Blue Bombers - 2025 Regular Season - Discussion Thread

[Mike]

I think the hazy IPAs that exist outside of Manitoba are far superior to anything we do inside this province and that *may* be part of the reason that Manitobans have a weird impression of them.

Even Kilter (who I love) does a bad job of them these days. Inside Canada, the true champions of hazy IPAs are in Quebec (Messorem, Le Ketch, Bad Bones, Nano Cinco, Brewskey) or Ontario (Badlands, All My Friends) and I guess Alberta has a few top guns as well (Irrational, Polyrhythm, Establishment) but I would say overall, only Messorem/Ketch/Bad Bones can hang with the folks down south

 

brb gonna go pour myself a beer

[Noeller]

I'd like to know what you're basing your opinion of Good and Bad on.... Is it personal preference, or did you go through the Cicerone process and have a full understanding flavour profiles and such? 

[Mike]

5 minutes ago, Noeller said:

I'd like to know what you're basing your opinion of Good and Bad on.... Is it personal preference, or did you go through the Cicerone process and have a full understanding flavour profiles and such? 

I don’t need to go through the cicerone process to have a full understanding of flavour profiles. I also don’t need to have a full understanding of flavour profiles to know what is “good” and what is not “good”

Winnipeg’s biggest problem in the brewing process is its water. It’s too hard and nobody invests the time, effort or capital into a solution, because that takes away from a brewery’s primary function - profit. The second problem is that because of our market, every brewery’s favourite adjunct into a beer is “local” - we are roughly 3-5 years behind the rest of the country in terms of process and technique. We have exactly one brewery (Kilter) with an established barrel program, we have almost zero clout outside of our own provincial border other than just networking collaborations (although this is going to be changing soon) and the breweries typically rely on “local” style branding to mask major flaws in their beers or overall lack of effort in the brewing process.

There’s a reason TCB has to pay vendors for front row shelf space, there’s a reason Stone Angel shut down, there’s a reason Half Pints (gonna miss them, sad they went downhill) is up for sale. These places haven’t changed, never adapted and got lazy. I don’t need to be a cicerone to see that. Sookrams, Kilter and (sometimes) LBJ are the big three in Manitoba and it’s going to stay that way for a long time with reason. Nobody else wants to put the effort in, why bother when you can coast off local collaborations with charities, awareness causes and vendors because that’s all our market tends to care about because that’s all they’ve been taught to care about. 
 

We’re gonna see some evolution this summer / fall and I know you’re not going to believe me, but I’ll say it anyways - I’ve got quite a bit to do with it. Hopefully the change results in some positive progression moving forward, our market will be better for it. It’s going to be nice to see some Manitoba branding on beers brewed outside of this province. 

 

[Noeller]

You could have saved a lot of typing and just said Personal Preference..it's totally fine. You and Dave come from the exact same spot and that's fine.

[Mike]

4 minutes ago, Noeller said:

You could have saved a lot of typing and just said Personal Preference..it's totally fine. You and Dave come from the exact same spot and that's fine.

You could’ve saved a bit of typing and just said “I don’t wanna learn”

[GCn20]

8 hours ago, Mike said:

I don’t need to go through the cicerone process to have a full understanding of flavour profiles. I also don’t need to have a full understanding of flavour profiles to know what is “good” and what is not “good”

Winnipeg’s biggest problem in the brewing process is its water. It’s too hard and nobody invests the time, effort or capital into a solution, because that takes away from a brewery’s primary function - profit. The second problem is that because of our market, every brewery’s favourite adjunct into a beer is “local” - we are roughly 3-5 years behind the rest of the country in terms of process and technique. We have exactly one brewery (Kilter) with an established barrel program, we have almost zero clout outside of our own provincial border other than just networking collaborations (although this is going to be changing soon) and the breweries typically rely on “local” style branding to mask major flaws in their beers or overall lack of effort in the brewing process.

There’s a reason TCB has to pay vendors for front row shelf space, there’s a reason Stone Angel shut down, there’s a reason Half Pints (gonna miss them, sad they went downhill) is up for sale. These places haven’t changed, never adapted and got lazy. I don’t need to be a cicerone to see that. Sookrams, Kilter and (sometimes) LBJ are the big three in Manitoba and it’s going to stay that way for a long time with reason. Nobody else wants to put the effort in, why bother when you can coast off local collaborations with charities, awareness causes and vendors because that’s all our market tends to care about because that’s all they’ve been taught to care about. 
 

We’re gonna see some evolution this summer / fall and I know you’re not going to believe me, but I’ll say it anyways - I’ve got quite a bit to do with it. Hopefully the change results in some positive progression moving forward, our market will be better for it. It’s going to be nice to see some Manitoba branding on beers brewed outside of this province. 

 

I was pretty involved in the domestic beer marketing for a number of years and no indie brewery has the clout to match dollars with Inbev or Molson/Coors and if an indie gets popular enough they get bought by them.

Manitoba has a market in which craft and indie brewers struggle for in house space and don't have the resources to get people tasting their product. Farmery has probably had the most success doing so and their market share is negligible. 

I don't disagree that our IPAs are awful here, but so are many other provinces. Our hops are kind of ****.

Part of Manitobas problem was even getting a brewery going and listed by MLCC. Until 10 years ago it was extremely difficult for our breweries to even get into their stores. That has changed but our breweries are way behind.

Edited 4 hours ago by GCn20

[17to85]

11 hours ago, Mike said:

Winnipeg’s biggest problem in the brewing process is its water. It’s too hard and nobody invests the time, effort or capital into a solution, because that takes away from a brewery’s primary function - profit.

Wait so you're telling me breweries in winnipeg don't do water adjustments? 

That's also a bullshit argument too. Calgary has hard water as well. I don't know what winnipeg is like but I know Calgary is comparable to Munich and I think the Germans managed to brew ok... 

Hard water does lend itself better to malt forward beers where as soft water does make the hop character shine through more but even a ton of people who home brew adjust their water to the style they're making.

[Noeller]

Everyone gets basically all their hops from the same place... The Yakima "Hop Cartel"... It's essentially the best place in the world to get hops, so everyone pays them a ridiculous amount of money on a big contract. Lots have tried to grow their own hops, and I know some in AB are trying local hops, but it's pretty much all **** compared to Yakima.

[rebusrankin]

Can you guys just start a beer thread in the general section.

[Atomic]

12 hours ago, Mike said:

There’s a reason TCB has to pay vendors for front row shelf space, there’s a reason Stone Angel shut down, there’s a reason Half Pints (gonna miss them, sad they went downhill) is up for sale. These places haven’t changed, never adapted and got lazy. I don’t need to be a cicerone to see that. Sookrams, Kilter and (sometimes) LBJ are the big three in Manitoba and it’s going to stay that way for a long time with reason.

Pretty sure TCB has overtaken all of them or will overtake them in short order. Helps to be owned by the Princess Auto family.

[Club Beer]

Craft beer sucks.