Beer Trading for Dummies

Let’s start with the basic question…Why trade?  Ever crave a beer you know you can’t get?  Ever hear of this magical beer or brewery across the country?  Wonder how to get your hands on a bottle?  Welcome to the world of Beer Trading.

A few steps to make sure you have a first successful trade.  Make sure you research your beer.  What you claim to have and what other traders want may be entirely different.  A popular beer to you may be worth trading but not if it’s mass produced and distributed nationally.  You should decide what to look for when shopping around, a limited release beer or aged bottle will get you more interest.  Try to find a local beer in your area that has high demand but limited to your region, thus making its value to a trader 1000+ miles away that much more in demand.

 A few Beer Trading rules to follow:

1. Always research your trading partner.  Make sure you do your homework.  While most are legit, you don’t want to be the one to send your package and get nothing in return.  Besides wasting your time and money, it has left you wanting nothing else to do with trading.  Ask other group members for insight and the who’s who of the group.  But as a first time trader, you want to make sure you send what you promise or its your reputation on the line when the next trader does their homework on you.
2. Understand the lingo.
   F/T – For trade, what you have to offer
   ISO – What you are looking for.  Either specific beers or types of beer.
3. Packaging.  Don’t be cheap.  Make sure you properly package the product.  Separate sealed bags for each bottle just in case a bottle would break.  As you may not know, shipping beers is illegal so you do not want your package to stick out if a bottle were to break.  Make sure you use lot’s of bubble wrap and a sturdy box taped up well.  Make sure each bottle is well secured.  Last thing you need is to be flagged by Fed Ex or UPS.
4.  If you have a successful trade, make sure you post that it went well and that you would recommend the trader for other users
5.  Enjoy those hard to get beers!

By Sam Kheir