An Open Letter to Craft Brewers
Dear Sirs/Madams,
I really enjoy the fruits of your labors. I don't buy BMC any more. Thanks for you hard work, and excellent product.
But. . .
I am a home brewer. I normally just keg my beer, but when I need to enter contests, I need bottles. And since most of you use the kind of bottles I need, I usually wash them, and remove the labels. Unfortunately for me, I don't do that as I drink the beer. I usually let the bottles pile up and clean what I have to have when I bottle.
However, a few weeks ago, Satan (my brewing partner) asked me to bring any clean bottles I have for our joint brew that happened the other day. We wanted to bottle the beer so we could each have a case of each beer. So I spent almost 4 hours, including soaking time, cleaning two cases of bottles. And some of you guys have hacked me off.
Why slather so much glue across the bottle to attach your label?
First, props to a couple of brewers who are frugal in their glue use: Real Ale Brewing Company and Great Lakes Brewing Company. The Great Lakes labels slide off after a thirty minute soak in hot water. Real Ale applies a thick strip of glue on each side of the label, but doesn't use any glue anywhere else. Thanks, guys!
The rest of you guys spread glue on your bottles like you're Bob Ross painting a happy mountain! C'mon, guys!
All right. I will appeal to your bottom line. Imagine how much money you would save if you cut your glue use in half!
Thanks for you time. I still like your beer. I just hate to clean your bottles.
Labels: Beer Philosophy
posted by hiikeeba at 08:01
5 Comments:
I hope you'll forgive me for a moment of link whoring, but I have felt your pain all too well.
It's more the brand of glue used than the quantity. Some US brewers use something closer to rubber cement. Eurobottles have labels that float themselves off after 10 min in water.
As I understand it, most European breweries don't have to contend with their bottles floating in ice chests. American brewers chose the adhesives they use to keep the brand name out there in the person's hand, even if it's spent a week in water. That way we can all see what brand the other guy is drinking. Some of that stuff won't come off with steel wool!
Yes, first the scraping, then the steelwool.
I have found that most commercial labels come off great after a very long (multi-day) soak.
Ah! It's that prior planning and patience thing!
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