Japan Times features a German brewmaster in Otaru

Imported beer? Make that an imported brewmaster.

The Japan Times has an interesting feature on Frankfurt native Johannes Braun of Otaru Beer. In 1994, when the craft wave began in Japan thanks to law revisions, Braun was recruited to move to Otaru to create beer in the traditional styles he learned growing up.

Although he's been going strong for years and the beer is well established in the North (so I read), don't expect to find a bottle at your local liquor shop. According to the article it's only available within a 100 kilometer radios of Otaru (make travel plans accordingly).

Braun chimes in on a number of hot topics in the Japan craft world, including the sameness in offerings from the big companies, consumers who see beer as a starter to clear their throats, and a tax system that makes quality beer more expensive than swill when it should be the other way around.

Cheers to Braun for giving me one more reason to want to travel to (move to?) Hokkaido.

Lawmakers aim to protect domestic third-category beer-like drinks

An article from Mainichi tells of calls in Japanese lawmaking circles for increasing the tax on so-called "third-category beer" to protect domestic brewers from foreign competition.

The article says imported third-category drinks, mainly from South Korea, are selling in Japan for less than 100 yen, naturally causing trouble for the local boys. Some lawmakers, however, are said to oppose the plan on grounds that "ordinary people" should be able to enjoy the pleasures of these beer-like drinks.

Another, more hopeful note comes at the very end of the article:

At the same time, the DPJ has been aiming to introduce a tax that corresponds to alcohol content, and officials are expected to discuss such a system at future meetings of the government's Tax Commission. If such a tax were implemented, beer varieties containing around 5 percent alcohol would be taxed at the same rate. This could result in third-category beer fizzling out altogether.

Personally, I'd prefer to see a tax structure like this, which doesn't reward manufacturers of beer for producing low quality products. In the meantime, don't let your friends drink beer-like beverages!

In other Japan beer news, it looks like two new tie-ups between Japanese and Korean brewers will mean pints of Premium Malts or Sapporo beers on your next trip across the Sea of Japan. (Here and here).

"Local" beer shipments increase this summer over last

Buried deep in a Kyodo News business round-up from a few days ago comes this promising stat: Compared with last year's June to August period, shipments of local beer grew by 8.1 percent this year. The tally includes figures from "45 leading local brewers," with shipments reaching 2,005 kiloliters. The Big Five, meanwhile, gained just .7 percent. Kyodo, referencing information form Tokyo Shoko Research, attributes the increase in craft beer shipments to marketing, such as being active in events through the especially hot summer (article accessed here).

While this is a fairly narrow window of data, I think it can be seen as positive. I am not sure where the numbers are on a larger scale (that would be interesting to see), but perhaps it means a few top brewers are finding their niche, in terms of both quality and marketing.

Beer News Round-Up

From CNNGo comes a light-hearted look at the "zero craze" in Japan, including swill like Suntory's All Free, which is free of calories, alcohol and meaning. The article contains this mysterious passage:

Never mind that it costs more to down a can of All Free (alcohol-free, calorie-free, sugar-free) beer-wannabe liquid than the real stuff, at ¥138 for a 350ml can. Real beer that can be bought for as little as ¥90.

Let's ignore the mysterious grammatical issues and ask this question: What "real" beer costs 90 yen? Answer: None. Perhaps the author is referring to happoshu or third-category trash? Don't wanna know.

Kyodo News reports on the not-surprising decline of beer shipments in August compared with last year. Sadly, also this:

Shipments of less expensive, so-called third-category beer-like alcoholic drinks rose 8% to 13.08 million cases, an all-time high for August, mirroring the tendency of consumers to tighten their purse strings, with Kirin’s ‘‘Nodogoshi Nama’’ and Asahi’s ‘‘Clear Asahi,’’ being particularly popular.

So-called third-category beer-like alcoholic drinks. Just the fact that it takes so many words and hyphens to describe the product is enough to cause concern. Then, if you actually taste the stuff ... spit it out. Buy a beer!

That does it for today ... if I can avoid blog-neglect, I'll aim to keep abreast of the latest Japan beer news.

For now, happy drinking, and see you on twitter.

Baird Brewing in The Huffington Post

Baird Brewing gets plenty of attention in the Japan craft beer universe, but once in a while the spotlight shines from afar. Today, The Huffington Post features an interview with Bryan Baird himself.

Among other things, Baird says that 10 years deep, "we seem to have gained real traction and
achieved that magical sort of critical mass. Our three gold medals in the 2010 World Beer Cup certainly didn't hurt things either."

So things are going well. Reading more of the interview, it's not hard to see the ingredients of success, like Baird's commitment to character, which he describes as "the interplay of balance and complexity." Too many craft beers in Japan, Baird says, have complexity, but lack balance (while the big brewery offerings have balance but ... you know the rest).

Another interesting comment from Baird was in response to a question about the "Japanese"-ness of Baird beer:

We enjoy lovely soft water in Numazu that really contributes a round and balanced house character to our beers. In the Japanese aesthetic, harmonious balance is greatly prized. I think Baird Beer is a liquid embodiment of that Japanese aesthetic value

Looking ahead, Baird sees good things for the craft beer market in Japan. He says he can picture the market share for craft beer in Japan jumping from less than 1 percent (today's figure) to something more akin to the numbers in the U.S. (4 percent by volume and 7 percent by dollar) within 10 to 20 years.

The full interview has a lot more interesting items to digest, so give it a read.