NZ Beer Festival

[Peter Smith]

from lukes post

New Zealand Beer Festival – maximum serve 165ml, bar closes 2 hours before session ends 10am-3pm & 4pm-10pm. Beer Festival where you can’t buy beer? no beer over 9% but you can buy wine (which is likely to be 12-14%)?

WTF 165ml 1/2 pints............

[Peter Smith]

I reckon its time to have a standard pint in NZ    at brothers there pint glasses hold less then a 330ml bottle of beer

1 imperial pint	=	1⁄8	imperial gallon
	=	1⁄2	imperial quart
	=	4	imperial gills
	=	20	imperial fluid ounces
	=	568.26125	millilitres (exactly)[3][4] ≈568 mL
	≈	34.677429099	cubic inches
	≈	1.2009499255	US liquid pints
	≈	1.0320567435	US dry pints
	≈	the volume of 1 1⁄4 lb (567 g) of water at 62 °F (16.7 °C)

[vdog]

I'm confused - the bar closing 2hrs before session close is news to me and I can't find any mention of it anywhere on the event website or any other? I can understand wanting a short break to reset things, and there is a break between sessions, but really don't understand why they'd need to close the bars as early as that. If the issue is intoxication, just don't serve the drunk people (like the law demands anyway), surely? And if there's some other issue then I'd love to hear it, bit stink to have a beer festival where 40% of the time you're there you can't get a beer.

[nzbrewer]

Evening session starts at 4pm, and last calls are 7.45pm, no beer sales after 8pm, with the event ending at 10pm

[vdog]

Thanks Luke. Is it the same deal in the morning session, which is shorter to begin with? 

[nzbrewer]

still need to check out the final times for the morning session. I think it will be something like last drinks 1.45pm, and no serving after 2pm, session ends 3pm.

[craig rothwell]

I found my cup from last year. It's got two lines on it, the lower one is 165mL, the upper line is 320mL. I started off getting half fills so I could try different beers but was taking too long to get served, so switched to full cups. This year I guess I'll be standing in various queues for 4hours. I hope the people serving are up to it, they're going to be busy.

[nzbrewer]

all the changes have come from meeting the requirements of the local council and the police. They are trying to minimize harm from alcohol.

So the smaller serve size could possible resulting in people standing in lines for longer, as it isn't much quicker to pour 330ml vs 165ml and take payment. Ultimate result will be half the amount of beer served during the festival. Add to this the reduced hours, then even less volume of beer served. 

One could speculate that potentially this will leave the beer drinker attending the event and the brewers serving beer, slightly dissatisfied. 

It will be interesting to see what happens when 10,000 people find out that a little over half way through their Beer Festival they can no longer buy beer. Many will be attending for the beer and the entertainment is just a bonus. You pay $30-$40 a ticket to come to an event that doesn't deliver to your expectations. 

So from 8pm -10pm what will people do that can't buy a beer at a beer festival?

[Peter Smith]

goto the vulture!!!    you forgot to add the time you cant drink while queueing to get in.....    its the end of this festival imho   I am starting to tire of spending so much on a ticket when great beers are on tap now in akl...thats 4 pints to just get in.

[Tom C]

Hear, hear Peter.

I can't be arsed with this one any more either.  As you say there's better drinking in town any day of the week.

[nzbrewer]

We are re-releasing Epic Mosaic IPA on Saturday (limited release). There is something you can't get any day of the week. Also we will have Hop Zombie and Coffee & Fig Stout and the last kegs of Carolina.

[Crusader-Rob]

They did this last year in chch, one hour before it finished up they stopped serving. 

Its funny, they're making the rules tougher for the few hooligans out there. but hey as the old saying goes, "Theres always one"

Luke, I'm looking forward to Carolina at GKBF too. And don't forget the Stone Brewing stuff.

[vdog]

I agree with you Luke (and with Peter). I would expect that both festival attendees and brewers will be left feeling a bit let down by this, and that this might affect participation and attendance next year. It's a real shame - was a great festival last year.