Goose Island Brewery, one of the pioneers of the craft beer movement in America, is now available in Japan. Will the Chicago-based brewery inspire and provoke conversation in Japan as it did in America? In a market as competitive as Japan’s, all new players face the struggle of acceptance but Goose Island may have the pedigree and quality to thrive.
As we wrote in our feature on barrel-aging in issue #27, Goose Island has the largest barrel-aging program in America, and its Bourbon County Stout is a classic of the barrel-aged beer category. It has some of the highest scores you’ll see on popular beer rating websites. The barrel-aging program isn’t just the biggest, though; it was also America’s first, inspiring a whole generation of brewers together with other powerhouses that quickly followed, including Founders and Elysian.
Goose Island has been an innovator in multiple beer categories, notably the American IPA. As Matt Brynildson of Firestone Walker noted in our interview with him (issue #24), when he worked there in the late 1990s under John Hall, son of founder Greg Hall, they were experimenting aggressively with various hop varieties, blends and techniques. That culminated in the formulation of Goose Island IPA, another classic and standard-bearer of the craft beer movement. In many ways, Goose Island helped strengthen the trend toward hoppier beers along with Anchor Brewing Company, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company and Lagunitas Brewing Company.
Goose Island’s line-up includes a diverse array of beers, not just those that tend to appeal to beer geeks. It has racked up a slew of medals in various styles at the Great American Beer Festival and the World Beer Cup over the years. Its brewpub in the Clybourn neighborhood of Chicago, meanwhile, has been a mainstay of area drinkers and visitors to the “Windy City” since 1988.
Like all large, iconic breweries, Goose Island has gone through some rough patches and growing pains. Perhaps the most controversial chapter in its history was its sale to ABInBev in March of 2011. Its hard-core craft beer fans were dismayed, to put it very lightly. This was one of the first in a handful of great American craft breweries to sell in whole or part to a mega-brewery. We have written about this topic previously in our two part series Craft Beer is Dead and Craft Beer is Not Dead. Since then, quite a few others have followed, losing their industry designation as “craft breweries” with the Brewers Association in America. Our consistent take on this topic is that quality is quality and ultimately the consumers will decide.
In Japan, where the lines between craft and non-craft are rather blurred, Goose Island will have to attract new consumers with good products, not “craft” designations or the lack of them. This shouldn’t be a problem, especially when considering what it is bringing to the market. Interestingly, it launched with a three-month subscription service and orders may be placed online (http://www.rakuten.co.jp/gooseisland/). It shipped six-packs of Honkers Ale in June. It followed in July with six-packs of its Goose IPA. The final month of August will see the release of Sofie (765ml bottle), a saison/farmhouse ale partially aged in wine barrels with citrus peel. You can still join the subscription until midnight, August 15th, with products shipping 8/19, 9/16 and 10/21.
In addition to these beers, Matilda (765ml bottle), a Belgian strong pale ale, is slated for September release, and Sour Sisters (765ml bottle), a series of differently flavored sour beers, for October. No laws in Japan prohibit the online sale of beer or, for that matter, breweries shipping directly to consumers. Goose Island selling beer this way is not unusual. However, to our knowledge it is unprecedented for a major brewery to launch online rather than in retail accounts. Perhaps the direct-to-consumer model will work and Goose Island will prove that it continues to break new ground. Until the verdict comes in, we may have to pop open a few bottles. Drinking a little history can be good for you.
