The question is on beer drinkers’ lips as often as a foamy mustache: When is the craft beer bubble going to burst? The boom of craft brewing has led to competitive retail shelf space, attention-grabbing novelty recipes, increases in the price of basic ingredients and a growing number of cease-and-desist orders when intellectual properties bump into each other.
We saw that last problem in Wisconsin last year, when O’so Brewing faced a potential legal battle over its then-called Night Train porter. The brewery had to choose between keeping the name and only selling the beer in Wisconsin and Illinois, or continuing its plans for expansion and changing the name to comply with an unnamed company’s existing trademark. O’so changed the name (to Night Rain, a name so similar to the original, I’m still amazed it got approved by any legal advisers), and can continue with expansion plans and selling the popular beer.
I’m not business-savvy enough to tell you if any of this is evidence of a craft beer bubble about to burst. But it’s amusing that the latest case study in a crowded craft beer market is that three Wisconsin beers are all named Bubbler.
The first, at least according to beer review utility Untappd, was brewed by Plymouth Brewing Company in Plymouth, Wis. It’s a golden ale, and Plymouth brewer Joe Fillion says he started homebrewing it back in 1998 or 1999: “Bubbler was designed as an easy-drinking, blonde/cream ale with a noticeable hop profile. If I could produce it as a lager, I would do so. Currently, we don't have the chilling capacity to do lagers.”
Fillion says he began producing his Bubbler commercially in October 2013, and it was entered into Untappd in December of that year. Madison’s own Next Door Brewing Company was just opening its doors back then. Next Door recently hit retail shelves with its Bubbler beer, also a blonde ale.
“Our Bubbler beer,” says Ben Spoehr, general manager at Next Door, “is distinct in that it is a different style from the other beers, is already available in distribution, and is a year-round offering from us.” (Plymouth Brewing does not package at this time.)
But yes, there’s still a third Bubbler beer, and it's being brewed by the biggest kid on the block: New Glarus Brewing. Listed on the New Glarus release schedule online as a June debut, this Bubbler is described as a hefeweizen, or wheat beer. It should be available soon in six-packs, like, everywhere.
However, if you set your clock by the date of New Glarus’ federal trademark application — which was filed for the beer on Aug. 14, 2015 — then New Glarus has a head start. Next Door filed an application for a Wisconsin trademark on April 6 of this year. Plymouth Brewing, though, is confident that it was first in the market by a country mile.
“We are aware that we are not the only brewery trying to use the name ‘Bubbler,’” says Next Door’s Spoehr. “We have reached out to New Glarus and have spoken with Plymouth about their planned usage of the name and hope to find an amicable solution.”
Similarly, Fillion has done the legwork to keep this traffic jam from turning into road rage. “I have spoken with Deb [Carey] at New Glarus, as well as Aric [Dieter] of Next Door. We’ve had good communications regarding this issue.”
Hope and good communication are what keep situations like this from being handed over to the lawyers, but it’s still three breweries wedged in the doorway à la the Three Stooges, wriggling to be the first one through.
The competitive, bustling, increasingly high-profile craft beer scene is only going to see more of these intellectual property collisions as breweries grow and expand into new markets. But it’s nice to see friendly resolutions, like what we’re seeing so far with Bubbler. It’s the Wisconsin way.
