Beer Trading

Hello all, and sorry for the radio silence the last few days. It's been a combination of a little too much beer while on vacation and not any the last few days (and the next few) as I give myself a little post-vacation detox. I figured I'd take this week to just give a brief look at some of the stuff I do within craft beer outside of just drinking  it, and I'll start tonight with trading beer. Just like comic books and baseball cards, craft beer can be (and often is) traded. This can range from two people in different areas of the country agreeing on a dollar value that each will spend and shipping a box full of interesting local beer to each other, all the way to finely specified swaps of sets of beers that would sell on ebay for hundred and hundreds of dollars. A good number of beer trades are set up through dedicated trading communities on Beer Advocate (where I do my trading) and Rate Beer. Typically, it all begins with someone posting what's called an ISO/FT (or In Search Of/For Trade) where they specify what beers they are willing to offer up for trade, and what brews they'd be interested in a receiving in return. Other people interested in the parameters of the proposed trade will start exchanging messages until one (or more) trades are agreed upon. Shipping is usually done via UPS or FedEx because will shipping alcohol through USPS is technically illegal, it's only against the terms of service for private couriers (and rarely enforced at that). Often times traders will throw in "extras", which are exactly what they sound like, bottles beyond the agreed upon trade as a nice little bonus/surprise. Extras are usually local, easy to get beers, but it's not unheard of for traders to throw in more rare or expensive beers as extras on occasion. Personally, I tend to send out 2-4 bottles as extras, depending on how many are 12oz vs bigger bottles and what the beers are. However, if someone is doing me a solid, by say sending me a more obscure/hard to get beer than I'm mailing out in return, I'll add a little to my extras as a way of saying thanks. After that, it's down to just waiting for the package to arrive in the mail. Getting a trade box in the mail is usually a highlight of my day, or even week; I feel like a kid on Christmas morning every time. Going forward I'll be talking about various trades I make and posting pictures of my hauls. Expect a bunch of those posts in a couple weeks as tonight's blogging inspired me to go and set up about four more trades.