Please Note - No brewery is required to fill your growler so don't get bent out of shape if someone says no. This is all still flexible, new territory for everyone and folks are developing their policies. Also, remember that sometimes individual employees may get things wrong. Oh and don't forget - a clean growler is a happy growler! Keep some electrical tape on hand to obscure logos as well.

Why Don't All Breweries Fill "Foreign" Growlers? There are a few reasons, but a big one is branding. To many craft breweries, their growlers are a big (sometimes only) piece of marketing. They want to know that their beer is ultimately associated with their branding so that when you pour the beer for yourself or others, you're getting that association to them. The reason everyone wants to make sure the growlers aren't carrying other's marks is for that same reason - why would I want you to associate my beer with Brewery B because you put in Brewery B's growler? (The other less unspoken side - Suppose Brewery A sucks - why would brewery B want potentially sucky beer to come out of their branded growler?).

There's a labor issue as well - growler filling takes time away from serving on-prem customers. Most breweries have a system in place where the staff can jam out their growler in reasonable time. The staff has the process down cold. Introducing random spurious unusual growlers now means the staff has to adjust to each new growler that comes in, inspect it, make sure it meets the breweries policy, etc.

Foreign growler fills put the staff in a position of "judgement" with a lot of gray area that can piss customers off. Before the policy was simple and clearly understood - "not our growler - no fill". Now the staff has to decide does this meet our policy? Inevitably they'll end up pissing off the customer who comes in with a milk jug or some such. (They exist)

The Customer Argument: All of this is balanced against the one big reason that consumers want to fill foreign growlers. I don't want to store 20 growlers in my car whenever I think I might stop by a brewery. I'm absent minded to hell and won't remember to go grab Brewery A's growler before going to the brewery. Am I likely to buy another growler just so I can take away their beer? Probably not. I want my life to be simple - I have a good, clean, awesome growler. Please put your awesome beer into my awesome growler and I promise to sing your praises and branding to the pouring audience. Whenever I pour your beer into my glass I will say a silent prayer of thanks - "thank you Brewery A for your hard labor that brings us such magnifience".

Breweries - See something wrong or want to change/add your status? Email our web team at webmaster@maltosefalcons.com

Key:

- Happy to fill your growler

- No foreign growler fills.

- Brewery will fill foreign growlers under certain conditions. (usually restricted growler types)

- Status Uknown - How about a Helping Hand?

Totals: 44 out of 56 breweries fill foreign growlers (79%)