Karl Strauss San Diego Beer Week Snippet

After a fun filled weekend in Colorado I managed to recuperate in time to take in some of the festivities in San Diego, of which there were many! At the Bloggers Conference there was one local brewery from San Diego that had truly piqued my interests and they had for a couple days leading up to the conference, and that was Karl Strauss.

A few days before the conference I was speaking to Steve Goto, a brewery rep, regarding his ideas of the three tier system (Brewer, Distributor, Retailer) and he had mentioned that Karl Strauss was indeed a mini-micro brewery. While I had through that Karl Strauss was reaching the size of Samuel Adams they have been building their fan base in San Diego, Orange, and LA counties almost exclusively.

I took a tour of their original brewery where I learned all about their “fast fermentation techniques” of using oxygen stones and medical grade oxygen to make the little yeast ferment at warp speed! After the tour of their “down town” brewery I got a chance to speak with Chris Cramer the CEO of Karl Strauss. He passionately discussed Uncle Karl's influence in the making of Karl Strauss beer, especially the origin of the Red Trolly recipe which was one of Uncle Karl's own. Uncle Karl had bases in Germany as a brewer and brought much of that influence into the recipes.

The greatest thing that interested me about Karl Strauss was the size. They seemed so big from an outside standpoint and yet were so small. In Disney's California Adventure, Karl Strauss is the only beer that is served! I was curious as to how that effected demand? Cramer calmly said they have looked into distributing farther but they're very comfortable with their size and exclusivity that they have now and maybe might look into distributing to northern California in the near future.

I participated in their Cask Night as they popped open a special San Diego Beer Week special Stout, which was fantastic. I truly recommend that if you are in the San Diego area to visit their down town location, they have so many more beers there than they distribute and the food is simply outstanding!

Karl Strauss

1157 Colombia St.

San Diego, CA 92101

(619) 234-2739 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting            (619) 234-2739      end_of_the_skype_highlighting

@Karl_Strauss

Posted in: Beer Weeks,Brewery Tours,Brewpubs,Events