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It’s amazing how fast some things can develop intro “something” in this country – the speed with which certain things can become “the thing” overnight. And something that is now “a thing” will be happening today and that thing is….Black Friday Beer.
Black Friday is, first and foremost, known as the biggest shopping day of the year. And although its status might be changing somewhat, as more Americans opt to shop online – it’s still huge for the malls. It’s a day of shopping madness and incentivized consumer mayhem – and it’s the kind of shopping day that could drive anyone to drink.
But to truly understand how craft beer has grown to become such a big deal on Black Friday, you need look no further the Chicago-based Goose island Beer Company and the beloved brand that they’ve become known for.
The originator of the entire bourbon-barrel aged beer category, the Bourbon County Brand began in 1992 as an imperial stout that was brewed in honor of the 1,000th beer batch at Goose Island’s Clybourn brewpub. Since that time the brand has grown into a family of award-winning Stout variations (and one Barleywine) – highly prized beers that sell out almost immediately upon their release – and go on to fetch high prices on craft beer’s black market.
In 2010 the brewery decided to release these popular beers on the day after Thanksgiving – and the Black Friday Beer tradition was born.
Goose Island was acquired by the nation’s biggest brewer Anheuser-Busch in 2011. This allowed the brewery wider distribution and the power to promote the Bourbon County franchise and its Black Friday events on a much grander scale – and things have gotten bigger with every year
Today Goose Island is sponsoring holiday events in nine cities including Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Jacksonville, Fla., Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Phoenix and San Francisco, and the Black Friday Beer release concept they’ve fostered has caught on. Now other craft brewers have embraced the concept and throwing their own local celebrations today.
In 2012, Milwaukee-based Lakefront Brewery got into the Black Friday game, and they began brewing a special one-day only, Imperial Black IPA – it was an enormous success.
Last year people were in lines more than two hours before, Lakefront opened – its 1,200-bottle supply of Black Friday beer sold out in 90 minutes.
This year, Lakefront has changed up the style and upped their production in hopes of keeping up with demand. But today’s crowds will enormous – there’s just no getting around it.
Portland, Maine’s Allagash Brewing has also hopped on Black Friday special release train and today they are debuting their Allagash Midnight Brett Ale in bottles at the brewery.
Where these Black Friday Beer events go in the future is anyone’s guess – but we’re thinking this holiday phenomenon is only going to get bigger. And we should all drink to that!
Happy Black Friday!
