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Put down that brewsky! Watch Beer Wars first….
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Photo: Ducks in a Row Entertainment Corporation
Beer Wars, written, produced and directed by Anat Baron, examines the state of the beer industry in America from the perspective of craft beer makers and their struggle to survive. And what a state it is: with the big three producers – Miller, Coors and Anheiser-Busch – accounting for 78 percent of the U.S. marketplace, there is little room on any market shelf for the local, small craft beers that many American’s love and others would love to try.
This documentary is lively, fun and informative. It provides a history of beer making and marketing in America, and interviews such little known companies as Yuengling & Son in Pottstown, PA, the oldest brewing company in existence in America. Other, more well known micro-breweries, such as Boston Brewing, which manufactures Sam Adams, give truly candid interviews, opening up their breweries and their hearts.
Two craft beer entrepreneurs are showcased in this film, at opposite ends of the business development scale: Sam Calagione, founder of Dogfish Head Craft Brewing Company, whose distinctive beer blends have lead the company to implement significant expansion, and Rhonda Kallman, one of two original founders of Boston Brewing, now out on her own, attempting to develop (and raise capital for) her own fledgling brand of beer, Moonshot. The decisions and dilemmas that these two individuals face will be very familiar to all small business owners, but the passion they share for the products they developed are inspirational and courageous in the face of an uncertain future and a marketplace dominated by the big beer corporations.
This documentary begins before the big Three merged into the Big Two (Miller Coors), but includes that news as part and parcel of its inevitable conclusion: American ingenuity (small craft beer manufacturing) is being swamped by tasteless mega-production and mega-marketing. One of the more enlightening parts of this documentary happen at the very beginning, as consumers are asked to taste and choose which lite beer is their favorite, in a blind tasting. Not one can find their favorite, even with two tries. The point is that the Big Two have watered down beer taste so far that not one of their beers remains distinctive. As the head of the Craft Beer Association explains it, when you meet with large-scale beer producers they ‘rarely talk about what’s inside the glass,’ their meetings are about lifestyle and the shape of the bottle or the design of the packaging. At craft beer meetings, ‘it’s about taste and flavor; that is the essential premise of what craft beer is all about.”
This tasteful DVD is not yet available for rental and but you can purchase it here: Beer Wars. Three out of four stars. Extras include a panel discussion moderated by Ben Stein. Required viewing for this summer season, before you go out and purchase that case of cold beer. Put down that Bud: pick up this movie!
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