Moon Dog World Preston Venue
If there has been as much pre-launch hype and wall-to-wall coverage surrounding a new venue opening in Melbourne in recent years – especially one with craft beer at its heart – as was dedicated to Moon Dog World, we'd love to know. Then again, if there's been a new venue opening in Melbourne…
The Beer Bar Venue
There’s a bustling and diverse pocket within the Sydney suburb of Alexandria where choice is king. It’s something of an odd spot, containing everything from parks and gyms to offices and digital golf; even before you leave the car park, you’ll find your artisanal culinary needs met by the Meat…
Big Shed BruChocs 2022 Beer
For the past few years, two very South Australian businesses have worked together on a unique collaboration to celebrate a very special occasion: FruChocs Appreciation Day*. For those asking: "What on earth are FruChocs? And ahy do they warrant their own day?", they are little morsels of milk chocolate…
Stomping Ground Into The 'Wood: Whiskey Barrel-Aged Strong Ale With Coffee Beer
I've long said that the biggest issue with beer, whisky and coffee is you're unlikely to enjoy all three at once. In part, it's thanks to many cafes closing at 3pm and too many whisky bars opening at 4pm, but there's also a sensibility to the proceedings. Are you meant to have three separate glasses…
Staves Negative Tests, Positive Vibes & Lost At Sea & Frankie Beer
**Negative Tests, Positive Vibes** Smoked Pineapple & Lime Nitro Sour... Flies in the face of winter. Flies in the face of COVID-19. Flies into your face. Expect a solid sour tang, with lime acidity cutting through the pineapple flavour. The smoke is only gentle, like the charred effect on a slice…
Cheeky Monkey Hazy IPA Beer
The weekly sum of new 2020 releases can challenge the purchase decisions of even the most "checked in" beer fan, so the arrival of a new core range beer seems almost gleefully avant-garde or, at best, blindly optimistic, even if it’s hazy. And that would be the case here, if there wasn’t a longer…
KAIJU! & Thin Man Brewery Mortal Wombat IPA Beer
With borders closed and COVID-19 running rife through much of the planet, it's not really an ideal time to be creating an international collaboration. But if the pandemic has proven one thing it's that brewers are a bloody resourceful bunch. Thus it was that, following an introduction by a member of…
Blackman's Brewery Needs More Simcoe Beer
Normally, Blackman's on road legend Luke ensures their Same Day IPA releases arrive at Crafty Towers on the same day they're packaged so we can tell you about them ASAP to aid those seeking the freshest of hop hits. The release of Need More Simcoe was exactly the same, but with one small issue: there…
Bad Shepherd Unicorn Beer & Lumberjack IPA Beer
As is becoming increasingly apparent, not only have we reached a point at which the role of ABAC – the [Alcohol Beverages Advertising Code](https://craftypint.com/news/2174/the-big-issue-cracking-the-code) – has become a weekly discussion point but we seem to have moved beyond that to a place in…
Rocky Ridge Kenny Wagon Wild Zebra Beer
Rocky Ridge's first charity beer, Kenny Wagon Wild Zebra, is one very close to the brewery’s heart. McKenzie Spalding – aka Kenny Wagon - is the daughter of one of the Rocky Ridge team and is currently undergoing treatment for Sarcoma, a rare form of cancer that affects the bones and connective tissue,…
Sailors Grave Breakfast Stout Beer
With hindsight, it was surely only a matter of time before Sailors Grave was going to address the issue of the drunken sailor. The brewery's name and nautical stylings almost demand it and their reimagining of traditional children's book illustrations throughout their branding seems a good fit for bringing…
Mash Brewing Little NEIPA Beer
When Mash Brewing joined the haze craze in 2017, they did it with something of a unique spin: a mid-strength New England IPA. This inspired iteration resolves the classic lack of body that plagues the lower ABV category, an issue the brewing world cheekily calls "donuts" – all upfront aroma and late…
The Big Issue: Quality News
As the craft beer industry and the audience for its beers grows, is there anything more crucial to its ongoing success than quality? With more people than ever before stepping away from mainstream beers to try something new, their first experience needs to be a good one otherwise they may be put off…
The Big Issue: Beer Quality News
From popping bottles and exploding cans to beers turning dark through oxidation or arriving at venues uncarbonated, there have been plenty of examples of beers leaving local breweries not quite right in the past year or so. Sure, when there are thousands of new, often experimental beers being…
The Big Issue: The Canned Wagon Pt II News
Earlier in the week, we examined the phenomenal renaissance being enjoyed by cans in the beer industry. Part one of our Big Issue feature looked at the history of beer in cans and spoke to some of those who have helped bring them back to prominence. Today, Marie Claire Jarratt delves deeper in the company…
The Big Issue: Branding Revisited News
We looked at branding in a Big Issue feature on the site two years ago. But, with so many new businesses entering the market since then, existing ones relaunching and the phenomenal rise of canned beers providing a broader canvas upon which brewers can set artists and designers to work, it's timely to…
The Big Issue: Ownership News
When was the last time a week passed without news breaking of a major brewery taking a significant stake or complete ownership of a craft brewer, either here or overseas? As the tectonic plates of the global beer industry continue to shift as never before, such moves happen with growing frequency. So…
The Big Issue: Skills Shortage News
Wind the clock back to March last year, to the moment breweries and venues across Australia shut their doors, and were you to draw up a list of the issues the pandemic was likely to cause you'd probably have come up with a fair few before landing on "skills shortage". Keg sales vanished,…
The Big Issue: Withdrawing The Line News
The last six months have seen a clutch of beers and ciders taken off shelves across Australia for quality-related issues. In November last year, Newstead’s Johnno Apple Cider was recalled due to concerns that secondary fermentation might cause cans to burst, a process Moon Dog then went through in…
The Big Issue: On A Wing & So Rare News
Travel back in time to the dim and distant past of, well, all the way to 2014 and you'll encounter a time when there was much discussion around the pros and cons of imported beer. Plenty of grey imports of dubious age were landing on these shores, while some worried that fascination with these…
The Big Issue: Private Label Beers News
Walk into a bottleshop owned by one of the country's major retailers and the shelves are likely to be stocked with more craft beer than ever before. But it's not just offerings from indie brewers or the homegrown and acquired craft brands of the big brewers filling the shelves and fridges – the…
The Big Issue: Brewer Shortage News
As the number of breweries in Australia continues to rise rapidly, it's not just competition for taps and shelf space that is intensifying. A shortage of experienced brewers is creating a headache for many of the country's smaller operations too. Stories of brewery owners "tapping up" employees of other…
The Big Issue: Drinking News
Let’s face it: working in the beer industry is a pretty sweet gig. You’re frequently surrounded by fun people in an environment that is based, more or less, around delivering good times to people via the means of flavoursome drinks, often in cool surrounds, with those drinks also possessing the…
The Big Issue: Exploitation News
The agreed line is that craft beer is a resoundingly good thing. And that working in the industry means you're the luckiest person alive. Yet what happens when someone's goodwill or eagerness to be part of it is exploited beyond all reasonable limits? Here, Kerry McBride peers beneath the…
The Big Issue: Sexism News
It was about two years ago I first noticed it happen. A Sydney brewery had just released a new beer I wanted to try, so I headed over to my local pub on a quiet Thursday afternoon. When I got there, the place was nearly empty, apart from a group of men in the brewery’s merchandise and another person…
The Big Issue: Ownership Revisited II News
Back in May, on the day the Independent Brewers Association (IBA) was launching its seal, we returned to the topic of ownership, one we'd first addressed in depth in late 2015. Between those articles, several other Australian brewing companies had been acquired by bigger operations: 4 Pines and Pirate…
The Big Issue: The Future Of Beer Fests II News
After Brewsvegas limped to its conclusion in 2020, with attendances reduced and events cancelled as pre-shutdown COVID restrictions tightened seemingly by the day, the Australian beer events calendar was pretty much wiped out. Months later, festivals did return in parts of the country that escaped…
The Big Issue: Who Owns Your Beer? News
Does independence matter? Or is the current discussion around ownership, as one brewery owner put it to us recently – although rather more pointedly, doing more harm than good to the industry? Shouldn't everyone brewing and selling beer be focused on quality instead? Is creating a…
The Big Issue: Ownership Revisited III News
Back in May, the Independent Brewers Association (IBA) launched its independence seal. The aim is to provide focus for the association's drive to encourage more drinkers to support local, Australian owned brewing companies. As of last week, 86 of the IBA's members had licensed the seal – chances…
The Big Issue: Crowdfunding Pt II News
Earlier this week, we ran the first part of our look at crowdfunding in the Australian craft beer world. It's something that has become an increasingly popular method of raising capital, for projects big and small and for both new businesses and those that are already established. Part one looked at…
The Big Issue: Cracking The Code News
Whether it's can designs deemed likely to appeal to minors or social posts encouraging excessive drinking, the local beer world has been keeping ABAC – the Alcohol Beverages Advertising Code – busy over the past year or so. Cheeky Monkey were reprimanded for their Ri-beer-na release and are currently…
The Big Issue: Coping With COVID-19 Part I News
“Broad strokes – it's shit, feels very flat, cut off, isolated…” As I was figuring out how to write this article, I asked members of The Crafty Pint team – a number of whom live in locked-down Melbourne – to share privately how their mental health had been affected during the COVID-19…
