We print the best by, production time (shift at a minimum), location code (for us), and whatever tax code is required. I dont know if beer requires additional code info like tax codes, location, etc. Put a clear Julian or calendar produced on date. It is a pain when running a lot trace versus a production date code Fortunately the product taste holds up just as long and we can adjust Vit C for safety factors due to distribution. We have to use them because we make a 100% RDA of Vitamin C on labels and we know how fast Vit C degrades and that is the end of it. Seems to me easy enough for brewers who want to list only the Best by/Pull Date to preprint the label such as:īest Before _ X months after we bottled this beer.įrom a different perspective, best by dates are a pain in the ass. On top of that, they admit that the longer period is based not just on the beer, but on the extra time required for shipping and distribution. Is nine months really just "somewhat" longer than 17 weeks? Most would say it's twice as long. So, which beers are "typically" given about four months and which six months? The consumer has no idea.Įven worse, they no longer even even state their imported brands shelf-life period (they used to say " 9 months" in previous versions of their pdf, which I did not save), just the vague "somewhat longer". Given the fact that so many people want an actual bottling date instead of, or in addition to, the brewer's recommended pull/best before date, most would not consider the MillerCoors method the "gold standard", especially given this rather vague, non-brand specific aspect of their pull dates: military time) on the production line (15:30 = 3:30 PM).Ĭlick to expand.Is that a company-wide, international M-C code, or just their US subsidiary's, MillerCoors? P.S.- If you see a colon in the code string the two numbers before and after it represent the bottling or canning time (in 24-hr. Kudos to Heineken for putting both a production date and best buy date (BBD) on its products. However, Heineken puts the one-digit year before the date. In a four-digit code the year is often placed after the day and 16 is shortened to 6. 11, 2016 - the 285th day of the 2016 Julian calendar. Also, in his interpretation a code of 2856 which I saw recently would be March 85, 2016. In a recent Google+ Hangout one participant tried to convince me that a four-digit code was MDDY where a digit represented the month which is impossible because there aren't enough digits (0-9 =10) to represent the 12 months of the year. Genesee utilizes a MDDY born on date format, with letters A-M representing (Jan.-Dec.) The letter I is skipped. It's like baseball and the designated hitter - use it in both leagues or get rid of it. AB InBev should get its act together and do one standard code. I've seen multi-packs of the same brand side-by-side which used different codes. The first five digits of a newly-canned Yuengling product would read: 17027 (the numbers that follow are internal data).Īnheuser Busch switched to a best before date for Budweiser and Bud Light but still uses two different born on formats for its other brands: DDMMMYY (27JAN17) or YYDDD (17027). Like it or not, some version of a Julian Calendar code system (001-365) remains in place for many breweries, usually a YYDDD or DDDY format. It's my money and I'm deserving of beer as fresh as possible. Sometimes in life things only get better if enough people complain.
If I see a date and it is old (singles can linger on the shelves a long time), I notify the retailer and distributor. As a rule of thumb, I don't buy beer if I don't see a date unless I can purchase it directly at the brewery. Molson Coors is the gold standard - a simple MMMDDYY format "best before/pull" date (JAN2717) which is usually very legible on the bottom of the can and multi-pack container if applicable.Ĭraft beer brewers could do a much better job in this area (one shouldn't have to drink the bottle first or be a detective and get a magnifying glass searching for a mystery code hiding somewhere).īeer is a perishable food product and should have a clearly stamped "born on" or best before/pull date in an easy-to-read location (no different than milk or bread). 27, 2017) will be used in all examples except the Google Hangout anecdoteįirst off, a few things I think most beer enthusiasts would agree upon: