But some hard to find whales drop off the list as they retire. Meantime, I was seeing CBS everywhere on shelves in Florida when a few years ago it was impossible. Ditto for Bells Black Note, meaning as time goes on some hard to find beers become more available.
I’ve never had more than roughly half of the top 50 ticked, but that is seeming to be harder and harder to maintain. This is overall a good thing as international beers take over from previous American/Belgian dominance I guess. Also what used to be one beer in top 50 has turned into a number in some cases due to the fact that everyone makes a million variants of their whales (dark lord, Bomb, goose island).
I guess it seems like I’ve reached critical mass at beer hype, whereas my desire to chase whales isn’t higher than the speed at which new whales appear. Sounds like a balanced ecosystem.
Im fairly convinced it has got harder, as People pump their local Rarity as the only way to get the other Local Rarities that hit the Top 50 last month.
there no doubt most Top50 beer are damn good but better than more widely available ones. Not convinced.
when was the Last time a Widely available beer hit the top 50 or even top 100
But I also think it got easier to get a solid amount of Top50 beers, as some old classic whales are not whales anymore (KBS, Parabola, CBS, etc), at least here in Europe.
Ya, definitely finding that. Seems there is a basic curve wherein a company puts out some whales, develops mad hype for a couple years, then gets enough money to increase production or sells out to the man, at which point distribution goes way up.
When I first came on RB in 2011, CBS, KBS and Black Note were all impossible to find. Now they are fairly easy to find. There are some alternatives - Dark Lord is still tough for example, but many of the small guys who do really well find it quite easy to amp up production. Now we are starting to see Hill Farmstead on tap in DC even.
the RB scoring system is also biased towards such beers - once a beer has 500 ratings that are great, you won’t get it out of the top, since hardly any ticker ever rerates, and most (myself included) don’t go down from a once-given high score even if the perception is different later.
True. Hence Dark Lord’s Imperial Soy Sauce staying top 10 because it was there in the 80s. Plus if something is seen as a top 10 beer, people will continue to rate it as such, especially if they are less experienced raters.
that soy sauce indeed was the most disappointing brew of the Top50 I’ve had. All others were legitimately great (tough maybe not great enough for Top50 for me).
Dont think it was ever easy. I’ve never hunted for those top 50 beers or so called whales. I’d much rather drink 5 $10 RIS than one $50 (or more) so called whale. I really thank my (regular) trade partners a lot for sending me their local gems.
