7 January 2008

The Great Beer Rip Off

7 January 2008 | Affirmative Action Man

I recently went do pick up a carton of my favourite beer – Cascade- and was devastated to see that the size of the stubbies has shrunk from 375ml to 330 ml – but the price has stayed the same.

Its just like the great spirit Rip Off where the size of the bottles has shrunk from 750ml to 700ml over the last 10 years.

My advice is get a still & home brewing kit

[Ed. For the benefit of everyone else suffering under this travesty of injustice, can anyone suggest where you can get a still or home brewing kit. And better yet, some advice on how to operate them?]

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farnarkler8:02 pm 20 Feb 09

Introduce yourself to Richard, the award winning brewer at the Wig and Pen and offer him a decent amount to teach you the things you really need to know about home brewing and then go for it. You’ll get a better beer than the mass produced stuff.

Pommy bastard6:26 pm 20 Feb 09

Err yuck, VB

My favs are London Pride and Cornish Cream…

I thought you’d be a Skinners man!

http://www.skinnersbrewery.com/

AN5:17 pm 20 Feb 09

I have the benefit of many years of working overseas in the States.
No 750ml or 700ml, the standard is 1litre with 1.75litre almost as common.
Vodkas, Bourbons, Rums, Just about whatever you name. 1.25litre bottles $8-$14 each.

Moving up the shelf, Johnny Walker Black Label, not even shopping around $19 for a full litre bottle.

Smirnof 1.75litre bottles $19 each

Skyy 1.75litre or Myers Rum $19 each

Black Velvet Canadian Whisky 1.75litre $13, same for 1.75litre Old Crow Bourbon Whisky

Wines 750ml bottles $7 for 2 bottles.

1.75litre mixers (Mudslide, Margarita, Pina Colada) $11 each

And where are the out of control alcoholics over there they keep talking about over here as a smoke-screen excuse to milk more money in excise from the Australian citizen?

Then I move back to Australia… Holy Hell!!! 🙂

This is the land of incredibly shrinking products even with price increases (hidden 4x price increase that way) — enough toothpaste to wash a fleas bum and deodorant to last a only a month. A months worth of tampons for the wife costing as much as a years supply back there. You people sure like taking it every which way without complaint over here!

For the price of one tiny tube of name brand sensitive teeth toothpaste for the wife here I ordered 3 tubes each being 3 times as much toothpaste and spent less money than the one tube here, same brand!

I see some big online orders to the states. With the bad Aussie dollar and the cost of international shipping, I can still come out ahead of buying anything in an Australian shop.

S4anta9:35 am 10 Jan 08

Nathan,
home brew is an exception to the rule because at no point do you put methanol or ethanol into the brew, unless you like to swill metho down at the pot

nathan7:31 pm 09 Jan 08

According to the links above, you need a license and you pay the excise, since methanol is an alcohol. But on top of that, you pay 38 cents a litre in excise to produce biodiesel in the first place.

Quite simply, it seems that if it’s alcohol- or fuel-related, you pay excise. Home-brewed beer is the sole exception.

Mælinar8:57 am 09 Jan 08

I wonder how this applies to the extraction of surplus methanol/ethanol from the glycerin byproduct when making biodiesel.

Strictly speaking, the methanol (moonshine) or ethanol (spirit alcohol base) is distilled alcohol.

nathan5:18 pm 08 Jan 08

My understanding is that the ATO is responsible for the rules regarding alcohol production. They say that even though you don’t need special permission to own a still with a capacity of less than 5 litres, you must have a licence before you can use it.

Mælinar12:36 pm 08 Jan 08

VY – homebrew alcohol (at least in component form) doesn’t have an alcohol content (yet), hence why its excluded.

Why you would want to put a crate of explodable bottles into the post for your brother who’s off in the Sianai is anybody’s guess, but I’m pretty sure excise tax would be reasonably waivered as an acceptable loss due to the scale of the operation.

Arguably, once you get above a certain proportion of quantity, the ATO will start thinking you are a commercial operation and adjust their rates accordingly.

ant12:16 pm 08 Jan 08

Yes, for some resaon I’ve found using real sugar seems to up the alcohol content? I made one last year with 1kg white sugar, and 500 g of golden syrup, and that stuff was up past 8%. Had an odd taste. The current one with just 1kg of sugar also seems to be heading into elephant beer territory, taste is OK but not as refreshing as the normal ones made with dextrose. I haven’t bottled it yet, so it might morph again during the final 2 weeks in the bottle.

VYBerlinaV811:56 am 08 Jan 08

Alcohol content has been reduced to save costs. The Tax Office calculate excise based on alcohol content, and the cost is not insubstantial. Interestingly, home brew is explicitly excluded from excise liability.

My home brew tends to be in the 6% range, and made one that was about 10% (which was VERY sweet). Playing around with the quantities changes things like this – lot’s of fun, especially when you accidentally make a really good one 😉

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