Hoff-Stevens kegs are becoming rare breed - Weekly Specialty Beer Report - Brief Article

Modern Brewery Age, Sept 2, 2002

AP--It was 1994 and Yards Brewing Co. of Philadelphia, PA, needed to keep costs down. So the fledgling microbrewery began shipping its ales, porters and stouts in old-fashioned metal beer barrels. They were dinged and dented, but cheap.

The microbrewing craze gave the Hoff-Stevens keg--the once-ubiquitous beer barrel--a new lease on life. The old-style kegs could be bought for $5 to $10 each, perfect for small brewers trying to reduce overhead. Now, even the micros are abandoning the Hoff-Stevens in favor of the straightsided Sankey, and the metal beer barrel is becoming a thing of the past.

There are no reliable statistics on the number of Hoff-Stevens barrels still in circulation, but organizers of the Great American Beer Festival see their numbers dwindling. About 95% of the 1,200 beers on tap now come from Sankey kegs, said Paul Gatza, director of the Institute of Brewing Studies, the festival's organizer. A few years ago, about a third were still Hoff-Stevens.

Hoff-Stevens kegs are no longer made and the old ones are wearing out. But in their heyday from the 1 940s through the 1970s, countless numbers were rolled into dormitory rooms and fraternity houses, backyard barbecues and neighborhood taverns.

The Hoff-Stevens has two holes, one on the side for filling and another on top for tapping. Once filled, a wooden "bung," or cap, has to be pounded into the side hole. If the keg wasn't tapped just so, beer would shoot all over the place.

Most large breweries abandoned the Hoff-Stevens in the late 1970s and '80s, switching to the sleeker Sankey because it was easier to fill, easier to clean and easier to transport. And because there was no bung to drive home, the breweries could save money on labor. Plus the Sankey has handles, unlike the Hoff-Stevens,

"This is a technological improvement," said Gregg Smith, manager of Idaho Brewing Co. in Idaho Falls, Idaho. "Nobody missed the old handcrank starters on the car, either."

Yet for all its flaws, the Hoff-Stevens allowed small startups like Yards to devote money to expansion. The brewery, which sells beer in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland, has grown so much that it's had to move twice to larger buildings.

D.G. Yuengling & Son Inc., the nation's oldest brewery, decided to keep its Hoff-Stevens kegs rather than invest millions in the newer Sankey model. That allowed Yuengling to build a new brewery.

The old kegs are durable--and well-traveled. In Yards' Philadelphia brewery is a 1969 keg from Schlitz Brewing Co., a 1948 barrel from Berghoff Brewing Co. and a 1973 model from Carling Brewing Co. All will be put back into service. Still, these warhorses are nearly worn out. For every 100 kegs filled by Yards, two or three leak.

Yards v.p. Bill Barton predicts the brewery will switch to the Sankey keg by the end of the year. Yuengling is also planning to switch. "Wholesalers are reluctant to take the Hoff-Stevens," Barton said. "Bars don't want them because they want uniformity. They want it to be easy."