Fall Has Arrived...Beer Style!

The coming of Fall usually heralds the arrival of the beers we crave as the weather mellows and the wind picks up. Breezy days of Autumn make you want to crack open Spicy pumpkin beers, creamy Oktoberfests, and chocolatey brown ales. However, with each year it seems the beers normally reserved for Fall are arriving as the scorching weather of Louisville is in full swing. I don't know about you, but none of the beers I mentioned (sans Marzen-style Oktoberfest beers) makes me want to drink them in 90 degree weather with the humidity in full swing.

So why do we release them earlier and earlier when people do nothing but lament their arrival? The first culprit would no doubt be commercialism. If you get the product on the shelves first, then you have first dibs on the market. That is huge to some degree. If you are the only option for those looking, then you are the one they will buy 4 out of 5 times. I myself found myself craving an Oktoberfest and bought Great Lakes as it was literally the only option on the shelves at the time.

The second reason is what makes this a more formidable combination than a string of blows from Ali in his prime: If you don't buy them before they are gone, you get none. Pumpkin Beers and Oktoberfests sell like wildfire, and they hardly ever last until the months where you want them (November and October respectively.) That in and of itself is frustrating enough to get you to pick a few up and hold the last couple bottles until you truly want them. Especially for the many of you who are looking to drink some bottles of Southern Tier Pumking or Schlafly Pumpkin Ale.

So how does this disgusting trend stop? The sad part is that it probably won't. People are insatiable, and craft beer is hotter than ever right now. The only way to reverse this trend would be for many, many people to be on board and abstain. Even then it would be doubtful, as who could resist the desire not to buy one of their favorite seasonals? We are slaves to the man. So let's all toast those cases of Fall beer that we will be holding onto until Fall actually arrives. Cheers!