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is beer better in bottles or cans?
Head-to-head war: bottles vs. cans
Founder of Sam Adams sparks industry brouhaha by insisting glass is best
By Jenn Abelson, Globe Staff | July 29, 2005
''Tastes great, less filling" was yesterday's debate. The latest battle brewing among beer makers: cans vs. bottles.
It all started this month when Boston Beer Co. president Jim Koch, the maker of Samuel Adams, released his Beer Drinker's ''Bill of Rights." One major tenet: ''Beer shall be offered in bottles, not cans, so that no brew is jeopardized with the taste of metal."
For brewers and drinkers of canned beer, this was the shot heard 'round the beermaking world. Canned beer has long dominated the market and in recent years, a growing number of microbreweries have begun using cans because of improved technology that makes it cheaper and easier to package their craft beers.
''This is a 'Bill of Wrongs,' " said Dale Katechis, owner of Oskar Blues Brewery in Lyons, Colo., which sent a release across the country suggesting Koch had been kidnapped by aliens. ''Not only is the line about cans tasting like metal damaging to us, but it is also untrue."
Oskar Blues Brewery -- which sent a letter inviting Koch to taste its canned beer -- says aluminum gives beer longer shelf life, protects it from the destructive effects of light, and gets colder more quickly. As for a metallic flavor, can backers say that's hogwash, because plastic lines aluminum cans to prevent such an aftertaste.
Says Dave Lambert, owner of Marlborough's Sherwood Forest Brewers, which packages its brews in cans: ''There's a lot of us who make good canned beer."
But Koch doesn't believe in the canned standard -- at least not for Sam Adams. He says he has refused requests from airlines, stadiums, and golf courses to can the revolutionary suds -- rejections that he says would have brought the firm millions of dollars.
Koch, considered a microbrewing industry pioneer, maintains that canned beer runs the risk of imparting a metallic taste. Although plastic protects the inside of the can, Koch says the tab and lip of the aluminum can -- where people sip their beer -- is exposed.
''I wouldn't have named my beer after a revolutionary if I was afraid of generating controversy over my principles," Koch said. ''I recognize others have different standards and may make compromises that I'm not willing to make."
This isn't the first time that Koch's marketing tactics have ruffled feathers of fellow brewers. In the early 1990s, Sam Adams backed down from calling itself ''the Best Beer in America" after rivals accused the company of false advertising. These days Sam Adams calls itself ''America's World-Class Beer."
In the beginning, beer drinkers only had one choice: draft beer. But modern technology brought new packaging innovations, chiefly bottled beer in the 19th century, then canned brews in the 1930s.
And since beer makers switched to a water-based plastic coating for cans from a solvent-based one in the 1980s, studies have shown that there have been no detectable differences between canned and bottled beer, says Ray Klimovitz, technical director of the Master Brewers Association of the Americas.
At B-Side Lounge in Cambridge last week,, 25-year-old Kimberly Newton clutched her 16-ounce Schlitz and declared: ''I am a can girl."
Newton defended her beer against Sam Adams, saying the aluminum keeps the beverage frostier than bottles, and cans make it easier to gulp.
Meanwhile, her friend Stephanie Power insisted that on a recent camping trip, the bottled Miller High Lifes were superior to the Miller cans offered that night.
''And there's just something sexy about a bottle," Power said. ''You can't get that in a can."
Over the last decade, the total volume of bottled beer sold grew about 35 percent, giving bottlers a bigger foothold in the industry. But in US homes, its popularity has fizzled, with consumption dropping nearly 10 percent over the past four years, according to NPD Group, a Port Washington, N.Y., research firm.
Other brewers, including Anheuser-Busch, Inc. and Pittsburgh Brewing Co., further complicated the can vs. bottle debate by introducing a new player into the pack: 12-ounce aluminum bottles. The firms promise consumers colder beer in bottles that can't break.
Demand has been so high in bars, restaurants, and supermarkets that Anheuser-Busch plans to double its production of the aluminum bottles by fall, according to Doug Muhleman, group vice president for brewing operations and technology at Anheuser-Busch.
''We were shocked that he would make that statement," Muhleman said of Koch's charge that cans can make beers taste metallic. ''Obviously, he has some other agenda."
Joe Piccirilli, president of Pittsburgh Brewing, which packages beer in both bottles and cans, said there are some things you just can't debate.
''A bad beer is a bad beer whether it's in a glass or can," Piccirilli said. ''And a good beer is good no matter what way you package it."
Jenn Abelson can be reached at abelson@globe.com
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Bottles because the beer stays colder longer or so i am told mine dont last long enufe 
Originally Posted by ForrestBlack
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