This from the Alchemist Blog:
Everyone is asking when we will expand our distribution of Heady Topper. Although we are unable to commit to any other market on a regular basis, we hope to occasionally spread some Heady around New England and beyond.
We have been struggling keeping up with the demand for Heady Topper here in Vermont since we opened in September. We had a great winter season, and continue to sell nearly 80% of our beer in Burlington alone! We are happy with this, as we always wanted Heady to be a local beer, first and foremost.
Initially, we thought we would have enough Heady Topper to send to Boston on a regular basis. However, we were pleasantly surprised to learn that Burlington has a lot of beer drinking power (I would have been in trouble if Heady was around while at UVM). Hence, we have only had the opportunity to make one shipment to Boston in the last 8 months.
Now that mud season is among us, I am happy to say that we finally have some extra product to send out of Vermont. Over the course of the next 8 weeks, we plan to make shipments to Philadelphia, Boston and NYC. We wanted to attend Philadelphia Beer Week in June, but realized that we will not have enough product to send out of state once summer is upon us.
So, we will have Heady Topper available in Philadelphia within the next 2 weeks. Origlio is helping us with this shipment; we hope to have a link on our website listing retailers as soon as possible. I do know that our friends Tom and Peggy, at Earth, Bread and Brewery will be having some sort of event with Heady. Wish we could make it! They are a lot of fun.
In a couple more weeks, I hope to have another pallet to send to Boston. We sent a pallet a few months ago, and we look forward to getting some more fresh Heady to our neighbors in Massachusetts. This is a great market for us- lots of honest beer drinkers. If we ever have enough Heady to expand our distribution on a regular basis, it will most definitely be Boston.
Finally, sometime in May, we hope to send a pallet to NYC. This will go through Union Beer. Again, we will post a link on our website with retailers. We have never sent Heady to NYC, so it will be fun to see how it goes. And, it will be really great to have our good friends at The Blind Tiger serving it.
Once summer arrives, we anticipate selling all canned Heady Topper in Vermont. However, in the meantime, we will do our best to get some Heady to our neighboring states.
We are absolutely humbled by the response we have had in Vermont. Consumers and retailers alike have shown us more support than we ever dreamed of. So, thank you Vermonters! And, thank you to everyone who has made the pilgrimage to Vermont to visit us and all of our great local breweries.
Following Tropical Storm Irene’s flood devastation, the financial boost you bring to our villages is integral to our recovery.
-Jen
I got get to Vermont.. :-)
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