Coachella and Craft Beer

Coachella and Craft Beer

Coachella. Best known for it’s huge crowds and brain-melting performances, music festivals bring people together from all walks of life. We didn’t expect to find beer lovers among the crowds, but nestled between the main stage and Sahara tent was a GIANT BEER BARN!

The beer barn definitely peaked our interest, and we weren’t the only ones. For a music festival that people pride on being different, it dawned on us: Coachella is the perfect place to showcase unique craft beers!

Beer to the Masses

The rise of music festivals has also signaled the rise of craft beer. By concentrating nearly 100,000 people – you read that right – 100,000 people from all over the world, festivals are quickly turning into mini-beer conventions.

With beer catering done by Beer Belly, this year, they had almost 90 different breweries with 250 different beers, each rotating over Coachella’s 6 day tenure.

Imagine 100,000 people trying craft beers from every sized brewery from all over America. This is the niche that festivals create. As much as people enjoy the music, festivals are an escape from the everyday, the normal. That, combined with the fact that you’re in the middle of the desert really dissuades you from being entirely sober for the whole thing.

No More Draft Drought

What’s better to quench your thirst than an ice cold IPA? Or what about a pilsner? Maybe a porter? Festivals help expose people who normally wouldn’t be able to distinguish between a stout and a sour, that there’s a world of beer out there other than the beer aisle at the grocery market.

It’s this hipster counterculture that really allows craft brews to flourish at festivals. Exposing the masses to something craft and local is something that can be instagrammed and re-blogged. Something that can be enjoyed in the moment, but immortalized online forever.

No longer will thousands of people live in the dark ages of beers; the renaissance has come, and it is loud. Coachella isn’t the only example: Outside Lands in San Francisco and Lollapalooza in Chicago, craft beer is clearly becoming a big business. When people spend hundreds of dollars to escape normal life, they need extraordinary beer to match. The atmosphere, music, along with the experiences make craft beers and festivals a match made in heaven.