How to Make the Most Of Your Beer Fest Experience!!

1. Come with an Open Mind

You invested some money, find some new beer.

Come with An Open Mind Every festival will have a handful of breweries that you can find everywhere, but this isn’t everywhere. Skip the big boys pretending to be craft beer and find the local options that you may have never heard of and give them a taste. This isn’t just a trip to the bar, this is a trip to a Beer Utopia.

2. Bring WaterIt’s not just for hydration anymore

Bring WaterThe point of the festival is to find a few favorite flavors. If all you’re drinking is beer, your flavors are going to blend. Bring a bottle of water to clean your palate and find uniqueness in all the beers.

3. Go with Friends

Having your own bar stool at the local watering hole may be ok, but sharing is caring at a beer festival

Go with FriendsWhen you go with friends (at least those you trust aren’t too germy) you set your self up for sharing opportunities. When your friends eyes light up after a sip, the share is on and you may have just found your next glass or favorite beer. The lone wolf is stuck to looking at strangers faces and that’s creepy

4. Don’t be afraid of the Artist

When you go to an art exhibition you seek out the artist to ask questions

Don’t be afraid of the artistSame rules apply with craft brewers. If you have questions, don’t walk away. If a line is long, wait until it dies down. Craft brewers brew with love, and who doesn’t want to talk about what they love. These men and women are full of knowledge and can help you understand what makes their beer tick.

5. Save room for the Trucks!

We’re not in college anymore. The $5 Foot Long to “soak up” the beer tastes bland and causes you to miss out on the halftime eating festivities

Save room for the Trucks!You need to hit the food trucks about half way through your experience. You haven’t eaten from a truck before? Well congratulations because your experience just got better. Local food artisans in a crusty old truck, yup it’s worth it and affordable. Enjoy the best tacos in town.

6. Drink HomeBrew!

Uncle Jessie is not racing across the Hazzard County line with bath tub swill anymore.

Drink HomeBrew!A large % of craft brewers began making up basement or garage brews. Those turned into what you enjoy on tap today. Seek out the homebrew tent for the next big thing. Just because it’s made at home doesn’t mean it’s subpar. Every brewer does it for love. Show these guys some love and chat them up because you can say you had them before they distributed to all 50 states

7. Take pictures

No matter how much you’ve had to drink, that one brewery from that one place that I liked is not how it’s labeled in the store.

Take PicturesIt was the best beer you had. It was also taste number 12. You wake up the next morning, and the name in your head is gone. BUT YOU TOOK A PICTURE OF THE TENT, YAY FOR YOU!! Now you can find it anywhere. Your friends are no help, they were drinking Blue Moon. Remember to pull out your phone and snap a shot, or that beer will be gone forever ( for you, we’ll all be drinking it)

8. Travel for a Festival

Like your local sports team, your local beer isn’t the only one available to the world

Travel For a FestivalDifferent parts of the world offer different flavors. And some area do some flavors better. Find a unique place with a unique beer fest and you have yourself one heck of a beer fueled trip. With the growing distribution of craft beer you may find a brew coming to your area and you can be the first to suggest it when it arrives. You are now a beer hero!

9 Don’t be that Person

Stumbling, vomiting, slurs…save them for the bar that doesn’t card college kids

Don’t be that personThere are no keg stands or beer bongs of Busch Light at the beer festival. This is a celebration of flavors and art. It is not a snob fest or a polo match. Have fun, try as many flavors as you can handle, but please don’t pee on my shoes

10. Bring the Beer Fest home with You

Honor the festival in your fridge

Bring the Beer Fest home with YouYou’ve now had real hand crafted beer straight from the brewer. You’ve enjoyed it with friends and like minded people. You’ve heard the brewers story and ate from a food truck. As you stare at the cooler at the liquor store to stock your fridge, please walk past the Coors and Miller signs and make sure you support local brewers in your home as well. The Beer Festival is not just an event, it is part of an education. Always build on your education outside of the classroom