canyon / Vinyl Room Happy Hour

Talking about supporting local business. . . The Vinyl Room in Burlingame is going to do a promotion for us (and them) on Friday, July 11th at 4 PM and will be serving between 4 and 6 of our beers! The price? $3 a glass from 4 until 8 PM.  (Regular $5 after that)

Check out their website for more details

Parking in Front of Roll Up Doors

A reminder that it is best not to park in front of “roll up doors” when you are at the brewery. People do work late in the complex - even on Fridays. Many businesses in the complex need to drive their vehicles into their unit. If you are parked there, you may be towed. You can safely park along the creek, on Industrial and on Harbor.

Got A Mobile Phone Web Browser?

If you pull up the Devil's Canyon Brewery website in your cell phone browser the mirrors, string and bubblegum that make up the Internets will recognize that you have a limited viewing area and will render the website in a wholly satisfying and spiritually fulfilling manner.

But wait! We have added one special page that you may want to add to your favorites, or bookmarks, or tattoo on your wrist: DevilsCanyonBrewery.com/taps - note the "/taps"

This will bring up the list of locations where our beer is on tap! Very handy when you are out and about and asking yourself, "Self, Where can I get an award winning locally brewed tasty Devil's Canyon beverage?"

Just another innovative feature of the Devil's Canyon Brewery website for you, our favorite customer.

Emergency BBQ Eye on the Bay

Our friends at Emergency BBQ were spotlighted on CBS Eye On The Bay!

Check out the video here: http://cbs5.com/video/?id=35539@kpix.dayport.com

Devils Canyon Eye on the Bay

HAH! We were spotlighted first. Kinda. For a few minutes. Almost at the end of the program.

Take a look at OUR Eye on the Bay video and see who you recognize! The episode spotlights our Brew-On-Premise program.

http://cbs5.com/video/?id=12805@kpix.dayport.com

Brew On Premise

Speaking of Brew-On-Premise. . .

September 13th - Spots Available
July 19th - Spots Available  

Want a truly unique Experience? You can brew your own batch of beer on our gear! Start from scratch or tweak your favorite home brew recipe! During the approx. 5 hour process under the guidance of an award winning brewer, you will make enough beer for a 13.2 gallon keg or about 5 cases of beer.

Make it an event with friends or co-workers and you can mix and match cases of your different brews. This is a perfect activity for a unique twist on any type of event you might host.

Photo Gallery Updates

Huh!
I'm outa luck, outa love
Gotta photograph, picture of . . .

We are pretty diligent about uploading photos we take at various events into the Devil’s Canyon Photo Gallery. The photos for last Beer Bus, Sunset Magazine, The Beer Club BBQ and last Beer Friday are all there. Dan will be taking photos again this Beer Friday and usually gets them uploaded by Sunday.

Beer Club BBQ Aftermath

About the Beer Club BBQ. . . Our friends at Emergency BBQ served up some good eats but there was one little “problem” we almost ran out of food! We were scratching our heads and trying to figure out what happened. We know there were several last minute arrivals that hadn’t RSVP’d, but there were a few no-shows so it all kinda equaled out people-wise.

How could we have almost run short of food? Well, well, well – we ran some numbers and it turns out there was plenty of food – apparently really, really, REALLY tasty food. Here is what the gathering of about 60 people consumed:

An 80lb pig
65lbs of ribs
10lbs of tri-tip
15lbs of beans
Caesar salad
Cole slaw
Rolls
Brownie bites

And beer. Holy Food Coma Batman! We’ll apologize to anyone who didn’t feel they got their fill as soon as we get our jaws off the floor and eyes back in their sockets!

Again, photos are in the Devil’s Canyon Photo Gallery – thanks for coming out, see you at the next one where we will apparently be roasting a small elephant!

Yelp Yelp Yelp Yelp Yelp Yelp

  Got a minute? How about giving Devil's Canyon a review on Yelp! Already reviewed us? How about reviewing a few of the places our beer is served? And be sure to thank them for serving local beer!

No Beer Friday in December

But there will be a Hootenanny party! Stay tuned for details. . .

Full Boar Scotch Ale Cheddar Cheese

Hop Scotch Cheddar Cheese samples & sales will be available from 5:30-6:30 at the outside bar.

Cheese sales will be taking place at the inside bar from from 7-11pm. ($8 for a ½ lb.)

And you can always buy the cheese online, anytime, day or night!

Newest Accounts and FREE BEER

Welcome Aboard!

The Counter – Palo Alto
Seniore’s Pizza – Santa Clara
The Counter – San Jose (Santana Row)
Stanford Alumni – Palo Alto (Open to the Public!)

A map with all of our customer locations is available here

Remember – a $15 receipt from any of the places our beer is served gets you a free beer on Beer Friday! Limit 2, See Jamie for receipt redemption.

Devil’s Canyon Group on Facebook 

We have a Devil’s Canyon group on Facebook. If you have an account you can join the Devil’s Canyon group here.

June Beer Friday Bands – Open Auditions!

Local singer / songwriter Leo Matthews will be dishing out her simple, raw, and acoustic guitar work outside from 5-6pm.

Following that, Devil's Canyon Brewing Company in conjunction with The Jack Aces and CORA will be having an Open Audition for a Female Vocalist

The Jack Aces are a local rock/dance band that is looking to expand! Singers are invited to join them on-stage for a fun, live audition.

Please email Eric@TheJackAces.com  for the song list. This is going to be a lot of fun!

Also, this just in!

Special appearance by critically acclaimed and award-winning vocalist, songwriter and performer Emily Lord!

Thanks again for your support of Devil's Canyon Brewing Co., Local Beer, and Local Businesses!

Questions, Comments, Ideas, Just Plain Lonely? Let Us Know.

See You At The Brewery!

Devil's Canyon Brewing Co.

Belmont, California, USA
DevilsCanyonBrewery.com

"What Kind Of Local Beer Do You Have?"