[brewboy]

Our intent would be for people to pour the beer in a glass, regardless of bottle or can.

That kind of shoots a hole in the convenience theory. Now you'd have to buy beer in cans and take glasses with you.

[theDarkSide]

Our intent would be for people to pour the beer in a glass, regardless of bottle or can.

That kind of shoots a hole in the convenience theory. Now you'd have to buy beer in cans and take glasses with you.

I already do this anyways.  I don't find it inconvenient. I can't remember the last beer I drank directly from the bottle or can, but I think it was the same year Windows 3.11 was released.

What I want to know is when is someone like Blichman Engineering going to come up with a canning system for homebrewers...

[dirtyjerzey]

I'm not going to buy into the whole bottle vs. can taste contest....drinking straight from a vessel, bottle wins hands down (IMO).....but as mentioned: any of the 'good' beers that we would consider craft beers we would drink from a glass anyways, so i think the argument is moot.  I could give a crap about bottle or can when drinking BL, but bottles taste better....maybe it's just me.

My biggest proponent for cans is portability: fishing, camping, etc...  I think I could muscle down a SN from a can if I had to    I'll drink from a glass when I'm at home sitting on the back deck regardless of weather it came from a bottle or can. 

I HATE taking bottles out on the boat....they break, they clang together (need to be quiet fishing), take up more space when storing empties (cans crush easy)....I would buy cans of craft beer! 

I'm sure for smaller brewery operations, purchasing the additional equipment to convert partially to cans is a cost prohibitive capital investment. 

[majorvices]

Our intent would be for people to pour the beer in a glass, regardless of bottle or can.

That kind of shoots a hole in the convenience theory. Now you'd have to buy beer in cans and take glasses with you.

Really? How hard is it to carry plastic cups? We have a membership at a private pool and it is very convenient to not worry about broken glass, and I carry plastic cups and pour the beer in plastic cups (I'm certainly not going to carry proper glass ware up there). Also, I am a back packer and sometimes I like to lug a couple of beers - ain't no way I'm packing in bottles. In that instance I usually carry something like Newcastle or even BMC and drink it from the can. I would drink an IPA from the can if I was 15+ miles from the car, no problems. 

Along the same lines there are a few pubs selling beer in Nalgene Growlers now. Nalgene! I need to get one of those to bring up to the pool! Genius! BPA be damned!

Anyway, I think cans are convenient and I think that eventually you will see a lot more craft beer in cans because of the convenience. You don't have to share my convictions though, and I might be wrong. But craft beer is currently expanding in cans, that much is certain.

[brewboy]

Why not bottle on PET containers?

[theDarkSide]

But craft beer is currently expanding in cans, that much is certain.

That's right, CANS!

[boulderbrewer]

Along the same lines there are a few pubs selling beer in Nalgene Growlers now. Nalgene! I need to get one of those to bring up to the pool! Genius! BPA be damned!

You can get these from White Labs if you order a 5 to 7 barrel batch of yeast. Best bet is to hit up a brew pub that uses White Labs and see if the will part with some. Might be a hike for you though.

[majorvices]

Why not bottle on PET containers?

I dunno. Might be a viable option down the road. Isn't as impervious to light and o2 though.

Along the same lines there are a few pubs selling beer in Nalgene Growlers now. Nalgene! I need to get one of those to bring up to the pool! Genius! BPA be damned!

You can get these from White Labs if you order a 5 to 7 barrel batch of yeast. Best bet is to hit up a brew pub that uses White Labs and see if the will part with some. Might be a hike for you though.

There are a few small 7bbl breweries locally. Plus, hopefully I'll be ordering yeast for that size batch very soon. I didn't realize they sent them in Nalgene but that makes a lot of sense since they can be sterilized. Good info, thanks!

[blatz]

keith I have a handful of them (and can get more) if you really need one.

[Hokerer]

and because they are more recyclable,

Small point but, recyclable isn't necessarily a plus.  While recycling is definitely a plus over throwaway, re-use blows recycling out of the water.  Especially with craft beer as most bottle in non-twistoffs.  From a conservation perspective, using the same bottle 5, 10, 20 times is far better than using 5, 10, 20 cans even if you can recycle them.  Maybe we need to get back to the returnable bottles system we had long ago (and Europe still uses to great advantage today).

Oh, and spare me the holier than thou "I keg so I'm so superior to you poor schmucks who still have to bottle".  That's another one for "nudder story".

[majorvices]

Blatz, thanks, I may take you up on that sometime.

Hokerer - I agree, I miss returnable bottles. That is smart packaging. My point on recycling though, mainly, is that our local curb side pick up does not accept glass. Not sure how that expands across the country but obviously I am thinking local market, and a lot of the type of people who I expect will be drinking our beer are the type of people who may be concerned about recycling. I personally hate throwing away bottles, it really feels wasteful to me.

BTW, keg is way superior to any other package. 

[brewboy]

I personally hate throwing away bottles, it really feels wasteful to me.

We do agree on something.  

[akr71]

Oh, and spare me the holier than thou "I keg so I'm so superior to you poor schmucks who still have to bottle".  That's another one for "nudder story".

A keg is basically a can - a really, really big can.

[Kaiser]

Why not bottle on PET containers?

I dunno. Might be a viable option down the road. Isn't as impervious to light and o2 though.

Some of the cheaper bands in Germany are sold in brown PET bottles. The problem is the O2 permability but judging by the papers I have come across, the industry is working on solving this problem.

When it comes to packaging it's all a matter of cost. If disposing bottles is cheaper than setting up a reuse infrastructure the industry will always bias towards disposable containers.

Kai

[brewboy]

A keg is basically a can - a really, really big can.  

When they start canning beer in stainless, I'll change my mind.