Place: close to Newberry, Eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Pickelman’s gas & truck stop & subway & eatery.
These days, with all the miles we’re traveling, The Happy Hour Guys make a regular practice of scoping out beer coolers in local truck and gas stops. Most of the time it’s a disappointing exercise, a macro-beer and wine mess featuring nothing local or interesting.
But things seem to be changing.
In a truck stop in the Eastern U.P., Jimmy wanders back toward the beer cooler and finds a veritable cornucopia of local and small craft brews on display and ready for purchase. Great Lakes Brewing out of Cleveland, Arcadia from Maine of all places, Dogfish Head, and a new big favorite of ours, Founders Brewing out of Grand Rapids, Michigan. In an earlier entry we found an incredible stock of New Glarus products at a small gas station in the middle of Nowhere Wisconsin.
So what does this mean? Truly, the craft beer movement in the US has reached a kind of critical mass if owners of small mom and pop gas and go places find it profitable to feature these kinds of brews. There is a market for them, an audience!
Have you seen great craft beer in unexpected places? Email us and let us know!
Great craft/local beer: IT’S NOT JUST FOR BEER GEEKS ANYMORE. Woo Hoo!