The State Of The Pint Address

The Full Pint co-founder Danny Fullpint addresses the present and future of The Full Pint, as well as a look back on the past 4 years. Cheers!

The State Of The Pint Address

It wasn’t long ago that Jonny and I were starting this site up, first trying to use dreaded Apple iWeb, and eventually using a young version of WordPress. We were so amazed back then at how simple WordPress made our job of managing content.  While we were just starting up, Port Brewing/Lost Abbey just started up, Dale’s Pale Ale was the hottest shit that everyone was clamoring for, and Twitter wasn’t in anyones vocabulary. We really had no idea how well this would take off, and to this day, we still crack big smiles and let out big laughs at how far two buddies from college came in the last four years. (Click the pictures for retro versions of The Full Pint)

You might notice our snazzy new layout. This is our third upgrade. Hopefully you see that it loads way quicker, and is more appealing on the eyeballs.  If it wasn’t for Jonny’s years of experience tweaking PHP, we’d look like just another out of the box, free wordpress site.  There are many folks who are inspired by our site, and for one reason or another give it a try themselves. By the looks of the turnout of this years Craft Beer Blogger’s conference compared to the years previous, you will see that while it seems very fun and glamorous to drink and tell, there is a lot of hard work and dedication behind the fun, suds and picture taking. Fighting through a lot of challenges and financial issues, The Full Pint has remained at the forefront, making sure that we stay consistent with the quality and quantity of our content. We are proud to tout that each month and each year, we continue to grow upward.  We can’t take all the credit however.  The craft industry is exploding, and the level of interest in the content we are providing continues to increase.  We are happy to provide you with this site, and happy to provide the brewers a legit place to put their content.

Where do we go from here?  One of the sole purposes of upgrading to this new layout, was to provide more options for advertisers.  4 years ago, craft beer wasn’t nearly this big. Now that it’s almost mainstream, there are now more beers, breweries, and related products on the market.  We will never turn our site into a premium or pay to read service, but with that comes some targeted advertising.  It’s no biggie from where we sit, as that is the model of some of the most successful news and blog sites out there. Another long term goal of ours is to provide more perspective. We’ve gotten great reception with the coverage we’ve been providing, however we never want to be pigeon holed into being a So Cal based beer site with California homerism tendencies.  We have a new writer named Frances, with a beer, food and wine writing background, and you will become more familiar with her voice going forward. We have also been enjoying Arne Frantzell’s Trouble Brewing Comics. Arne has been bringing it to the table every week, and has been a tremendous addition to our brand.

We’d also like to thank Adam Nason at Beer News for motivation in keeping this going. As hard as it is for two men to run this site, BN is ran by 1 dude.   Adam over at Beernews.org does a tremendous job (all by himself) at bringing you geeks the latest beer labels as they are approved. That is his deal, he works hard at it, and that’s what sets him apart from the pack.  You will never see me hanging out at the TTB lounge with him. We work with the breweries to release the info on their terms, and in their light.  As we branch out and find new ways to entertain, while helping out the craft beer industry, we will always welcome friendly suggestions or contributions from you the readers.  At our toughest times here at TFP, we’ve questioned why we’ve continued to work on a project that has an ROI so far away. It’s simple. We love it, we love you guys, and we love craft beer. Thank you so much for your support.