[fredthecat]

I know a lot of people keg nowadays, but I still bottle. I returned to Canada and had to rebuild my bottle collection from scratch.

Surprised to see that there were almost no glass reusable bottles except for belgians and german weisse beer bottles with a few exceptions. Tons of stuff that used to be in bottles was gone or in cans.

This has something to do with recycling they claim. I could imagine it being one attempt to minimize homebrewing and keep people enslaved to big beer and big canadian prices. absolute cheapest beer at the store is about $1.95 / 500ml can. ontario microbrew default price is set at about $3.25 / 500ml can and is of extremely variable and often mediocre quality.

Thankfully I managed to snag enough glass bottles because I could see the writing on the wall, but by now its even harder to get glass bottles. Disgusting and pathetic behaviour by the big-beer owned "The Beer Store" govt owned beer supplier.

[narvin]

I know a lot of people keg nowadays, but I still bottle. I returned to Canada and had to rebuild my bottle collection from scratch.

Surprised to see that there were almost no glass reusable bottles except for belgians and german weisse beer bottles with a few exceptions. Tons of stuff that used to be in bottles was gone or in cans.

This has something to do with recycling they claim. I could imagine it being one attempt to minimize homebrewing and keep people enslaved to big beer and big canadian prices. absolute cheapest beer at the store is about $1.95 / 500ml can. ontario microbrew default price is set at about $3.25 / 500ml can and is of extremely variable and often mediocre quality.

Thankfully I managed to snag enough glass bottles because I could see the writing on the wall, but by now its even harder to get glass bottles. Disgusting and pathetic behaviour by the big-beer owned "The Beer Store" govt owned beer supplier.

Glass recycling doesn't make much economic sense anymore, now that china won't take our dirty stuff, but it's more about cans just being cheaper and better for freshness for craft breweries.  With the number of companies offering mobile canning lines now, you don't even need an upfront investment.

[fredthecat]

fair enough. lol, im on my third aventinus IN A CAN NO LESS, so i cant formulate a decent response at the moment.

[jeffy]

Cans keep the beer from staling better, keep the light out and are lighter than bottles, making it easier on production and shipping costs.  Plus people actually get paid to recycle them.  So it is not a matter of the man sticking it to the little guy.
I remember talking to the production manager at the Tampa Yuengling plant, who told me they had to shut down the entire brewery because of a worn out belt.  He was talking about the conveyor belt that ran the bottles through the bottling line.  It had been designed for cans and wore out prematurely because bottles are heavier.  That was close to a million dollars he wasn't expecting.

[kramerog]

There was a stigma attached to canned beer not that long ago.  Who doesn't remember the supposedly superior-to-canned-beer skunky flavor of Heineken in green glass bottles?  Now cans are the rage, except for the large format glass bottles. 

Not so sure that glass recycling doesn't make sense.  While plastic recycling was deeply impacted by China and other Asian countries refusing to take recycled materials in the US, plastics recycling is successful in Europe where something like 50% of the plastics in plastic bottles is from recycling.

[denny]

Since cans are lighter than glass, shipping cost is also reduced. There is no conspiracy against homebrewers.  There aren't enough of us to matter

[allenhuerta]

Since cans are lighter than glass, shipping cost is also reduced. There is no conspiracy against homebrewers.  There aren't enough of us to matter

This is just a funny thought to me lol homebrew conspiracies. That could be an interesting YouTube series.

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[4dogbrewer]

I use the PET bottles along with kegging my beer. I turned in all of my glass bottles years ago. Yes, buying single cans of beer in Ontario is not cheap. Multiply them by 17 and you get what it costs to buy a 24 of beer. Our cans are 473 ml by the way. Using my CPBF with my PET bottles is quick and easy. Too bad there is no where to take them at the moment except to my back yard.

[fredthecat]

yes, i guess i agree that there aren't enough of us to matter. i think homebrewing among the masses has fizzled now that microbrews have really got their teeth into people and are everywhere.

I use the PET bottles along with kegging my beer. I turned in all of my glass bottles years ago. Yes, buying single cans of beer in Ontario is not cheap. Multiply them by 17 and you get what it costs to buy a 24 of beer. Our cans are 473 ml by the way. Using my CPBF with my PET bottles is quick and easy. Too bad there is no where to take them at the moment except to my back yard.

exactly, i cant stand that 473ml. its visibly less than a tallboys volume when poured into a pint glass, so for the highly priced ontario microbrew cans youre actually getting even less value than for a 500ml can from anywhere else.


i considered PET bottles for my quick and cheap basic beers, but havent done it yet. I just already have more than enough glass. I'm completely anal about saving and cleaning every bottle. Even found some very old homebrew hidden in a crawlspace from more than a decade ago. got two stubby 341ml bottles and one 550ml samuel smith bottle.

are you in ontario?

[denny]

Actually, there are more homebrewers now than ever.  But to a multinational company its peanuts.