I just ducked out to a bottle shop near work that is known to stock the odd beer from HopDog in Nowra.
I was specifically after brewer Tim Thomas’ White Christmas. I knew it’d been bottled recently and figured there was a chance I’d find it in the bottle shop fridge. But no.
Which left me with a not-uncommon conundrum – how to leave a bottle shop without buying anything.
What do you do when nothing really takes your fancy in the bottle shop fridge?
As well as beer, I’m also a book lover and can happily browse through a book store but walk out empty-handed if I don’t find anything I like. I can’t do the same with beer. I think it’s because people don’t associate bottle shops with browsing – you don’t go in there to have a look around and see if anything takes your fancy. The idea is that you’re going in there because you want some beer (or wine, spirits or whatever else takes your fancy) and you’ll take the best of what they have to offer.
Maybe the bulk of people who go to bottle shops are like that, maybe they’re going to pick up something guaranteed to be in the fridge, like a six-pack of Toohey’s Extra Dry or some Crownies.
But that’s not me – I don’t want to drink that stuff. And yet I feel weird when I leave a bottle shop without buying anything. Like the staff are looking at me like I’m some sort of freak.
So with no HopDog on offer, the place at least had a few kinda sorta decent beers. I opted for a Swell pale ale, even though I’d had it before and wasn’t all that impressed by it. But I had to buy something – I was the only guy in the store and the staff were looking at me already because I’d spent more than 12 seconds standing in front of the fridges.
So I picked a Swell beer. Not that I especially wanted it but because I needed to take something up to the counter.
Jeez I wish I could just go “Nah, nothing good here” and walk out.
Categories: bottle shop, Wollongong
BEER IS YOUR FRIEND 
I’m lucky enough to have an amazing bottle shop right around the corner from my office. While I’ll typically go in thinking to buy a specific beer, there’s so many choices I find it near impossible to limit myself to just one purchase.
On the flip side, if there’s nothing that truly catches my eye, I typically buy one bottle of something I’ve never had before just to try something new.
It’s a good problem to have and one that not everyone gets to enjoy.
With the number of breweries in the US I’d have thought that it’d be pretty easy to find a decent bottle shop. Over here most bottle shops feature a lot of mainstream brews and maybe a few more interesting things.
it is indeed a tough call, but I’ve gotten use to walking empty handed, if they ask if I need a hand, just say “na just looking”
I’ll tell them I’m okay if the staff asks if I need help (and, to be honest, I feel faintly insulted that they assumed I needed help picking beer).
Sometimes I’m able to walk out without buying anything, usually in the bigger bottle shops, like Dan Murphy’s. That’s probably because there’s a certain level of anonymity because of the number of customers there. But small bottle shops, still can’t do it.
Mind you, I’ve had the same problem when visiting wineries and doing some wine tasting. Always feel odd walking out after a tasting without buying anything. Kind of like I’ve insulted them and have implied their wine isn’t good enough to buy,