You generally see a fair amount of people posting re-caps about beer events telling you how great a time it was and what amazing beers they had, but in reality this kind of thing isn’t very useful to the average person. If you were there, you already know what was there and how much fun it was or how it took five security guards to tackle the guy in the Gumby suit. So I will be using my soapbox for a bit more pragmatic purpose, giving you a bare bones breakdown of what they did right and what needs some improvement so that in the future you can make an educated decision on how best to spend your hard earned beer money. Without any further ado here is my breakdown of Golden Road Brewing Better Weather Fest 2012.
THINGS I LIKED:
-They were giving away free hats to everyone, which because it was a sunny day probably saved a few people a trip to the drug store for some aloe, but also got people jazzed about the event from the entry gate.
-They had Wreck Check (a group without a website that I can find) running a breathalyzer station that you could visit before, during, and after you were done with your drink tickets. This was a tip based service, but definitely good to do before taking off.
-The can beer challenge was a great idea. You were given 8 tasting cups of beer with a number on each and had to match the number to one of the eight beers listed. It sounds easy, but even I only got 50% correct. For those who were able to get all 8 correct they would get their name put into a drawing for some Golden Road prizes.
-There was no shortages of food or water. This seems like a no brainer, but I’ve been to more than a few of these things where this sort of thing didn’t cross anyone’s mind ahead of time.
-Really good variety of beers to choose from. They had each brewery bring two or three beers and there was pretty much a few options for almost every style.
THINGS THAT NEED IMPROVEMENT:
-Though it was called the Better Weather Fest it could have easily been called the Beer Sauna Fest. There was a bit of oversight in the fact that putting all of the beer stations in the uninsulated, metal roofed warehouse with almost not ventilation might be a problem on an almost 90 degree day. There was one industrial fan setup at the far end of the room, but the inevitable cluster of people seeking relief made it’s effectiveness negligible. I really felt bad for the beer pourers, one of whom I was convinced was on the verge of passing out from the heat.
-Couldn’t bring the beer out to where the food was. Not a huge inconvenience as they were not huge pours of beer, but sometimes its nice to sit down and enjoy your beer or see how it compliments the food.
-The food area needed some shade. Probably still weary of the wind storm that canceled the last time they tried to throw an event at Golden Road, they did not provide any covering of the designated food eating area. Sadly this was also the only area with any seating, except for a few benches on the loading dock.
Hopefully these kinks get worked out by the time the next beer festival at Golden Road, but overall I’d say it was a pretty good event and look forward to future events from the team at Golden Road.
Cheers
Beer Guy LA
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