THE BEER BEAT: Jim Koch ponders whether it's "Last Call for Craft Beer."

I recall seeing an article, five or six weeks ago ... ah, yes. This version will do nicely.

Sam Adams sales are down, and so is Boston Beer’s stock, by Dan Adams (Boston Globe)

Boston Beer Co. stock slumped more than 11 percent in after-hours trading Wednesday evening following the release of an earnings report that detailed the company’s poor performance in 2016.

An early pioneer of the craft beer industry, Boston Beer reported an operating profit of $137.7 million for the year — down 12 percent from $156.2 million in 2015. Meanwhile, depletions — sales of Boston Beer products from distributors to retailers — fell five percent in 2016.

The company’s flagship Sam Adams brand family fared particularly poorly, with sales to consumers falling nine percent and revenues falling seven percent, according to IRI, a Chicago-based market research firm.

Jim Koch's analysis surely is right.

Koch blamed the company’s overall struggles in part on the increasingly crowded craft beer market.

He's written a whole op-ed piece about it (below), and again, he's almost certainly on the mark, though it is important to establish context.

Much has been written about the "craft" beer bubble, and whether it will burst. People ask me about this all of the time, and I think it's fairly clear that many of those smaller breweries investing on a production model dependent on package product in the marketplace will continue to be hurt both by a crowded market and the monopolistic tendencies of those at the top of it.

At the same time, breweries in business to make beer primarily for on-site consumption (the brewpub model), which focus on creating destinations, placemaking and community involvement, seem to have rosier prospects.

Personally, I've enjoyed watching Floyd County Brewing Company evolve, and whatever else one might say about FCBC, focusing on your own footprint takes much of the anguish and guesswork out of it. Kitchens are tough, but there's still more control compared to dealing with far-flung networks of wholesalers and retailers.

Just my two cents. It's hard feeling sorry for Jim Koch, though in some ways I do. Samuel Adams Boston Lager is one of the most important beers in American brewing history, whether "craft" or macro. It helped pioneer a whole segment, and it's still really good for what it is.

Might Boston Lager, a beer of genuine quality and pronounced flavor, ever enjoy the sort of thoughtless hipster-cred-borne comeback of Pabst Blue Ribbon, where just being seen holding a bottle or can of the brand enough to overcome the absence of discernible character in the liquid?

Hard to imagine, isn't it? That's really too bad. Boston Lager actually deserves it, but as becomes increasingly more obvious, "craft" beer savvy is a mile wide and an inch deep, if that.

Take it away, Jim.

Is It Last Call for Craft Beer?, by Jim Koch (New York Times)

When craft brewers get together, we agree that this is the greatest time in history to be a beer drinker in America. In 1981, there were only 82 breweries in the United States, and our beer, fizzy and flavorless, was the laughingstock of the beer world. Today, America is home to over 5,300 small, innovative craft breweries making unique, flavorful, creative brews.

But we also agree that the horizon isn’t so bright. After years of 15 percent growth, the craft sector is down to the single digits. Part of that is to be expected in a maturing part of any market — but it’s also a result of a pushback by a handful of gargantuan global brewers, aided by slack government antitrust oversight. I worry that yet another major shift in the beer landscape is upon us — and this time, American consumers will be the losers.

Democracy is being crushed by transnational corporations, which is why I say "Death to Chains."

As an appetizer, Matt Taibbi savages Thomas Friedman's new book.

Late Is Enough: On Thomas Friedman's New Book (Taibbi; Rolling Stone)

In his new book, 'Thank You for Being Late,' Thomas Friedman makes a short story long

"The folksiness will irk some critics ... But criticizing Friedman for humanizing and boiling down big topics is like complaining that Mick Jagger used sex to sell songs: It is what he does well." –John Micklethwait, review of Thank You for Being Late, in The New York Times

With apologies to Mr. Micklethwait, the hands that typed these lines implying Thomas Friedman is a Mick Jagger of letters should be chopped off and mailed to the singer's doorstep in penance. Mick Jagger could excite the world in one note, while Thomas Friedman needs 461 pages to say, "Shit happens." Joan of Arc and Charles Manson had more in common ...

On to the main course, referencing Friedman but actually making sense.

No country with a McDonald’s can remain a democracy, by George Monbiot (The Guardian)

... Under the onslaught of the placeless, transnational capital that McDonald’s exemplifies, democracy as a living system withers and dies. The old forms and forums still exist – parliaments and congresses remain standing – but the power they once contained seeps away, re-emerging where we can no longer reach it.

The political power that should belong to us has flitted into confidential meetings with the lobbyists and donors who establish the limits of debate and action. It has slipped into the diktats of the IMF and the European Central Bank, which respond not to the people but to the financial sector. It has been transported, under armed guard, into the icy fastness of Davos ... above all, the power that should belong to the people is being crushed by international treaty.

Monbiot's conclusion:

One of the answers to Trump, Putin, Orbán, Erdoğan, Salvini, Duterte, Le Pen, Farage and the politics they represent is to rescue democracy from transnational corporations. It is to defend the crucial political unit that is under assault by banks, monopolies and chainstores: community. It is to recognise that there is no greater hazard to peace between nations than a corporate model that crushes democratic choice.

Rat bastards at Indiana American Water are running amok.

Before trying to piece together yesterday's most recent Indiana American Water farce yesterday, it is useful for readers to know that Thursdays and Fridays are very busy days for eateries, like the five such establishments located on the 100 block of East Market in New Albany.

These eateries had been informed that IN-AWC would be performing maintenance on water lines beginning on Thursday morning ... except that the Frenchman was not informed and had started cooking for the day. He was visited by the health department, which gently broke the news. Other establishments made provision to be closed and lose money, understanding that there could be a boil advisory extending past lunchtime on Friday.

The "work" started, but some time around noon, IN-AWC had elected to not continue with the announced work, presumably because it was discovered that a valve was damaged and inoperative.

Oops. Giggle. Sorry you went and got all closed up and s**t.

Of course, a similar occurrence didn't stop IN-AWC from pursuing its holy (hole-y) writ back in March 2010 on Plaza Drive, when it found a gnarly rusted valve, shrugged and snapped it clean anyway, cost NABC an entire Friday of Gravity Head business, and characterized the neglected valve as an act of God rather than an act of lazy human maintenance ... but I digress.

Now it is suggested that IN-AWC will come back to the task next week, hopefully on Monday with the advisory into Tuesday, which would cost the businesses far less in terms of lost business than another Thursday/Friday scheduling, which prompts a question: Why hit them on their busy days, anyway?

Answer: Because like all public utility monopolies, it isn't about the customers, is it? Indiana American Water raises unresponsiveness to unscaled heights of opaque responsibility-dodging, as when, in effect, the company classifies all episodes of disrupted service as acts of God, not man, and urges customers to have adequate insurance to cover the water company's own incompetence and outright negligence.

As trenches are cut across newly paved streets throughout the city and left unattended for weeks on end, is it too late to advocate IN-AWC's nationalization?  

Annals of destruction: Hurricanes, tornadoes and now Indiana American Water Company.

At least Toast and Quills were warned. When Indiana American screwed NABC out of 10K on a Friday in 2010, all we got was a vapid excuse about how valves so rusted they crumble to the touch are an act of God, not an act of inept maintenance. Here are a few more scenes documenting Indiana American Water's monopolistic, spin-the-wheel-from-afar determination to leave no freshly paved street unexcavated, spare no small business from disruption, and leave downtown resembling Tripoli for weeks at a time.

Flash: Around lunchtime, Quills tweeted that the shop would have to remain closed on Friday until 2:30 p.m. because of the post-havoc boil alert, but moments later, Quills tweeted again: The work would not be taking place, and they'll be open tomorrow, anyway: "The water co called & said, 'It's just not happening today.' No reason. Weird."

Indiana-American Water, utility monopolies, street despoiling and why Robespierre was right.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again:

NAC is in complete agreement with any elected official, unelected official, ordinary citizen or random footloose Chia pet who wishes to eliminate any and all loopholes permitting those unsupervised rat bastards at Indiana-American Water to run roughshod over taste, decency and recently paved streets. That's because you really can trust IN-AWC -- trust the water monopoly to screw you every single time.

Previously at NAC: At home or at work, Indiana-American Water Company just doesn't give a damn. Hint: Few monopolies do.

Having repeated this, I'm just curious: Why is the city's point man for housing initiatives speaking at the Board of Works about the water issue?

New Albany OKs street cut for Scribner; Council still considering changes to utility excavation program, by Daniel Suddeath at the Alabama Pensioner Pop-Up Paper.


Carl Malysz, director of community housing initiatives for the city, said administration officials conferred with Indiana American Water last week about the proposed changes. Malysz asked the board to OK the Scribner Drive project — which is expected to impact traffic from Main Street to Spring Street — but hold off on approval for three other street cuts the utility has requested.

Water's off, so the NABC Pizzeria & Pub closed until around 5:30 p.m.

2:15 p.m. update: Semi-official word is, no water service at the Pizzeria & Public House until somewhere around 5:30 p.m. Suggestion is they were routinely checking hydrants, found a leak, and are fixing it. There goes the after work crowd. We think we'll be good by 5:30 - 6:00 p.m. with no ill effects after that. I will be back to update you.

As of 12:30 p.m., water service has been cut off at the Pizzeria & Public House in what Indiana American Water's far-off customer service representative describes to me as scheduled maintenance. For three hours.

That's right. For three hours. On a Friday. With no warning whatsoever.

I'll be back to let you know when the coast's clear. I hope we're open again by 4 p.m., but we're at the mercy of the water company, and I'm waiting for a call back from some poor unfortunate whose ass may well get ripped.

Bank Street Brewhouse is open.