Farewell Stone Ruination IPA

So...my favorite American craft beer is being discontinued.  If you follow craft beer news, you might be familiar with this:

Stone's Ruination IPA, How We're Killing Craft Beer."

Discontinued Stone Ruination IPA

a twelve year old veteran, is being discontinued by the hop-centric San Diego brewery.  In the wake of the news, one article about craft beer particularly caught my eye...particularly because of the title, "

The point of the blog post was this: when was the last time you, the craft beer enthusiast, bought a brewery's flagship beer?  When did you choose a pack of Dogfish Raison d'Etre or Bell's Kallamazoo Stout over a new, seasonal release?  How do you economically encourage breweries to continue to produce their "big classics?"  Pointing the question back at myself, I felt upset.  I love Stone's Ruination, have brought it on trips, and even homebrewed a Ruination clone.

But to be fair, my beer purchases do often go for the rare, the seasonal, or eclectic over the classics.  Just last month I bought a single $12.99 bottle of Rogue's Sriracha Stout just for the experience of tasting it, when I could have bough a four pack of the always exceptional Founder's Breakfast Stout.

Continuing that thought, when I visit the bar offshoots of breweries like Troegs or Dogfish, I fall in love with the fact that you can come and sample their random one-offs and brewery exclusives.  Trying the mouth-mashed chicha corn beer at Dogfish in August '14 was a highlight of my beer-enthusiast life!  Why settle for delicious-but-readily-available beers of Weyerbacher, when I can drive to the brewery for their tap room only beers?

But this post isn't meant to be a grievous gripe-fest.  I love Stone Ruination IPA and I am sad to see it disappear from the U.S. craft beer marketplace.  But that's what craft beer is, a marketplace.  Stone Ruination IPA had over a decade of success behind it.  But when the market shifts, small companies need to adapt. 

So here I am, with four final bottles of Stone Ruination IPA.

I'm using each one to toast to the future.

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