A Bad Day for Beer Drinkers


Aaaargh! This really pisses me off.

Erick and I have often enjoyed going to various brew pubs and bringing home a "growler". A growler, if you don't already know, is a big jug of beer(see above). The brewery fills it up with the malty beverage of your choice at the bar and seals it. You take it home and drink it. This is a fine arrangement.

But noooo, the government has to stick it's nose in. Sometimes I really, truly, hate California.

I was at BJ's tonight, a brew pub near the guitar shop, and I was ready to buy a couple of growlers for the guys' band practice (Playing music is thirsty work). I went up to the bar to place my order, and the bartender apologized and informed me that a NEW LAW had just been passed making it illegal to repackage alcoholic beverages, thus making growlers illegal.

I did some searching, trying to find out more about this, but I haven't had any success. I'm sure there is some well-meaning reason behind this, but man! I thought our governor was trying to make California more business friendly. Well, this sure isn't the way to do it. Why is it the government's business if companies want to package their beer and sell it to adults? It's no easier to drink a growler in the car than it is to open a can or a bottle. Plus, the types of beers sold in growlers are high quality and more expensive than the crap sold in 40 oz bottles in liquor stores, ruling out the whole teen drunkenness thing. My other thought is that this is the big beer companies trying to keep the small breweries from selling bottled beer. If that's the case, I'll take back the "commie" statement.

I'm going to keep looking into this, if only to find out what the reasoning is. As my brother in law said, "I don't care what your politics are, you have to admit, this is pretty pink."  ¶ 11:36 PM