A local brewery locked out of the Gilroy Garlic Festival is
grumbling about a monopoly on beer sales at the event.
Gilroy – A local brewery locked out of the Gilroy Garlic Festival is grumbling about a monopoly on beer sales at the event.
For nearly three decades, the Gilroy Chamber of Commerce has had sole purview to choose a beer distributor to serve the 100,000 or so visitors that flock to Christmas Hill Park in late July. And for nearly 30 years, the chamber has been the sole beneficiary of the hundreds of kegs served up over the three-day weekend.
Coast Range Brewery, on 10th Street, has failed to get a toehold in the event after a year of pleading with the chamber, according to Jeff Moses, general manager of Coast Range. Moses also has had no luck getting its beer into the event in talks with Bottomley Distributing Company, the area Budweiser distributor awarded a two-year contract for the event.
“(Bottomley) can distribute us if they want just for the weekend and carry us and put our signs in the event, but they don’t want to do that,” Moses said. “Obviously they want to sell their brands. We could do our garlic beer and put it in Gourmet Alley … It’s a natural.”
Bottomley could not be reached for comment by press time Tuesday.
Moses said his company could set up a booth at the event, but they would be crippled in terms of advertising – Bottomley’s contract gives the Milpitas company exclusive signage rights. That means no other beer vendor can put up signs, wear T-shirts advertising their brand, even have tap handles with their logos.
“They can make this work,” Moses said of the chamber. “They can purchase the beer if they like. They just won’t do it.”
It would not be the first time the city allowed micro-breweries into the event. Nearly 10 years ago, the festival allowed a group of local breweries, including Coast Range Brewery, to participate, according to Susan Valenta, the chamber’s chief executive officer.
“The distributor was really good about trying to work along with it,” Valenta said. “But we had some instances where there were some breweries taking advantage of the opportunity by plastering the place with marketing stuff.”
Besides undercutting the main distributor, managing multiple groups proved difficult, Valenta said. She said the chamber has favored a single large distributor – rather than a collection of micro-breweries – so it can steer clear of having to manage compliance with the state’s myriad alcohol laws. Distributors such as Bottomley deal with the state’s Alcohol Beverage Control laws, while the chamber focuses on managing the volunteers who pour beer at the festival.
“It’s a turnkey operation,” Valenta said. “(The distributors) do all the heavy lifting that’s involved with the handling of alcohol … At the end of the day, we’re not in the business of beer, but in fund-raising.”
The nonprofit business association has held a monopoly on the beer concession since the founding of the event in 1979. Today, festival beer sales finance more than 50 percent of the chamber’s $210,000 annual operating expenses.
Over the years, festival volunteers have debated whether the chamber should continue to hold a monopoly on beer sales, but the group’s governing board has always voted to “retain the status quo,” according to Brian Bowe, executive director of the nonprofit Gilroy Garlic Festival Association,
Getting local businesses involved in the festival has been a top priority for Bowe, who approached the chamber and several distributors about letting Coast Range Brewery into the event.
“I have tried working with the distributors directly to get them to carry the (Coast Range Brewery’s) Farmhouse products, and they have declined,” Bowe said, adding: “I think that the chamber has tried to give (Coast Range) a fair shake.”
The city’s 29th Annual Garlic Festival takes place July 27 to 29. To learn more, visit the Web site at www.gilroygarlicfestival.com.
