This month I have the pleasure of hosting The Session – a monthly space for beer bloggers around the world to blog on the same topic on the first Friday of the month. Though my announcement is slightly late, I hope that many bloggers can join us in this fun blogging exercise – posts are due on September 3rd. And, don’t be afraid to contribute if you’re new to The Session. The topic for Session #43 is very fitting for those just getting their feet wet…

Picture yourself starting school, on a cool, crisp September day. Only, you’re not as excited as you usually are because you’re starting at a new school. No one knows who you are, groups of friends are already established, and you have nightmares about getting lost in the hallways trying to find your next class. How will you ever fit in?…

In some ways, there may be a beer-world parallel to this experience: new craft breweries joining an established beer community, or even tougher, breaking into a non-craft beer town.

In the past year, there has been a sharp increase in the number of breweries in the US, completely bucking the steady trend of the past five years. According to Brewers Association stats, there are 1599 craft breweries in the US (as of July 2010), 110 of which opened in 2009. If you check out this graph of all U.S. breweries (which shows the total brewery count for June of each of the featured years) if you don’t believe me that brewing is taking off with leaps and bounds.

With the astounding growth of the number of craft breweries this year, chances are there’s a new one in development, or has just started out in your area. My challenge to you is to seek out a new brewery and think about ways in which they could be welcomed into the existing beer community. How does their beer compare to the craft beer scene in your area? Are they doing anything in a new/exciting way? What advice, as a beer consumer, would you give to these new breweries?

Take this opportunity to say hello to the new neighbors in your area. Maybe its a nanobrewery that came to a festival for the first time that you vowed to “check out” later. Maybe it’s a new local beer on a shelf on the corner store that you hadn’t seen before. Dig deeper and tell us a story about the “new kids on the block.” I look forward to welcoming them to the neighborhood!

To participate in The Session:
Write a post about the topic above – and leave a link to the post in comments on this post.
I’ll write a wrap-up post after the submissions come in so that everyone can see what you’ve shared.

Happy writing, Cheers!
The Beer Babe