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So you are such an obsessed beer geek the fact that there are awesome beers that you don't even have a chance of getting them pains you? Do you have conversations like this with lots of people in your life? http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/12535814/beer-traders Maybe you should seek professional assistance... OR You can trade with other similarly obessed beer geeks who live in different parts of the country with the same problem! Welcome to the world of beer trading! This world might seem complicated, confusing and borderline underground, but fret not for the rewards are all they appear to be. A goon in Florida can get some Pliny the Elder for some Ciger City Jai Alai, a goon in Indiana can get some Alesmith Speedway Stout for some Three Floyds Dark Lord, and a goon in Texas can get some Portsmouth Kate the Great for the low low cost of their firstborn son, a working human kidney and two blowjobs. Why trade? As I alluded to previously, there are some really great beers from really great brewers that aren't available across the entire coast. In fact, only 3 or 4 beer brands have major nationwide distribution and even then its only a small subset of their overall product portfolio. Hard to get releases and back vintages can be traded for similarly difficult to get / rare beers. Ultimately in a good trade both parties win! Why would I not want to trade beer? Beer trading is not a perfect utopia without any drawbacks. For one its a little on the expensive side as shipping and packaging materials can add up, especially if you try to trade overseas. Expect $15-$25 on shipping a box out, making your minimum target trade value to be somewhere around $50 to make it worth trading. Dealing with shipping is a bit of a hassle and if a box you sent out shows up with broken bottles you have to deal with getting them replaced. Why trade here and not eBay? eBay is for the most part the biggest scum of the beer trading world, with rare beers reaching outrageous values and promoting the profiteering and "scalping" of beer which ends up hurting the people who actually want to DRINK good beer. There are plenty of stories of grandma's and people who know nothing about beer, much less do any drinking of good beer going and buying up huge stocks of rare beer for the sole purpose of profiteering on eBay. Not very cool. Ratebeer has a pretty good trading scene with good traders, Beer Advocate is the central nexus of beer douchery and the trading forum there is everything wrong with beer trading. Please don't go to BA, block it in your host file if you can. Goons are cool, trading beer with goons is really cool. Legality: Isn't it illegal to ship beer? It is illegal to ship alcohol through the US Postal Service without special licenses and forms and etc etc. Don't do it. UPS and FedEx have a policy of not allowing alcohol to be shipped, but it is not against any laws or something you can get arrested for. As a shipping company it is a little bit of a pain in the rear end to deal with glass bottles that break in shipping and leak, not to mention dealing with spurious "compensation values" that could be quite high for something that is quite fragile. They don't want to know about it because they don't want to have to deal with it, make it not a problem and it wont be. People ship beer all the time, and its not hard to ship beer without it breaking and most often times if you drop off a box at FedEx/UPS they don't ask what the contents are and off it goes. See the "how to pack beer" section below. How to trade: Part 1 - setting up a trade There are two main methods to try and solicit a trade. One is effective for finding what you want and the other is effective for finding new stuff you don't know about. These modes are commonly reffered to as ISO/FT. ISO = is seeking of and FT = for trade. Lets say I want to trade for some Dark Lord and I know I have a few beers that might interest someone in that region or someone that just might have a Dark Lord. I'm just pulling beers out of my rear end for this example. My post would be something like this. quote:ISO: Dark Lord FT: List My trade list should be kept up to date and have every beer I am willing to trade on it. If you value X beer highly and don't think you want to trade it as general distribution, don't put it on the list. This might mean you end to keep a "beer trading cellar list" as well as a "full cellar list", but its much easier to work with somebody who has their trading list put together as opposed to generating a million emails agreeing on what is and isn't tradable. Its totally cool that you don't want to trade X beer, just don't put it on your trading list and cause an endless stream of disappointment because you don't want to trade your Allagash Vagabond. How to trade: Part 2 - Trading Ethically and Painlessly While ultimately a fair trade is one that both parties agree upon as fair and it could be a bottle of BA Dark Lord 2011 for 24 bottles of KBS 2010 (seen it!) or a bottle of Russian River Beatification for a really fresh great IPA that may not retail for a ton of money but you can only get it at the brewery. Most of the time it's a comparable number of beers at a comparable value, commonly referred to as $4$ (dollar for dollar). $4$ works well for most trades, beers that are exceedingly rare or of very old vintage don't always fit in. For example: Does a bottle of Rodenbach Grand Cru from 1994 have the same value as one released today? Not quite. Isabelle Proximus? Posse lot Especial? Midnight Sun M? Also a different story. These are examples of "whales" that don't really fit in with the $4$ scheme and there's no good metric for saying "if beer is 5+ years old it means its +30% in value" and so forth. If you are trading for these you'll have to take this into account and work out together what equates to a fair trade. Here is an example of what a trade I did recently on RB ended up as both parties getting what they want and agreeing it’s a pretty equitable trade. He started off looking for some Lost Abbey Sinners 2010, which I had and I've wanted to get some CDC Rosso E Marron, and we expanded with some other local stuff from there. There were a few high dollar value beers from me but he made up for it with a slightly increased bottle amount. It was pretty painless and easy and we both walked away happy people. quote:From Me: Above is a little chart/method that I've found is an efficient way to keep track of where the trade is at, balancing it out to keep $4$ pretty even. When you have a good idea that a trade is going to happen it's time to bust this out and then finish it up and agree on who ships first. Shipping cost is not counted towards the trade value unless someone is insisting on something outrageous like overnight/etc. Shipping hit both of us for about $30 on this box. Bonus Beers The last thing that is a good practice and something that really puts the icing on the trading cake is bonus beers. These are beers you throw in with no secured trade. They are optional (sometimes your shipper is already full) but always a good idea. I've discovered some really awesome beers I knew nothing about because they were local to an area I've never been to, and I hope that I've helped people find some nice stuff this way. How much bonus beer should you throw in? Depends on how big the trade is and how generous you feel. If you didn't ship first and the other guy packed in a ton of extra bonus beers you should try to return the favor. How to pack There are many ways of packing beer, but in my opinion ALL of them are pains in the rear end. The one that is by far the least pain in the rear end is a styrofoam bottle shipping container system thingy. You can get them at Bevmo/Total Wine and other places and they are the bomb. One of these shipping containers (common sizes are 1 bottle, 2 bottles, 3 bottles, 6 bottles and 12 bottles) are usually only a few bucks ($4-$8) but turn packing a box of beer into a near bulletproof process that doesn't take much time and only needs some scrap paper to get them nice and secure. Here is how I packed a 12 bottle shipper. First take 3-4 pages of a newspaper and ruffle them up a bit and set it over the slot for the bottle, this will make sure that the paper expands to secure the bottle from jostling around too much.  Set the bottle on top of the hole and slowly shove it down, the paper should crumple around the bottle in a near form fitting fashion. Try and wiggle it, you can probably only wiggle it on the top side of the bottle.  Next take two pages of a newspaper and fold it in half and then squeeze it together some so it becomes kind of snake-like, and then shove it in around the top of the bottle, kind of forming a ring around the bottle. You might need to do this twice but after you do this the bottle should be secure and wont budge at all.  Repeat until all of your bottles are nice and secure. Once they are all packed just put the top on and tape the box up and its ready to ship! Misc trading stuff If you've got some cool tips for this section let me know and I'll add it in! -Cellar Management I like to use the iOS app Brew Vault to manage my cellar. It does cloud syncing to multiple iOS devices and you can easily export a list and mail it to yourself. Great app, quick and easy. Some people use an excel spreadsheet or google apps sheet and that works fine too.
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Oct 14, 2011 19:44
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ISO: Firestone Walker 12,13, Abacus FT: list Note that the "Keeper" column denotes if a beer in the cellar is not for trade. I've done at least 15 trades on Beer Advocate, and can provide references. PM me. ShaneB fucked around with this message at 20:01 on Oct 14, 2011 |
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Oct 14, 2011 19:59
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rage-saq and I are actually in the process of trading, here's what we agreed to: From Me: CBS 2011 Behemoth 2011 JP Luciernaga From Rage-Saq: FW Abacus 2011 FW Parabola 2011 FW 14th Anniversary ----- ISO: Lost Abbey - Any of their Sour/Wild Ales Russian River - Pliny the Elder, Any of their Sour/Wild Ales FT: Jolly Pumpkin - Pretty much any of their common and seasonal stuff Bells - Expedition Stout, Any of their year-round stuff Shorts - "" Founders - "" Great Lakes Brewery - "" I'm not necessarily ISO of any of Lost Abbeys/Russian Rivers limited releases, I'd just like a chance to even try their common beers. I just don't have a huge cellar of whales.
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Oct 14, 2011 22:55
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Cool! Also, any thoughts/suggestions on an Android app for cellar management? ISO: Founders CBS Victory Dark Intrigue Goose Island Bourbon County Vanilla Stout F/T: '09 Dark Lord '07 - '10 Stone Vertical Epic Dogfish Head Bitches Brew '08 Dogfish Head World Wide Stout (multiple) '11 Founders KBS (multiple) I mostly do cigar and/or wine trades, so I don't mind shipping my end first. GP035 fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Oct 14, 2011 |
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Oct 14, 2011 22:59
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I have a trade going on right now with Corbet. I shipped his 3 bottle box today. From Me Abacus 2011 Parabola 2011 FW14 From Corbet Founders CBS FFF Behemoth JP Luciernaga
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Oct 14, 2011 23:29
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Oh, I have a trade request going on RB but it got buried. ISO: Three Floyds XV (that crazy anniversary blended beer) FT: list. I'll definitely trade for over $4$ on that one. If you've get a bottle you want to trade, let me know and I'll make it worth your while.
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Oct 15, 2011 01:28
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rage-saq posted:Oh, I have a trade request going on RB but it got buried. I don't have my current FT list finished yet, but I am going to the 3F anniversary party. Depending on bottle allotment I would be interested in trading you for some things on your list. I'll keep you up to date on what I've got.
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Oct 15, 2011 15:40
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Huge_Midget posted:I don't have my current FT list finished yet, but I am going to the 3F anniversary party. Depending on bottle allotment I would be interested in trading you for some things on your list. I'll keep you up to date on what I've got. Nice! If there is any way I could possibly get 2 I'll majorly hook you up. Let me know when you know how many you get and if you are up for trading them.
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Oct 15, 2011 18:58
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Current beer cellar ISO: Upland Lambics (Kiwi, Persimmon, Blackberry) Firestone Walker: Parabola, Abacus, anything outstanding Lost Abbey: Anything wild/spontaneous fermentation/lambic/sours (Duck Duck Gueze, Red Poppy, Cable Car, etc.) Russian River: Fresh Pliny, any of the -ations Alesmith: Speedway Stout The Bruery: Black Tuesday, Chocolate Rain, anything wacky from the Provisions series Cigar City: Jai Alai, Cedar aged Jai Alai, Guava Grove, Hunhapu's (any variations), Maduro Brown, Marshal Zhukov's, Oatmeal Raisin Cookie 3Fontenien: Anything Cantillon: Anything Huge_Midget fucked around with this message at 22:55 on Oct 15, 2011 |
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Oct 15, 2011 21:17
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I live about 5 minutes from one of the top bottle shops in Southern California, fairly close to SA RB: http://www.ratebeer.com/user/140014/trade/ Also a trustee for a Goon in Bruery's Reserve Society and willing to trustee for others if interested. FT: Cellar List available upon request Russian River (Any non-special releases, including fresh Pliny/Blind Pig) Lost Abbey (All releases, including specialties) AleSmith (All releases, including specialties) Alpine (Limited access, but can drive to the brewery if needed) Bruery (All releases, including Reserve Society) Cantillon (Ask) Kern River (Most releases) Midnight Sun (Most releases) Anchorage Brewing (All releases) Deschutes (Most releases) Firestone Walker (All releases) Beachwood (All releases) Hair of the Dog (All releases, special releases are limited) Jester King (Limited distribution) Boulevard (Limited) Vintage Stone Releases (Changes weekly) Almanac (All) ... And most other California breweries ISO: (Limited Releases and Seasonals, although looking for some year-round releases from these as well) Bells Founders New Glarus Three Floyds Cigar City Sun King Dark Horse Half Acre Tired Hands Hill Farmstead Toppling Goliath Zam fucked around with this message at 06:26 on Jun 22, 2013 |
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Oct 16, 2011 04:24
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Have : Just got a case of Victory Brewing Otto ... Def willing to part with 4 or so bottles.. Looking for offers.
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Oct 16, 2011 21:31
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I'm forever in search of two beers, that I can't get here in Georgia. Hövels - http://www.hoevels-hausbrauerei.de/ and Velkopopovický Kozel Cerny (Dark) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velkopopovick%C3%BD_Kozel I have access to tons of microbrews and odd stuff via local liquor stores, and can try my best to track down anything you want in return - or just give you money. Please god help me, and do PM if you have access to either of these two. edit : I guess this might not fit in this thread that well, since neither are like ultra rare expensive beers - but still, if you want to do a nostalgic bro (lived in dortmund) a solid... mindphlux fucked around with this message at 07:32 on Oct 17, 2011 |
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Oct 17, 2011 07:25
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mindphlux posted:I'm forever in search of two beers, that I can't get here in Georgia. Any beer trade fits in the beer trading thread! Though the chances of somebody living near where this is distributed might be difficult, your best bet might be the RateBeer Trading Forum as they do lots of international trades.
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Oct 17, 2011 07:40
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rage-saq posted:Any beer trade fits in the beer trading thread! Though the chances of somebody living near where this is distributed might be difficult, your best bet might be the RateBeer Trading Forum as they do lots of international trades. I've asked in a GWS beer thread before, and I think someone said they at least had access to Hövels, which I'm jonesing a bit more for - so I guess I figure it's worth a shot at least!
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Oct 17, 2011 08:56
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mindphlux posted:I've asked in a GWS beer thread before, and I think someone said they at least had access to Hövels, which I'm jonesing a bit more for - so I guess I figure it's worth a shot at least! Try and crosspost in the commercial beer thread. Pimping this thread in there will only help make it more active 
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Oct 17, 2011 16:24
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I work at Cigar City, so I have access to all bottles, as well as growlers. I don't want anything crazy, as I'm at a stage in my beer geekery where I just want to get beers I like to drink. For example I traded a Whiskey Barrel-aged Hunahpu's for several bottles of New Glarus Belgian Red. I'd like some Cantillons. I don't think Shelton Brothers are distributing them anymore to FL, or at least in very small quantities, so I'd be interested in getting some. Kriek, Rose de Gambrinus, etc. I don't trade much though so I'm good for like once a month.
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Oct 17, 2011 17:42
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bananasinpajamas posted:I work at Cigar City, so I have access to all bottles, as well as growlers. I don't want anything crazy, as I'm at a stage in my beer geekery where I just want to get beers I like to drink. For example I traded a Whiskey Barrel-aged Hunahpu's for several bottles of New Glarus Belgian Red. I'd be interested in getting some BA Hunahpu's or BA Marshall Zhukov's. No Cantillon's here yet, they are in the process of changing distributors (maybe).
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Oct 17, 2011 18:10
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I don't have the BA Zhukov's, although we're going to release a big batch of it aged in apple brandy barrels in the coming months.
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Oct 18, 2011 14:18
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bananasinpajamas posted:I don't have the BA Zhukov's, although we're going to release a big batch of it aged in apple brandy barrels in the coming months. Mmmm, I like the sound of that. What would you want for one? Anything in particular?
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Oct 18, 2011 16:28
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bananasinpajamas posted:I don't have the BA Zhukov's, although we're going to release a big batch of it aged in apple brandy barrels in the coming months. For reals, Dark Lord? KBS? Whatchoo want mang?
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Oct 18, 2011 17:56
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Absolutely no imperial stouts. I'll take 6ers of awesome sessionable beers before any IS.
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Oct 19, 2011 04:35
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bananasinpajamas posted:Absolutely no imperial stouts. I'll take 6ers of awesome sessionable beers before any IS. I want some of it and I will give you some awesome local Michigan stuff for it.
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Oct 19, 2011 04:54
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bananasinpajamas posted:Absolutely no imperial stouts. I'll take 6ers of awesome sessionable beers before any IS. I've got almost every single stone collab beer they have done except for the IPAs (as they wouldn't be good anymore)
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Oct 19, 2011 06:45
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Corbet did you get your package today?
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Oct 20, 2011 15:33
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rage-saq posted:Corbet did you get your package today? Got it! Packaged very well! I'll be sending out your bottles tomorrow.
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Oct 21, 2011 02:06
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Corbet posted:Got it! Packaged very well! I'll be sending out your bottles tomorrow. Sweet! Looking forward to it.
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Oct 23, 2011 03:02
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I suppose its going out on too much of a limb if somebody here had a Veritas 004 or some of the Allagash coolship beers they would like to trade...
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Oct 25, 2011 20:20
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OP, do you know about the legality of international shipping? I'm sure there's some people who'd be keen to try some New Zealand boutique beers, and I was technically underage when I last went to the States, so that wasn't really much fun on my end.
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Oct 28, 2011 14:33
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I've never seen any laws that indicate it is illegal to make international personal alcohol shipments on either the US or Belgian side. I don't know about NZ but they are a bit more progressive on the alcohol laws than the US so I can't imagine it would be breaking any laws. International shipping for beer is a LOT of money. Like $60 USD for shipping a 6 pack of beer.
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Oct 28, 2011 15:37
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rage-saq posted:I've never seen any laws that indicate it is illegal to make international personal alcohol shipments on either the US or Belgian side. I don't know about NZ but they are a bit more progressive on the alcohol laws than the US so I can't imagine it would be breaking any laws. UPS and FedEx only ship alcohol under certain circumstances (and a six-pack internationally would be way more than $60) and i'm pretty certain it's just plain illegal to ship it via USPS. don't know how that applies to things coming in to the US, but customs is gonna be checking it out on both ends. funkybottoms fucked around with this message at 16:03 on Oct 28, 2011 |
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Oct 28, 2011 16:00
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funkybottoms posted:UPS and FedEx only ship alcohol under certain circumstances (and a six-pack internationally would be way more than $60) and i'm pretty certain it's just plain illegal to ship it via USPS. don't know how that applies to things coming in to the US, but customs is gonna be checking it out on both ends. Yes, this is mentioned in the OP. I don't know about international laws though but people ship beer internationally frequently on RB, its just expensive as gently caress its not worth it unless you are trading super high value bottles.
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Oct 29, 2011 00:08
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Corbet posted:Got it! Packaged very well! I'll be sending out your bottles tomorrow. Box arrived today and all the bottles are intact and happy! Thanks!
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Oct 29, 2011 00:11
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I'm willing to trade what I can get in Maine for Bell's, Founder's, Oskar Blues, Great Divide, and other CO or CA breweries. I DO get Stone out here
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Oct 29, 2011 19:31
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ISO: Surly Darkness 2011. FT: list plus any and all beers available in NYC including Captain Lawrence. I'd also be interested in Darkness 09.
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Oct 31, 2011 15:49
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Mikey Purp posted:ISO: Surly Darkness 2011. Not able to access your list.
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Oct 31, 2011 16:31
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rage-saq posted:Not able to access your list. Oops, sorry. Fixed sharing prefs.
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Oct 31, 2011 16:42
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Mikey Purp posted:Oops, sorry. Fixed sharing prefs. I've got a Darkness 09 I'd be willing to trade if your BCBS Rare is on the table. Obviously the value of a BCBS Rare is a bit higher than a Darkness 09 and I would throw down some more from my list. I'm going to review my list and make sure its up to date, there has been a bit of trading activity and I've been slacking.
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Oct 31, 2011 17:54
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rage-saq posted:I've got a Darkness 09 I'd be willing to trade if your BCBS Rare is on the table. Obviously the value of a BCBS Rare is a bit higher than a Darkness 09 and I would throw down some more from my list. Yeah I'm missing quite a bit give me a few.
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Oct 31, 2011 18:11
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Updated my list.
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Oct 31, 2011 20:57
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rage-saq posted:Updated my list. I have an unhealthy mental attachment to my BCS Rare so I don't think I'm willing to part with a bottle yet, even for a major addition to my Darkness vertical. If there's anything else you may want I'd be happy to work it out though. Also, I would love to get my hands on some more Terroir if there's anything on my list or in my area that you'd like to trade for.
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Nov 2, 2011 20:18
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