Comments on: When bloggers and writers brew

By: Alan

Alan — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 10:58:21 +0000

Entirely agreed. Fullers should pay and give beer and pay for travel and expenses. Seeing as they have no product without your participation, why not?

Really, this discussion is pointing out to me how abused beer writers have been, how they have had beaten out of them the understanding of the validity and value of their set of knowledge.

By: Bailey

Bailey — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 08:05:48 +0000

Yes.

By: Martyn Cornell

Martyn Cornell — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 07:49:35 +0000

I think in your case the cash offer was entirely just and right, Ron – the Past Masters series was/is an on-going commercial venture by Fuller’s, they were genuinely using your genuine expertise in interpreting old brewery logs, and they were correct in believing they should pay for it. I was paid when I appeared in a Fuller’s promotional video, because I was talking about the history of brewing, using knowledge I had that others didn’t, and it was no different to me being paid to write a beer history piece for What’s Brewing or whomsoever.

By: Leigh

Leigh — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 06:37:53 +0000

hi – beleive it or not, I missed out on your post before writing mine – I have been thinking about this for a while too, after I caught myself thinking ‘not again’ when another brewery announced another colab. However, It was the very morning I was off to brew at Rev’s – so the hypocrite in me surfaced for a little there!
I think my thought came from over-exposure, rather than any kind of dislike. As you can tell, I’m generally for them, although beleive 100% that a bloggers name will not really sell the beer. There was no need – and no suggestion – that my name would ever appear on the clip of our latest colab. Why? Bloggers, ultimately, serve a niche market. Drinkers, by and large, won’t have heard of Pete Brown or Melissa Cole, either. Or Mark Dredge or Marverine Cole. These little dips into the mainstream are fun for everyone involved but still of much more worth to the niche.
It’d be good to know what a brewer’s thoughts on this are. Why did you ask ======= to come and work with you for the day?

However- i’d like to think that my work within our lovely little niche will lead to more brewdays and opportunities to create something unique – which for many of us (amateur writers, working in other fields, unable to compete with the ‘pros’ no matter how hard we work – or seemingly the quality of our work) provides a little excitement and an opportunity to experience a drinker drinking ‘your’ beer and enjoying it.

By: Cold Comfort and Collaborations: Ilkley’s Siberia/Revolutions E.P « The Good Stuff

Fri, 05 Oct 2012 06:24:20 +0000

[...] Edit – That Twitter conversation lead to another post from Boak and Bailey with an interesting discussion afterwards…. Rate this:Share this:TwitterStumbleUponDiggLike [...]

By: Ron Pattinson

Ron Pattinson — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 06:18:35 +0000

Fullers offered me cash. I took some free beer and the odd paid trip to the brewery instead.

By: Ron Pattinson

Ron Pattinson — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 06:14:53 +0000

I was at the same event as Alan. Like him, I got a hotel room and free beer, plus in my case a plane ticket to Canada. In return, I helped brew a beer and gave a talk. The research and writing for the talk took around 60 hours of my time. I found the basic recipe for the beer, which was in an obscure Dutch. I don’t consider myself to have been wildly overpaid.

In about an hour my first post on the topic will appear, including full disclosure of what I got out of it.

By: Craig

Craig — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 19:51:15 +0000

Baseball gloves are sometimes “signed”—that is to say, a facsimile of a famous baseball player’s signature has been burned into the leather. I, myself, had a Ron Cey glove. I can truly say that had no bearing on me buying that particular mitt.

That being said, I agree with Alan that beer writers, geeks, bloggers and enthusiast can add something to the mix, I just don’t think that thing is simply them lending their name. Think of it as a back end approach, rather than a marketing gimmick.

By: Alan

Alan — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 19:04:39 +0000

And also, by way of explanation, I am a person who makes money giving advice and am not all that interested in watching one part of my advice giving being devalued compared to the rest. You want my time and experience to make money? Share the money. I am, after all, nobody’s cousin in any of this. On the other hand, I think I am pretty generous with my non-advice giving time and resources in other contexts.

By: Bailey

Bailey — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 18:55:17 +0000

Hmm. You’re probably right that not many people have heard of most bloggers, but then Mark Dredge has thousands of followers on Twitter and a book due; and even we (minnows that we are) get a pleasing number of comments from people who don’t blog. Martyn (see above) and Ron Pattinson are getting to be household names amongst beer geeks, especially across the channel.