Market research

[beer novice]

IL Turbo,I was at the stand last night,not there today,but you can get in touch by email.Enjoyed the RDS,great to see such a huge crowd buying Irish made beer and great to see some many Irish companies supplying it.I bought The Good Craft Brewery Guide by Tim O Rourke and he was a pleasure to speak with,the book is good reading.

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

TheSumofallBeers I  fully agree the product is very important and having a great product will lead to building a brand.I believe that unless a person is passionate about what they are doing you will never created a great product nor will it get sold.

A quote I read recently from someone in the beer press/microbrew went something like this:
"Passion is easy to fake. If you want to make good beer, you have to *like* beer."

It is certainly possible to build a business without knowing personally how to make the product. There are many examples of this, inside the brewing industry and out. But I dont think you can make a good product without knowing what a good product feels/tastes/looks like.

To make a good beer, you have to know what a good beer tastes like, otherwise you will just make beers without any feel for where they place in the market.

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

What type of stout/porter or English brown ale would you recommend and where to buy deadman,I cant wait to get started

You might be able to get Sam Smiths Nut Brown Ale, which is a really good northern english brown. It might be easier to get some US Brown Ales which have their own take on the style.

As for stouts and porters, you should be able to get some really good examples of both from around the world. Sierra Nevada Stout/Porter on bottles and Anchor Steam Porter should be easy to get. You may be able to get a Brooklyn Imperial Stout (it will hit your wallet) that is divine. For good english styles, Fullers London Porter is probably the best. Meantime stout, and their stronger London Porter may also be easy to get, and are some of my favourites here. Sam Smiths do a Taddy Porter that is worth a taste. Also, try and sample Harviestoun (Scotland) Ola Dubh and Old Engine Oil.

As for Belgian styles, get yourself over to a Belgian beerfestival, or just holiday in belgium. Beer is really cheap over there by comparison with import prices. Strong too, so pick small glasses.

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I am looking for someone to help me out,that's all nothing more nothing less.If someone can that's great if not that's ok to,I thought I would try here first.

If you want to learn, head along to one of the brew meets. With luck, there should be a NHC meetup near you, hopefully close enough that you dont have to drive.

At LAB (London) we regularly get commercial brewers coming in to talk to us. Commercial brewing puts a limit on how daring you can be with a recipe, which is something that home brewers dont have. So pro brewers always like to keep tabs on what home brewers are doing - to see what is working.

[mr hoppy]

I love the Sam Smith beers as well, but I've only ever seen the organic chocolate stout for sale in Ireland, and that was in a health food shop!

[beer novice]

Sumofallbeers,thanks you and I very much look forward to trying all the  beers mention.I have to disagree about passion being easy faked and if someone does this nothing great will every happen.By the way I never said I didnt like beer/stout I just didn't know how it was made Again thank you for your recommendations once I have tried a few I will be back to let you know how I got on.

[irish_goat]

What beers do you currently drink?

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I love the Sam Smith beers as well, but I've only ever seen the organic chocolate stout for sale in Ireland, and that was in a health food shop!

LOL! Can't say its one of my favourites though. The chocolate is really overpowering. IMO chocolate stout is the hardest stout adjunct/variant to get right.

The Nut Brown Ale and Oatmeal stout are the best Sam Smith beers. I like their Pale Ale too, but its pricey by comparison with the competition (excellent pale ales of many styles are all over the place in London, but it is hard to reliably get stout or porter).

[LordEoin]

agreed. too much chocolate can make a right mess. especially after a few months when other flavours have mellowed down...

[johnrm]

I was suppin Brew Dog Punk IPA and Brooklyn Lager at the weekend.
great beers.

[LordEoin]

yeah, i had a few punk IPA the other week and loved it.
The hardcore IPA was a bit too much though

[mr hoppy]

The hardcore IPA was a bit too much though

The cough syrup school of DIPAs!

Halcyon, or that To Ol one are way better IMHO.

[johnrm]

Cantillon oude geuze - Worth sampling, I came close once. 

[delzep]

The hardcore IPA was a bit too much though

The cough syrup school of DIPAs!

A bargain at just €9 a bottle in the laurels in Clondalkin...

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I have to disagree about passion being easy faked and if someone does this nothing great will every happen.

Well lets just say that passion for the higher arts in beer making is easily destroyed by what you actually do on a day to day basis - clean, bottle, and carry heavy crap. There is different things to be passionate about, like the end result itself and the culture around it, but passion alone won't carry you through as a brewer. Bull headed stubborn-ness and OCD on the other hand 

By the way I never said I didnt like beer/stout I just didn't know how it was made

I wasn't the one who said you didn't like it (I was paraphrasing another person). My interpretation would be something like this:

If you want to make good beer, you have to like beer. That means a bit more than 'I drink beer on a night out' or 'I like Stout/Erdinger/Miller/London Pride/West Coast IPAs'. You need a palate that can appreciate and enjoy beer, regardless of brand, origin or style, on its own merits. You need to be able to split out your personal preference from your appreciation.

Beer snobbery is a trap. Appreciate well-made no-nonsense stouts, bitters and lagers, as well as the rare stuff like trappist beers, Saisons, Imperial Stouts, and new world fruity pale ales.

Competing against the incumbents (BudCoollers, Heinoberg) is a trap. They make light unobjectionable beers and sell to a captive mass market whose palate is in a kind of stockholm syndrome.

Once you have a frame of reference for good beer, you will then know where your beer falls in that ranking, and can set aside any paternal love and be dispassionately critical.