Witte, Lauter, Noel, Holl, & Crouch on 2020 Part 1

<p>Looking back on 2020, one of the things I miss most is getting together with other folks in the beer industry, trading gossip and news, arguing a bit, and laughing over beers. Back in March, right before the long quarantine set in, my partner <a href="https://www.beeredge.com/our-team/">John Holl</a> and I traveled up to Portland, Maine to speak at a beer conference. On the night before the conference, John and I hit up some of our favorite breweries around Portland, including Allagash where we ran into draft beer genius and longtime industry stalwart, <a href="https://www.tapstar.org/about-tapstar">Neil Witte</a>, who was also speaking the next day. We headed back into town, where we met up with fellow beer writer, <a href="https://thelautertun.com/">Carla Jean Lauter</a>, at Novare Res. We debated, argued, and celebrated beer for hours before retiring to a local dive bar for round after round of karaoke. It turned out to the last real night out that any of us have had this year. </p><p>In this conversation, John and I get the gang back together, with Neil and Carla joining us. We’ve also invited our buddy <a href="https://www.joshnoel.net/">Josh Noel</a> of the Chicago Tribune back on the show. Josh is the author of the excellent, Barrel Aged Stout and Selling Out about the sale of Goose Island to Anheuser-Busch InBev. Folks, Christmas is coming up and this book makes a great holiday gift for your loved ones. </p><p>Carla is a beer writer based just outside of Portland, Maine, and the creator of the <a href="https://thelautertun.com/?p=5">Is This Beer Name Idea Ok?</a>, a flowchart that may save your brewery some serious social media fallout. And Neil is a Master Cicerone, a former Draft Quality Ambassador for the Brewers Association, and independent draft specialist and owner of TapStar.</p><p>We'll have part two of this conversation available in our next episode.</p><p>For more information on the <a href="http://www.beeredge.com/podcasts/">Beer Edge Podcast</a>, follow us on Twitter <a href="https