Surly Putting Darkness Day On Indefinite Hiatus

From Surly:

Darkness Day is over. For now, at least.

The annual celebration of our legendary Russian imperial stout is officially on hiatus. The move from Brooklyn Center to Somerset, WI, while necessary to keep it safe and create a better experience, also made it very apparent that this event needs to happen here in Minnesota. And, since the laws prohibit us from doing so, it won’t be happening.

The craft beer industry is changing, and we need to change with it. Craft breweries outside of our state are growing through more options to sell beer, including directly to their customers. These opportunities are limited in Minnesota.

The Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild is working to change our current laws and give consumers more choices. Currently, laws prohibit breweries that brew more than 20,000 barrels to sell growlers directly to consumers. The new bill would allow these sales, regardless of brewery size. We need to work with the Guild and our local legislators toward this end, hoping to give craft beer drinkers this option.

Put plainly: We want to sell Darkness bottles for you to take home from the Destination Brewery. Once we can, Darkness Day will return to Minnesota at our Destination Brewery.

Surly Nation changed the law before. It’s time to do it again. Even with change, some traditions will remain: We’ll keep brewing Darkness, a local artist will design the bottles (see below), you’ll find Darkness in local liquor stores, and we’ll continue to raise a toast with all of you. Cheers.

READ ABOUT THE BILL

You may have seen that we’re putting Darkness Day on hiatus. Our reasons are here. Our goal is to resurrect it at our Minneapolis brewery when it’s legal to do so.

The Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild is working to change our current laws and give consumers more choices. Currently, laws prohibit breweries that brew more than 20,000 barrels to sell things like growlers or 750 mL bottles of Darkness directly to consumers. The new bill would allow these sales, regardless of brewery size. We need to work with the Guild and our local legislators toward this end, hoping to give craft beer drinkers this option.

If you’re interested in helping (and judging from social media, you are), here’s how:

• Attend the Rally at the Rotunda on March 3rd.
  

• Contact your local legislator. Be thoughtful. Don’t be a dick.
  

• Share your support on social media.
  

• Get your fellow craft beer fans involved.

Thank you, and we look forward to seeing you at the Capitol on March 3rd!