Fort Collins Brewery just opened their new state-of-the-art brewery, restaurant and shops. Take a tour of one of the most innovative brew houses today.
Posts
This summer has been a momentous one for New Planet Beer. After our initial success in bringing great-tasting gluten-free beer to our fans in Colorado early last year, we decided to start joining the fun by visiting beer festivals and other events throughout the state. In doing so, we’ve been able to enjoy a closer interaction with new and existing fans of New Planet Beer. We’ve had a lot of fun and learned some valuable lessons for future events in the process. So without further ado, we give you the top 10 things we learned in our first eventful summer!
The Good, The Bad, and the Funny: New Planet’s First Summer of Events
- Give them pretzels! Did you attend any of the numerous Colorado beer festivals this summer? If you did, we’re sure that you caught at least one glimpse of a gluten-free pretzel necklace-adorned New Planet Beer fans. That’s because we know that spending several hours in the summer heat tasting beer can stir up an appetite. At future events we’ll continue our practice of supplying gluten-free pretzel necklaces to gluten-free festival goers.
- We need more swag. Festival and event-goers love to pick up swag. While supplies lasted, we were happy to provide New Planet Beer bottle openers made from recycled materials to people who visited our booth. Next year we plan on expanding our offerings with stickers as well! Also, look for more great New Planet Beer t-shirt and hat designs, soon to be available for purchase on our website.
- Pretty decorations sometimes backfire. Not every event location is conducive to having a decorative set-up. Case in point: the Fort Collins Colorado Brewer’s Festival, where our beautiful 8-foot standing banner repeatedly toppled onto our interns in the wind. Moving forward, we’ll reserve top-heavy decor for indoor venues.
- New Planet Beer tastes like beer! Please allow us some lighthearted joking at the expense of our fans. It was quite entertaining when someone new (especially gluten-free folks) tasted Tread Lightly Ale and remarked, “Wow! This tastes just like beer!” Thank you. Though an obvious statement, we are delighted that our fans are recognizing the fact that New Planet Gluten-free Beer is, in fact, beer.
- Volunteers melt in the sun. In addition to making us more visible over the crowd of event-goers, having a tent next year will prevent our volunteers and interns from overheating, sunburning, or otherwise looking miserable in the Colorado summer.
- More S,M, and less XXL That’s right. New Planet Beer t-shirts were all the rage when we initially passed them out for free and started offering them for a nominal price at events. The only problem: we didn’t anticipate how many of you would want one! We’re sorry for the t-shirt shortage and we’re working on a solution that will allow us to have more sizes and colors available in the future.
- The possibilities are endless. We participated in 14 fantastic events this summer and had the opportunity to participate in many more. Doing so allowed us to offer samples of New Planet Beer to over 18,500 thirsty event-goers. Future event planning will include a wide variety of venues and types, with a focus on those that promote planet-friendly practices or donate to environmental programs we support, in keeping with the mission of New Planet Beer.
- We can’t read chicken-scratch. Having our email sign-up sheet at events allowed many of you to receive this monthly newsletter. Unfortunately, some folks are not reading this because we couldn’t read their handwriting. We are exploring the possibility of making our email sign-up sheet digital as an alternative to having our interns study ancient and lost languages.
- Kegs are heavy. Fortunately, volunteers and staff at other breweries were friendly and let us borrow their hand-trucks. Otherwise, our interns would have rolled away with our kegs on more than one occasion. Live and learn: hand-trucks are on our shopping list.
- We love our fans. The absolute best part about being at events was meeting you, hearing your stories, and enjoying some cold New Planet Beer as friends. Thanks for supporting us at events this year! We look forward to continuing to brew great tasting gluten-free beer for you!
New Planet Beer is now being brewed in the new Fort Collins Brewery.
Fort Collins Brewery (FCB) just opened their new state-of-the-art brewery, restaurant and shops. This exciting facility is located on the northwest corner of Lemay and Vine in Fort Collins, CO. A visit is worth scheduling, as this is one of the most innovative brew houses today.
FCB moved its existing 15 barrel brew house over to the new digs, but will be supplementing greater production with the latest in automated 50 barrel systems in the near future. Since New Planet Beer will now be brewed in this larger capacity facility, we can ensure an endless supply of gluten-free beer. 
The new brewery also utilizes the most current thinking in sustainable, green technologies. FCB is most proud of their water waste system which is not connected to a public sewer, but rather recycles waste water on to farmlands. This is very much in-line with New Planet Beers efforts to strive to reduce environmental impact so we thankful that Fort Collins Brewery has taken extra steps in making this happen.
New Planet Beer will have the honor of being available in the new restaurant and on tap in the tasting room, so all of you who are eager to visit a brewery with a great tasting gluten-free beer, Fort Collins Brewery is the place to go.
Check out these videos and be one of the first to see the new Fort Collins Brewery and New Planet Beer coming of the production line…and soon to a store near you.
Wheatless Wednesdays at the Sink continues with a delicious menu featuring many gluten-free options and drink specials on 303 vodka and New Planet Beer! Sample menu offerings include: Certified Angus Beef Top Sirloin Steak with New Planet Ale onion compote on quinoa with chef vegetables, 303 vodka cream and grilled shrimp over brown rice and vegetables, and Grilled gluten free flatbread with aged balsamic, figs, goat cheese and olive oil. Come and enjoy these and other amazing gluten-free food items a great drink specials and receive a free taste of Tread Lightly Ale or Triple R Raspberry Ale.
When: Wednesday, July 28th, 2010 5-7pm
Where: 1165 13th Street Boulder, CO
Tell us what you think!
New Planet Beer would like to better get to know you and hear what you think of our beer. Please take a few minutes and fill out our quick survey. What’s in it for you? A chance to win one of five New Planet Beer t-shirts-and the opportunity to tell us what the next style of delicious gluten-free beer should be! Thank you for your time in advance and we look forward to reading what you have to say.
Check it out>
Great bands, crowds and gluten-free beer at the Breckenridge Beer Festival!
On Saturday, July 17th, New Planet Beer traveled up to Breckenridge for a weekend of music, food, and great beer at the Breckenridge Beer Festival. The event was a great success, drawing large crowds of beer lovers and a collection of great breweries such as Stone Brewing Company, Widmer Brewing Company, and Sam Adams Brewing Company, who are not seen at many Colorado beer festivals.
As with past festivals, New Planet Beer featured our Tread Lightly Ale and 3R Raspberry Ale at the Breckenridge Beer Festival. We are once again pleased to say that both styles of beer received much praise and were enjoyed as a refreshing summer treat by many. With fabulous bands, friendly crowds, and great craft beers, New Planet Beer recommends the Breckenridge Beer Festival to our friends and fans as a great opportunity to enjoy beautiful mountain views and some of the best brews around!
See how New Planet Beer performed in a blind beer taste test.
Fellow gluten-free blogger, Peter Bronski of No Gluten, No Problem, recently had a gluten-free beer tasting party of eight beers for a few friends. There were only three rules to this blind tasting:
1) The tasters knew that they would only be drinking gluten-free beer and had no prior knowledge of which beers would be part of the tasting.
2) They were able to taste the beers in any order.
3) They were able to return to a beer and re-taste it at any time.
The eight beers were separated into two categories. Flight one was made up of “clear” beers: lagers and light ales which included: Lakefront Brewery’s New Grist, Bard’s Beer, New Planet’s Tread Lightly Ale and 3R Raspberry Ale. Flight two was made up of “opaque” beers: yeasty, Belgian-style ales which included: Green’s Tripel Blonde, Green’s Amber Ale, Zonder Gluten Belgian Wit and Green’s Dubbel Dark.
After the two categories were evaluated, the tasters were asked to rank the beers and choose which gluten-free beer was “best in show” overall.
New Planet Beer’s Tread Lightly Ale ended up on top in the Flight one category, “3 out of 4 tasters rated New Planet’s Tread Lightly Ale their overall favorite.” We also were voted with top honors, “2 out of 4 tasters ranked New Planet’s Tread Lightly Ale their Best in Show.” We invite you to read more about the blind beer test and see what people had to say about the New Planet Beer and the competition.
As members of the Colorado Brewer’s Guild, New Planet Beer had the pleasure of attending the 14th annual Colorado Brewer’s Rendezvous on July 10th in Salida. Organized by the Colorado Brewer’s Guild for member breweries and pubs only, the Rendezvous features only Colorado-made craft beers. With nearly 50 breweries and pubs in attendance and over 75 beers on tap, the Rendezvous featured a beer for every taste, and enough beer to satisfy every one of the festival’s 2500 guests!
New Planet Beer tapped a keg of our new 3R Raspberry Ale and served Tread Lightly Ale from bottles at the Brewer’s Rendezvous. People who sampled our beer commented on it’s drinkability and good taste. If you didn’t attend this year’s Colorado Brewer’s Rendezvous and want to make sure not to miss out on future events and tastings, check out our events page for opportunities to join in the fun with New Planet Beer.
If your store is out of New Planet Beer, don’t worry – we have new stock on the way.
New Planet Beer has some exciting news to share – our beer is going to be brewed in a new and bigger facility! What does that mean? Well, Fort Collins Brewery, who we contract to brew our beer, has upgraded their production facility so they can brew even more beer, which means more New Planet Beer for all of you. In the short term you may experience a shortage of Tread Lightly
Ale in this transition, but don’t fret because in August we’ll be back in full stock and ready to serve our fans. After this move you should experience less Tread Lightly Ale shortages in the stores you frequently visit. Don’t forget we just launched 3R Raspberry Ale, so if you don’t see that on the shelves, please let that store know you’d like them to carry the product. It takes fans like you to help gluten-free customers get the selection they deserve. Thanks for all of your support during this transition and we’ll make sure the beer is heavily stocked going forward.
With nearly 50,000 attendees each year, the Great American Beer fest is a festival giant! Over 2000 types of beer can be sampled from over 450 American Breweries. New Planet will be at the festival delivering tastes of our Tread Lightly Ale and 3R Raspberry Ale. Act fast! Tickets to this event sell out every year!
When: September 16-18, session times vary
Where: Colorado Convention Center, Denver, CO
