As the Beveridge Place Pub‘s Hoptoberfest Tournament rolls merrily along, patrons are happily sampling a great assortment of Washington-brewed IPAs and voting for their favorite. Now that the final eight have been announced, the competition is heating up. Read our previous post to understand the whole story.
The desire to win is understandable, given that the champion is named the house IPA at the Beveridge Place Pub for an entire year–a distinction that translates into a significant amount of guaranteed beer sales for one of our small, local breweries. Winning this little IPA tournament is no laughing matter. Or is it?
As we previously reported, Bellingham’s Boundary Bay Brewery planned a “Guerrilla Brewers Night” at the Beveridge Place Pub on Monday night. They sent out a call to their mailing list, inviting people to the pub for merchandise giveaways and other surprises (free food, in other words). The hope was to sway the vote and help stuff the ballot box in Boundary Bay’s favor.
In National Lampoon’s Animal House, there was a scene when Otter told his his recently expelled fraternity brothers, “I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody’s part. We’re just the guys to do it.” I imagine a similar conversation taking place in Redmond at Black Raven Brewing — the brewers of the current Beveridge Place Pub house IPA.
When the reigning champion heard about what Boundary Bay had planned, they formulated a plan of their own. Black Raven Brewing staged their own Gorilla Brewers Night to countermand Boundary Bay’s efforts. Yes, I did mean to say, “Gorilla.” We were there and shot a short video when they came roaring into the pub.