It’s time for the State Fair to recognize the great home-grown accomplishments of North Carolina’s talented homebrewers and 50+ professional brewers, just as it promotes and rewards the state’s professional and amateur wineries. And cake decorators. Cattlemen and women. Cookie bakers and jam makers.  Watercolor artists and fern stylists. Pickles and pigs. You get the idea.

The gallery above is by no means exhaustive: after all, according to the N.C. Division of Tourism, Film and Sports Development, the North Carolina State Fair awarded 343 medals to wine alone in the 2011 N.C. State Fair Wine Competition.

That’s 343 medals for North Carolina wine. Zero for North Carolina beer.

Now, before you think, “Ack, it’s the State Fair, whatever” — keep in mind that that the N.C. State Fair brings in an average annual attendance of nearly one million people. That’s one million attendees leaving with zero exposure to one of the state’s most dynamic and interesting industries. Meanwhile, the Fair hands out blue ribbons to Christmas Dinner Table Arrangements.

It’s a long-standing snub, because frankly, beer lacks an agricultural identity and cultural roots in the South. And, admittedly, the state’s breweries have less political clout than the state’s wineries. But North Carolina is the best beer state in the South — truly the “state of Southern beer” — something readily acknowledged by both the media and by the state’s progressive tourism division. Check out the newly-launched “craft beer journeys” on the VisitNC.com website. Witness the recognition of Asheville as Beer City USA. Three years in a row.

Yet this exposure and excitement is inexplicably sheltered at the North Carolina State Fair, ostensibly under the guise of family-friendly entertainment.

So I will remind you one more time: 343 medals for North Carolina wine. Zero for North Carolina beer.

It’s not about families. It’s not about agriculture: after all, North Carolina was a center for hops production prior to Prohibition. It’s not even about political clout. Like just about anything booze-related in the South, it’s because of inertia: simply put, breweries and beer enthusiasts haven’t pressured the North Carolina State Fair to recognize and reward craft beer. It’s on us. The N.C. State Fair isn’t going to do it for us.

North Carolina beer finally has earned its rightful place at the table. Now it deserves a ribbon. A simple judging competition that awards and showcases great professional and amateur beer. I’m not asking for a beer garden at the fair. It’s not about selling growlers to go to fair-goers. It’s about parity with wine. Changing the score from 343 to 0 to something a bit more balanced.

How do we go about this? And what’s a realistic timeframe for change? I don’t yet know. But I do know how to annoy people and get results by asking pesky questions.  And this is a question I’ll be asking again and again, until we get the answer we deserve. A display case full of ribbons and North Carolina beer.

So instead we present you with this video, a fascinating British 1960s peek into the telecommunications future of the 1990s.  Analog meets digital:  scanned images are printed out on Polaroid-ish film; coaxial connectivity proposed in a Mister Rodgers landscape. For all you fellow retro-futurists out there, this is a tasty morsel.

Brewery update in a few days, once things settle down. (ha!)

SOON AND SOFT
Speaking of opening up a brewery, we have decided on a soft opening once our brewery is ready, hopefully in mid-to-late May. But our Super Poobah Happy Times Grand Opening will be Friday, August 13th — which just happens to be the five-year anniversary of Pop The Cap.  Super poobah happy times!

Does this make sense to you, dear reader? Basically, we want to ease into production – get comfy with the system, iron out our kinks, sell at some farmers markets, distribute to select restaurants and bars, and open up the tavern a few days a week. We figure after a few months of experience, we’ll be ready to rock for an epic celebration on August 13th.

In the meantime, we’re working hard on building a world-class brewery. You should see it!

THREE WORDS
Do you remember when we asked you to describe Fullsteam in three words? This was to help with a presentation on social media for the Craft Brewers Conference this past week in Chicago. Thank you to the 75 Fullsteam fans who helped with this project. Here’s how you described Fullsteam in three words (clicky to embiggen):

I bet you didn’t know this, but just before asking you to describe our three words, I had (finally) determined what ours were. It took nearly a year for me to be able to say, “yep, them’s our three words.”

Your contributions helped shape a presentation on our panel “Storytelling 2.0: Social Media is a Conversation.” Beyond the presentation, I was very curious to see how much overlap there was between our words for ourselves and your words for us.

So here are our three words…at least as we see it. Our goal as a business: for all that we do to be an unexpected Southern adventure.

• unexpected: defying conventional wisdom. Zigging when they zag. Celebrating our eccentricities. Getting away with posting videos of cheesy 1980s personal assistant robots. Showing “The Room” to frightened and enthralled audiences. Unexpected beer: from the ongoing effort to make beer from kudzu, to the success of beers crafted from paw paw and persimmon., to the unexpected pleasure of a sweet potato beer that is more subtle than spicy.
• Southern: embracing the South’s rich agricultural traditions. Brewing with local, seasonal ingredients. Incorporating Southern food traditions as a bridge to craft beer.
• adventure: full steam ahead in a spirit of fearless optimism!

(Before ya get snarky: please note that this is an exercise in uncovering our “unique value proposition:” all breweries strive to be “high-quality,”  ”fresh,” “innovative,”  and “award-winning.” We’re no different. The three word exercise is about exploring what makes us different.)

Once again, many thanks to the 75 of you who contributed to this exercise! We hope you and countless others will join us in the unexpected Southern adventure. And if you’re starting a new venture or heading up a business…what are your three words? What words do your fans use to describe your venture?

Visual word maps courtesy of Wordle.net. Check it out!

Waa ha go go!

The whole idea of the IF series is to celebrate the folly of past predictions of the future. And what of our current predictions? Who of the modern era’s so-called “Futurists” give us any comfort or insight to today’s mysteries? When’s the last time a Futurist predicted anything other than the perverse pervasiveness of technology? (Says the guy blogging, duly noted.)

The acceleration of the future can often be a noble cause, but let it not come at the expense in celebrating today. Unless you are from the future, you have no idea what the future holds.