Coors Brewery Tour

OK, OK.... I know that I said my next post would be from Chicago, but something happened today that was so great it has to be shared with the highest urgency.

Now say what you want about the American welfare system, or lack thereof... and how the free market fails to provide for those in need. But at 10.30 this morning in a western gold rush turned ski town on the outskirts of Denver, Corporate America provided!

I visited the largest brewing plant in the world, toured it for free, and got three free beers for my trouble! All it cost me was the $2 bus fare to get out there for a half day of entertainment and education. The brewhouse is enormous, containing 50 brew kettles. Needless to say it was hot in there. But more impressive still was the bottling plant, which had an output of 1800 cans of beer per minute, plus 340 kegs per hour. It moved so fast, it was pretty much impossible to track the progress of an individual can through the plant. Apparently 300 rail cars and 1500 trucks ship out of there every week, each holding about 100,000 cans of beer.

But by far the most impressive part of the tour of all, was the free beer tastings. I had paid nothing for the privelege, and felt a bit guilty as I let them take a photo of me at the beginning of the tour which I knew I had no intention of paying for, and guiltier still as I sampled 3 pints of their beer. If it wasn't for my new-beer-at-each-bar-while-on-tour policy, they may have gained themselves a regular customer out of me.