by Jeff Ramberg
This is the publication version of the presentation, which Igave on the topic at the last meeting. The entry forms to which I referare available from me; they also are printed in the Winter issue ofZymurgy magazine, along with the official AHA category and subcategorydescriptions (another reason to become a member of AHA!).
With so many brewers kegging these days, it may be worth sayingthat a homebrew submission for competition must be in bottled form. Thebottles should be 10 to 14 ounces in volume, in either green or brownglass, and free of any label or inking or raised lettering. Anylettering on the bottle cap should be obliterated with black magicmarker. Grolsch type caps are not acceptable.
The entry form is filled out and rubber-banded to one of the bottles.Here is where you will want to review the specific rules of thecompetition. AHA competitions seem to be fairly lenient in that theentry form may be completed in pencil and only one bottle is requiredfor the first round. At the risk of appearing presumptuous, I wouldsend the total of four bottles required for first and second rounds tosave the hassle of having to make a second shipment.
AHA entry forms request less information than you might think.For instance, they don't (at least, not at this stage) want to know yourlist of ingredients and processing steps. Apart from things like name,address and memberships in beer clubs and/or AHA, they will only want toknow into which category and subcategory you want your brew entered.Give this the proper attention because the judges will grade your entryaccording to the standards of the classification that you say it is; notthe (sub) category the judge thinks it more properly belongs to. Atsome point, somebody is going to want your recipe. Hopefully it will bewhen you receive notice from AHA that you won the "Hail to Ale"competition. But even if it is only a request from a fellow FSB member,you will want to keep track of your ingredients and how you used them;i.e., keep fairly detailed notes as to your recipe.
As for packaging, there are no AHA imposed rules. But you willwant to pack so four bottles can endure the rigors of parcel handling.This means lots of appropriately placed packing material. What worksmost excellently is the box and molded Styrofoam that outfits likeBeer-of-the-Month club use to ship their wares. When shipping, pleasebear in mind that U.S. Postal regulations prohibit the mailing ofalcoholic beverages. To my knowledge, yeast samples are OK. Also,certain private parcel services like UPS have their own company policiesagainst shipping alcoholic beverages. So if you want to avoid gettinginto extended, impassioned arguments that your entry is not an alcoholicbeverage, don't draw unnecessary attention to your package by having thebottles clanging around inside, or attaching stickers to the outsidesaying things like "Beer-Handle with Care".
One final note. When using the U.S. Postal System, you can saveyourself considerable money if your shipment can go by Priority Mailrather than Express Mail. Priority Mail is not guaranteed to arrive in2 days, but when mailing to another mid-Atlantic destination, 2 days isa pretty good bet. Also, (and this goes for mailing anything) if itabsolutely, positively needs a postmark NOW, the U.S. Post Office at thePhiladelphia Airport NEVER closes. Exit as though you were going to thePark-n-Jet, but drive around it to the right, proceed about a mile, andthe Post Office is on the left. One of the few career "war stories" Ihave is that this bit of knowledge came in handy late in the evening ofJune 7, 1995. We had several patent applications to file and they hadto have a June 7 postmark. All local post offices had closed for theday. But for the Philadelphia Airport post office, I would have had todrive those documents to Washington D.C. that evening for hand deliveryat the U.S. Patent Office.
