Brewers Association

Last updated

Brewers Association
Formation2005;19 years ago (2005)
Merger ofAssociation of Brewers, Brewers' Association of America
Type Trade association
84-0802918
Legal status 501(c)(6) organization [1]
Headquarters Boulder, Colorado
Membership (2020)
5,400 brewers [2]
President and CEO
Bob Pease
Website brewersassociation.org

The Brewers Association (BA) is an American trade group of over 5,400 brewers, breweries in planning, suppliers, distributors, craft beer retailers, and individuals particularly concerned with the promotion of craft beer and homebrewing. [3] [4]

Contents

Two of the largest programs supported by the BA are the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) and the annual Great American Beer Festival (GABF).

The current president and CEO is Bob Pease. [5] [6] The American Homebrewers Association was founded by past BA president, Charlie Papazian. [7]

American Homebrewers Association

Logo of the American Homebrewers Association featured in 2011 Aha logo2011.png
Logo of the American Homebrewers Association featured in 2011

The BA was established in 2005 through a merger of the Association of Brewers headed by brewer Charlie Papazian and the Brewers' Association of America, intending to "promote and protect small and independent American brewers, their craft beers and the community of brewing enthusiasts." [3]

The American Homebrewers Association is a division of the Brewers Association focused on homebrewers of beer, cider, and mead. The AHA was founded in 1978 by Charlie Papazian in Boulder, Colorado. The AHA runs the world's largest homebrew competition and also organizes several homebrew events in the United States and Canada. Julia Herz is the current executive director. The AHA publishes the magazine Zymurgy six times per year to its 37,000 members. [8]

Every year the AHA hosts the following events:

Ninkasi Award

The Ninkasi Award is the prize given by American Homebrewers Association for the brewer who gains the most points in the final round of the National Homebrew Competition, judged at the National Homebrewers Conference. [9] Points are gained from the brewer's winning entries in the 23 categories of beer and several categories of mead and cider. At least 2 points (1 bronze placement) must come from a beer entry.

The Ninkasi Award is named in honor of Ninkasi, the Sumerian goddess of beer. [9]

Past winners

The winners since the introduction of the Ninkasi Award in 1992: [10]

  • 1992 – Steve & Christina Daniel
  • 1993 – Walter Dobrowsky
  • 1994 – Michael Byers
  • 1995 – Rhett Rebold
  • 1996 – Tom Bergman & Chas Peterson
  • 1997 – George Fix
  • 1998 – Art Beall
  • 1999 – Tom Plunkard
  • 2000 – Joe Formanek
  • 2001 – Brian Cole
  • 2002 – Curt Hausam
  • 2003 – Curt Hausam (2nd win)
  • 2004 – Jamil Zainasheff
  • 2005 – Paul Long
  • 2006 – Joe Formanek (2nd win)
  • 2007 – Jamil Zainasheff (2nd win)
  • 2008 – Gordon Strong
  • 2009 – Gordon Strong (2nd win)
  • 2010 – Gordon Strong (3rd win)
  • 2011 – Paul Sangster [9]
  • 2012 – Mark Schoppe
  • 2013 – David Barber
  • 2014 – Jeremy Voeltz
  • 2015 – Mark Schoppe (2nd win)
  • 2016 – Derrick Flippin
  • 2017 – Jeff Poirot and Nicholas McCoy
  • 2018 – Greg Young
  • 2019 – Mark Peterson
  • 2020 - No Competition (COVID)
  • 2021 - Jason Lowery
  • 2022 - Timothy Lambert
  • 2023 - Richard Shoff

Brewers Publications

Brewers Publications was started in 1986 and is under the umbrella of the Brewers Association organization. The first book Brewers Publications published was Brewing Lager Beer: The Most Comprehensive Book for Home- and Microbreweries by Greg Noonan [11] .

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Homebrewing</span> Small scale brewing of beer, mead, ciders

Homebrewing is the brewing of beer or other alcoholic beverages on a small scale for personal, non-commercial purposes. Supplies, such as kits and fermentation tanks, can be purchased locally at specialty stores or online. Beer was brewed domestically for thousands of years before its commercial production, although its legality has varied according to local regulation. Homebrewing is closely related to the hobby of home distillation, the production of alcoholic spirits for personal consumption; however home distillation is generally more tightly regulated.

The Boston Beer Company is an American brewery founded in 1984 by James "Jim" Koch and Rhonda Kallman. Boston Beer Company's first brand of beer was named Samuel Adams after Founding Father Samuel Adams, an American revolutionary patriot. Since its founding, Boston Beer has started several other brands, and in 2019 completed a merger with Dogfish Head Brewery.

The Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) is a non-profit organization formed in 1985 to recognize beer tasting and evaluation skills. The BJCP certifies and ranks beer judges through an examination and monitoring process.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brewing in Oregon</span>

The U.S. state of Oregon is home to more than 200 breweries and brew pubs that produce a large variety of beer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anchor Brewing Company</span> Microbrewery in San Francisco, California

Anchor Brewing Company was a brewery on Potrero Hill in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1896, the brewery underwent several changes in location and ownership throughout its history. After years of declining sales due to competition with larger breweries, Anchor was purchased by Frederick Louis “Fritz” Maytag III in 1965, preventing its closure. The brewery operated at its Potrero Hill location from 1979 and was one of the last remaining producers of steam beer, a variety of beer trademarked by the company.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bappir</span>

Bappir was a Sumerian twice-baked barley bread that was primarily used in ancient Mesopotamian beer brewing. Historical research done at Anchor Brewing Co. in 1989 reconstructed a bread made from malted barley and barley flour with honey, spices and water and baked until hard enough to store for long periods of time; the finished product was probably crumbled and mixed with water, malt and either dates or honey and allowed to ferment for a few days, producing a somewhat sweet brew. It seems to have been drunk flat without bottling or conditioning with a straw in the manner that yerba mate is drunk now.

Ninkasi was the Mesopotamian goddess of beer and brewing. It is possible that in the first millennium BC she was known under the variant name Kurunnītu, derived from a term referring to a type of high quality beer. She was associated with both positive and negative consequences of the consumption of beer. In god lists, such as the An = Anum list and the Weidner god list, she usually appears among the courtiers of the god Enlil, alongside deities such as Ninimma and Ninmada. She could also be paired with Siraš, a goddess of similar character, who sometimes was regarded as her sister. A possible association between her and the underworld deities Nungal and Laṣ is also attested, possibly in reference to the possible negative effects of alcohol consumption.

Charles N. Papazian is an American nuclear engineer, brewer and author. He founded the Association of Brewers and the Great American Beer Festival, and wrote The Complete Joy of Home Brewing (1984). He is the longtime former president (1979–2016) of the Brewers Association. He is also the creator of the National Pie Day, a celebration of pies which is celebrated on January 23, Papazian's birthday.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Fix</span> American mathematician

George J. Fix was an American mathematician who collaborated on several seminal papers and books in the field of finite element method. In addition to his work in mathematics, Fix was a beer and homebrewing enthusiast and educator, as well as the author of several books about brewing. He died of cancer in 2002.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">World Beer Cup</span>

The World Beer Cup is an international beer competition organized by the Brewers Association, a trade group representing America's small and independent craft brewers. It is the largest competition in the beer industry and has been described as "the Olympics of beer." According to americancraftbeer.com, "Winning a World Beer Cup is like winning a Grammy or an Oscar…it brings the world’s attention to even the smallest brewery’s doorstep…and like a hit song or film, it can make a career." The cup was founded by Association of Brewers president Charlie Papazian in 1996 and is awarded every two years. The competition is held in conjunction with the Craft Brewers Conference & BrewExpo America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brewing in Vermont</span>

The U.S. state of Vermont is home to several breweries, microbreweries, nanobreweries, and brewpubs that produce a wide variety of beer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fred Eckhardt</span>

Otto Frederick Eckhardt was an American brewer, homebrewing advocate, and writer. Eckhardt is best remembered as a pioneer in the field of beer journalism, publishing a series of articles and books on the topic, including the seminal 1989 tome, The Essentials of Beer Style. At the time of his death in 2015, Eckhardt was memorialized as "the Dean of American beer writers".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greg Noonan</span> American brewer

Gregory "Greg" John Noonan was an American brewing expert who wrote several published books on brewing. His writing credits include Brewing Lager Beer: The Most Comprehensive Book for Home - And Microbrewers (1986) which he updated in 1996 and changed the title to New Brewing Lager Beer: The Most Comprehensive Book for Home - And Microbrewers. He also wrote Scotch Ale (1993) for the Classic Beer Styles Series from Brewers Publications. He co-authored Seven Barrel Brewery Brewers Handbook (1997) with Mikel Redman and Scott Russell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sour beer</span> Beer with a tart or sour taste

Sour beer is beer which has an intentionally acidic, tart, or sour taste. Sour beer styles include Belgian lambics and Flanders red ale and German Gose and Berliner Weisse.

The U.S. Open Beer Championship is an international brewing competition. The event, which is open to professional breweries and award-winning home brewers, is held in late June, with the winners announced in July.

Annie Johnson is a brewer who won the American Homebrewers Associations' Homebrewer of the Year award in 2013. She was the first woman in thirty years, and the first African American person ever, to win the award. In 2012, she won Pilsner Urquell's Master Homebrewer Competition held in San Francisco, where Master Brewer Vaclav Berka ) said the beer tasted like he was home. After an extensive career with the California State Legislature she began working for PicoBrew, a product development company in Seattle, WA that specialized in automated brewing equipment. In addition to that work, she is a Nationally ranked judge for the Beer Judge Certification Program and serves as proctor and exam grader. Shortly after she had heard about winning the AHA 2013 award she quickly accepted her job offer to be part of PicoBrew as Chief Brewing Office and recipe developer. She's an active member of Pink Boots Society which promotes women in the beverage industry, and as an elected member of American Homebrewers Association’s Governing Committee. She is a regularly featured contributor to Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rhinegeist</span> Craft brewery in Cincinnati, Ohio, US

Rhinegeist Brewery is a craft brewery and craft cidery based in Cincinnati, Ohio. The company also sells their ciders under the name Cidergeist, using an alternative apple-shaped skull logo. The brewery's 25,000 square feet (2,300 m2) taproom and production facility is located in Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, and occupies the former, pre-Prohibition bottling plant of Christian Moerlein Brewing Co. Rhinegeist operates an additional shipping, storage and innovation brewing facility in Cincinnati's Camp Washington neighborhood.

Carol Stoudt is an American brewmaster who founded Stoudts Brewing Company in Adamstown, Pennsylvania in 1987. In addition to owning the company, she was the brewmaster, salesperson, and mentor. She was one of the first female brewmasters since Prohibition in the United States and the nation's first female sole proprietor of a brewery in 1987. 

F.H. Steinbart is a homebrew supply store on SE 12th Avenue in Portland, Oregon. It is the oldest homebrew supply store in the country and helped nurture the vibrant Pacific Northwest craft-brewing scene.

References

  1. "Brewers Association Inc". Nonprofit Explorer. ProPublica. May 9, 2013. Retrieved March 25, 2020.
  2. "Who We Are". Brewers Association. Retrieved March 25, 2020.
  3. 1 2 "About Us: Purpose & History". Brewers Association. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
  4. "Membership Types". Brewers Association. Retrieved March 3, 2017.
  5. "Charlie Papazian Adopts New Role at Brewers Association". Brewers Association. January 2, 2016. Retrieved March 3, 2017.
  6. "The Team". Brewers Association. Retrieved January 11, 2020.
  7. "About Us: Brewers Association staff". Brewers Association. Archived from the original on March 12, 2012. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
  8. "American Homebrewers Association Membership Surpasses 30,000". BevNET Magazine. February 14, 2012. Retrieved March 17, 2012.
  9. 1 2 3 "Computer pioneer is a brewer at heart". The Coast News . July 12, 2011. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved January 11, 2020.
  10. "Access the list of the current and past National Homebrew Competition winners!". Brewers Association. Retrieved January 11, 2020.
  11. "Greg Noonan". Brewers Publications. Retrieved January 24, 2024.