Would you bid on a $1,200 bottle of beer?
Michael Moser is a Certified Cicerone and auctioneer at Skinner’s auction house. Simply speaking, he knows beers.
Moser is the one behind Skinner — the first brick-and-mortar auction house to sell beers.
Premium wines, we’ve had. But auction-worthy beer? At first, Skinner’s patrons were dumbfounded:
“You know you’re standing up there and you kind of switch gears from wine to beer, and you see a lot of puzzled looks from person to person, and eyes widening at the prices we were achieving,” says Moser.
“I kind of connected the dots. Actually one of the beers we were offering, Midnight Sun M, was one of the first beers that really caught my eye in the secondary market. I saw someone had bought it for a pretty penny and figured while we’re doing wine, why not throw some beer in it?”
And the cost of a single bottle of beer of Midnight Sun M? $1,200-1,800.
According to Moser, auction-ready beers are able to age up to 20 years or more in a bottle. That means bidders raise their paddles for stouts and sours.
But unfortunately for me, not for hops.
Stories You Might Like
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
