As we all live through this pandemic, a lot of beer lovers may be having a lot of thoughts. ‘How can I drink what I want now?’ ‘What the hell am I going to do with my spare time?’ ‘How can I help the community?’ ‘Is there a safe way to consume beer?’ And any number of thoughts under the sun. Of course, at Drink Local, we can’t answer all of these questions, as we’re having many of the same thoughts, but as we’ve continued to process this all along with you, we’ve noticed that while overall, this situation we find ourselves in is definitely a negative, there is some positivity within it and there are definitely ways to both help the community and enjoy some of our favorite beers. Most importantly, now is a great time to drink local brew!
If you’re not aware, a lot of your favorite tasting rooms, breweries and even some bars have began to innovate the ways in which they serve beer. Many are offering curbside pick-up, and a lot are even offering delivery. If you’re in a small community, these options may be available to you through your favorite brewery’s websites or instagrams. If you’re like us and happen to be in a larger market (we’re LA-based), then there are a plethora of options for you.
We’ve been thinking for a few weeks, ‘How can we talk about this?’ ‘How can we help publicize the things going on in the community right now?’ We’ve managed to try delivery options from Highland Park Brewery and Ogopogo Brewing so far, and not only are they two of our favorite Los Angeles breweries, but they’re also both fantastic options. Both offer same-day service and both sell cans and crowlers through their website. That means you can get very fresh beer! Highland Park does no-contact and Ogopogo does ‘minimal contact’ like your pizza place might be doing right now. Ogopogo even gave us a free bottle of hand sanitizer! We found them to be very safe options, and they are taking all of the necessary precautions to ensure the safety of their staff-members and customers. I think a lot of breweries are doing something similar right now. Please check your local options.
Some places we’ve seen, like Temescal in Oakland, are serving mixed packs and giving both fans and potential new customers an opportunity to try many of their beers in new and different ways.
Many delivery services are for local customers, but a lot of places also have opened up shipping options to make sure that even if you’re out of the area, and you don’t mind waiting a little bit, they can get beer to you. Once again, please check your favorites!
What we’d like to see from all breweries is that they make sure and offer a tipping module in their payment options. We want to make sure as many staff members are taken care of as possible in these trying times. If you don’t have it, please do it! We want to be able to tip!
The people who make beer so special for me and you are usually the people that we can’t see right now. The bartenders, the servers, the frontline staff. Many of these people are out of jobs. We saw that members of The Hermosillo, the original home of Highland Park Brewery have set up a gofundme in order to help the staff. We hope that other places have people organizing in this way too. Contributing as much as we can right now is so important. We know that a gofundme economy is not ideal, but that is the situation we find ourselves in, and it’s highly important, living in America, where many of us can’t have access to healthcare if we aren’t working. It is dire that we make sure that the people that have made so many of our days have the ability to stay safe.
I’m going to provide a link to an example and I’d love feedback from anyone who reads this. Maybe we can get a thread or a hub going that allows people to have access to resources for helping the beer community far and wide. If there is something like this already, please clue us in! We love beer and we love the community and we know many of you do too! Times are tight, but the best time to come together and prop each other up is, and always has been ‘right now.’
Hermosillo’s GoFundMe:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-for-the-hermosillo-staff
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