now drinking

[bjorn_skurj]

Bailey's is vital to some things, like mudslides and Irish car bombs.

[Gato]

if you're a girl.

 

 

 

:-)

[Lammycat]

Bailey's is vital to some things, like mudslides and Irish car bombs.

And the success of Bedford Falls' Builing & Loan.

[Guest Speed Racer]

And me. A Polish Chicagoan in Minnesota. Shit, if I'm in the same state as Solace I need *something* to get me through a day, no?

[benjamin]

Crystal(e) Light

[froggie]

i'm on the usual cask vino

[bjorn_skurj]

I'm about to hit the red wine myself.

[froggie]

out of a 4L box with a tap on the side into a coffee mug?

[bjorn_skurj]

Nope. Out of a 1.5L bottle into a plastic cup!

[froggie]

thats fine. as long it doesnt come out of a 750ml bottle into a fancy wine glass

[Welsh Rich]

As it's coming up to 9am here, a nice cuppa tea to kick start the day!

 

 

Except in a large Tigger mug instead of a tiny tea cup...

[bjorn_skurj]

thats fine. as long it doesnt come out of a 750ml bottle into a fancy wine glass

That'll be the day.

[froggie]

 

i'm enjoying the new nelly furtado disk over some cheap vino at the mo'

 

sorry, welsh, you'l gte your chance later... put some howling bells on in the meantime... they've left us again!

[awatt]

Any one like grappa? Me like, especially after a full night of good food and good wine. I'm all warm and fuzzy.

 

[Guest Speed Racer]

WHIIIISKEEEY, wine, and Bailey's.

[awatt]

WHIIIISKEEEY, wine, and Bailey's.

 

All at the same time? Bailey's used to be a favorite late in the evening, wee mornings...

 

[froggie]

Any one like grappa? Me like, especially after a full night of good food and good wine. I'm all warm and fuzzy.

 

 

 

 

i'm macedonian, so that explaions why

[aricandover]

 

thank you, Paul!

 

this stuff needs to be made available in Chicago, ASAP

[bjorn_skurj]

Yuengling's a fine beer. A good substitute for Rolling Rock, which will never pass my lips again.

 

Rolling Rock leaves Latrobe. Will Latrobe leave its brew?

 

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

By Chico Harlan, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

 

LATROBE -- Taste got more complicated yesterday. The beer plant on Jefferson Street became a ghost town.

 

Charles Erney, a Rolling Rock employee for 20 years, drove home and changed out of the polo shirt with the green horse stitched on the left breast, work clothes nevermore.

 

Rolling Rock, brewed by that name in Latrobe since 1939, officially closed its plant yesterday. And for many, a familiar brand instantly became a foreigner. A smooth taste developed a bitter back story.

 

Before May, Latrobe residents considered the beer and the town an equation -- one a pale, 12-ounce distillation of the other. Middle-class, easy-to-love, with enough quirks for character: The definition fit both the place and the brew.

 

But then Anheuser-Busch purchased the Rolling Rock brand for $82 million, promising the same formula but moving the production to New Jersey. Bottling in Newark will begin today.

 

Now, the 9,000 people in this town face a question. Experts say it's about brand loyalty. Many in Latrobe just say it's about loyalty.

 

"You see," said John Migyanka, owner of the Hotel Loyal, whose accompanying bar houses some 100 Rock trinkets, "you used to look down this bar, and boy, every person had a green bottle."

 

During the days of Latrobe production, Rolling Rock detractors labeled the beer bland. Supporters labeled it drinkable. But oftentimes, discussions about the beer flowed into discussions about, well, anything. That's why Rolling Rock's taste had little to do with ingredients.

 

Instead, for Mr. Migyanka, Rolling Rock meant family. It meant 1956, when he was just a 7-year-old sneaking a few 7-ounce pony bottles from the ice barrels at backyard parties and drinking them up on Baker Hill with his grandfather.

 

It meant, for Latrobe Chamber of Commerce President Andy Stofan, the pride he felt when industry colleagues said they'd "kill" for similar beer in their own towns.

 

It meant, for 23-year-old Jonathan Huemme, a summer fair several years back when he arrived with his girlfriend and two buddies at the Westmoreland County Fairgrounds, spent the afternoon baking in the sun and screaming as the Red Hot Chili Peppers played that evening.

 

The Rolling Rock Town Fair, that concert event was called. Mr. Huemme, now co-owner of Sharky's Cafe, still recalls the shape of the tickets. "Rolling Rock in big letters across the top," he said.

 

Popular brands develop a personality -- a product of both marketing and personal experience. But these "added values," as advertisers term this personality, pertain more to beer than, say, the industrial blast nozzles created by Latrobe's other substantial company, Kennametal Inc.

 

"People talk about a beer as a badge," said Eric Shepard, executive editor of Beer Marketer's Insights, an industry newsletter. "What you have in your hand at a bar says a lot about you."

 

Mr. Erney, in the human resources department at Latrobe Brewing Co., guessed roughly 90 percent of Rolling Rock drinkers in Latrobe will now switch brands. Among plant workers, the percentage might be even higher. At a Friday goodbye picnic, 45 outgoing salaried workers reached their hands into the stuffed coolers. Nobody drank Rolling Rock.

 

The roughly 200 jobs at the Latrobe plant are, for now, in limbo. A La Crosse, Wis., company, City Brewing, is considering an option to produce beverages there, and Latrobe Brewing union workers voted last week to accept a contract. Still, the sale remains incomplete, and in the meantime, the Rolling Rock shutdown forced the final employees to clean out their desks and share goodbyes.

 

"It's depressing," said Mr. Erney, staring at the green-and-beige factory. "Losing my job is one thing, but losing the brand is even worse. Because it is Latrobe."

 

Latrobe's newspaper, the Bulletin, ran a mock obituary for its beer ("Family and friends will be received at any local tavern") on yesterday's front page. Bottles from final Latrobe-brewed batch were given to employees, denoting the Latrobe Brewing Co. in tombstone style, "1893-2006."

 

For Mr. Stofan, the chamber of commerce president, Rolling Rock no longer remains a drinking option. He's cleared it from his refrigerator. Others, though, cannot sever ties.

 

Twelve years ago, Jim Mickinak converted his garage into a shrine for Latrobe's beer. He bought green signs at trade shows and later, through eBay. Two thousand pieces of memorabilia later, he operates what amounts to a museum stocked with kegs and cases. Rolling Rock only.

 

Mr. Mickinak drinks six to eight bottles daily. "Except on Fridays and Saturdays and Sundays," he said. "Then I drink more."

 

He will continue to drink Rolling Rock, he said, provided the New Jersey taste remains identical.

 

At Mr. Migyanka's bar yesterday afternoon, four drinkers sat on the bar stools -- green, naturally. The dark, wooden walls displayed clocks and neon signs and vintage advertisements featuring the Rock trademarks: the steeple, the horse's head, the "33."

 

When news about Rolling Rock's departure first came, Mr. Migyanka had talked with a friend and decided to try a new brand of beer. So he began sampling. Guinness, Miller, Budweiser -- even some of those high-end Belgian brands.

 

He figured change was a necessity: after all, his bar once rolled through 40 cases of Rock in a good week. Now, folks barely consumed half of that.

 

Yesterday, though, Mr. Migyanka took slow sips from a green 12-ounce bottle. He pointed to a picture of his grandfather, hanging near the side wall.

 

"It's a lump-in-your-throat kind of thing," he said of Rolling Rock's departure. "But this is in my fiber. I can't just break away from that."

[isavedlatin]

 

thank you, Paul!

 

this stuff needs to be made available in Chicago, ASAP

 

there's really no yuengling in chicago?

[anodyne]

that is a mighty fine beer.

 

now drinking: jim beam (with an 80% chance of a miller low life to wash it down)

[aricandover]

there's really no yuengling in chicago?

 

 

if there is, they're doing a great job of hiding it.

 

honestly, I don't think it makes past Ohio

[cryptique]

there's really no yuengling in chicago?

This should give you an idea of Yuengling's reach. It's definitely a regional brew.

 

honestly, I don't think it makes past Ohio

...if it even makes it that far...

[aricandover]

This should give you an idea of Yuengling's reach. It's definitely a regional brew.

...if it even makes it that far...

 

 

Georgia sucks

[WilcoFan]

Yuengling is a great standby beer. If you're out drinking and you go to a bar that only sells crap like Miller lite and stuff and they have Yuengling, then get Yuengling.