Eli Cannon's Beer God's Beer Fest Doubles Last Year's Attendance

This past Monday, Eli Cannon's Tap Room kicked off their Beer God's Week with its second annual Beer Fest. The weather this year was great (though the downpour last year did add a lot of character to the tasting), attendance was up, and more than 20 breweries were represented.

For a full list of breweries represented, skip right to the end of the article.

JD Crandall was the leading force for Beer Gods Week. He has recently taken on all the big activities and bar events for Eli Cannon's, and this was his first really large event (even though the tap flash mob was no small feat either). As a beer brewer and aficionado himself, JD is uniquely suited to bringing in quality beer and beer-related events to the people of greater Middlesex County.

This event, says Crandall, required a significant amount of planning becuase he wanted a lot of breweries, and a lot of beer: with no exceptions. Some beer fests cater to one distributor or another, Crandall pushed instead to have the greatest amount of beer he could gather saying,"I wanted to get the most beer under one tent."

At the end of the day, the beer fest went from around 15 breweries last year to over 20 this year. In terms of attendance, the fest doubled from 50 to right around 100. When asked why have a beer fest on a Monday (instead of the traditional weekend) Crandall reports that he likes to view the Fest as an explosive way to kick off Beer Gods week, so it can end with a chill luau on Friday (which has been rescheduled for this Wednesday due to the torrential rain we got).

In this way, Beer Gods week starts big and ends with a pleasing wrap-up, staying well-paced throughout (kind of like a finely balanced beer).

Asked about his new responsibility (and power) as bar manager at Eli Cannon's, Crandall says that he is really enjoying it so far. He enjoys learning about different craft beers and brewers, because even the most experienced beer drinker can always learn more about this ever-expanding craft. Another vital part of his new position that Crandall enjoys is the community connection that goes along with working with craft breweries.

Crandall's philosophy of including every brewery in his events promotes working with breweries that may just be starting out locally (like Relic), or breweries that are seeing new distribution throughout Connecticut (such as Clown Shoes, Six Point, and Green Flash). Looking ahead Crandall is planning an "End of the World Party" at Eli Cannon's as well as more lineups of great beers for future tastings.

For more information on the beers present at the tasting, check out this post on my blog. Stay tuned for a wrap-up of the other Beer God's Week events, and for more coverage of CT beer events be sure to follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Blogger.