“Columbia Heights Giant is running a great beer special”

by Prince Of Petworth April 19, 2017 at 10:00 am 75 Comments

Giant special

hahaha thanks to Leslie for sending us a shot of the famed bag of beers now back at the Columbia Heights Giant! Good deal or not?

NH Ave Hiker

meh the beers look pretty crappy (except for maybe Yuengling). It’s an ok deal, nothing special though.
- Q
  
  Fixed it for you: meh the beers look pretty crappy, including Yuengling. It’s an ok deal, nothing special though
  - NH Ave Hiker
    
    You people are acting way too pretentious with your beer choices.
jaseguy30

1 Pilsner Urquell and 7 economy beers? Nope.
Leeran

This is one of the weirder things done at a weird Giant. Like a bad, worse version of a make-your-own 6 pack.
- Truxton Thomas
  
  Isn’t this a direct result of make-your-own six-pack? I figured this was from leftover beers.
HaileUnlikely

No deal. On the other hand, shortly after this Giant started offering some limited selection of craft beers (maybe around 2008 or so), I once spotted a 4-pack of Boulevard Brewing Company’s “Sixth Glass” Quadrupel Ale on the shelf, but with no price. I brought it up to the register, the cashier scanned it, and it wasn’t in the system. The cashier was absolutely certain that it was supposed to cost $6.99. I did not complain. Anywhere else it would have been about $13..99. In retrospect, I’m pretty sure somebody had bought it elsewhere, carried it in while grocery shopping, and accidentally set it down and left it behind, as I have not seen that beer at Giant since then, and I’m reasonably certain it was never supposed to be offered for $6.99 (on the other hand, that was pure profit for Giant, as they [most likely unknowningly] sold me something that wasn’t even theirs).
MadMax

Terrible deal.
KenyonDweller

You couldn’t pay me to drink any of those, with the possible exception of Pilsner Urquell, which is so low in alcohol I’ll occasionally drink it when I’m too drunk for anything with flavor.
- HaileUnlikely
  
  I’d drink the Shock Top, but this would effectively be paying $6 for a Shock Top, i.e., bar prices at the supermarket. Pass.
- NH Ave Hiker
  
  Except they’re pretty much all the same beer as the Pilsner Urquell…
  - KenyonDweller
    
    Wrong.
dcgator

Uh, definitely a good deal. Sure, everyone wants a microbrew or whatevs, but cent-for-cent, this is a good deal. That’s 75 cents per beer. A Yuengling in DC at the Giant is probably $1.50 each based on a six pack likely being $8.99. Same for Heineken, except that would likely be $9.99 for a six-pack. So, money-wise, good deal. Beer snob-wise, of course not.
- HaileUnlikely
  
  If we look at it that way, it’s not a decent price; neither a steal nor a ripoff. Comparable beers at 75 cents per can/bottle are readily available if buying larger quantities – this let’s you get the unit price of a 24-pack without buying a 24-pack.
  - dcgator
    
    “…this let’s (sic) you get the unit price of a 24-pack without buying a 24-pack,” e.g., a good deal! P.S. I’ve never seen a 24-pack of Heineken, or any kind of pack where Heineken would come out to 75 cents per bottle/can.
    - HaileUnlikely
      
      Not sure about Heineken, but Coors, Yuengling, and similar are always $18 or $19 at the store I usually go to. Also, please accept my profuse apologies for my typo. It was completely unacceptable. I will strive to ensure that it never happens again ;)
- west_egg
  
  $8.99 for a six-pack of Yuengling??? GTFO.
  - dcgator
    
    I may have been off on what it goes for at Giant, but unless the Yuengling six-pack is $4.50, this still constitutes “a good deal.”
FrankFrankly

I can take home eight beers for the price of one draft at a bar? Sure, yeah. Deal.
NH Ave Hiker

No love for Yuengling?
- FridayGirl
  
  Nope.
- d
  
  Garbage beer.
  - NH Ave Hiker
    
    I wouldn’t call it garbage. For a mass-produced lager I think it’s one of the best.
    - KenyonDweller
      
      Budweiser (not Bud Lite) is my go-to mass produced beer on airplanes and other places where drinking is necessary and choices are few.
- KenyonDweller
  
  Disgusting.
- welshie
  
  I didn’t used to have a problem with Yuengling, but the company publicly supports the current president so I’m no longer buying their beer. Apparently the boycott isn’t working, but it makes me feel better.
  
  It’s a good deal if you can open the bags and exchange the “bad” beers for the better ones. I remember doing this a couple times at Giant- exchanging the Mickeys for Tecate, Dos Equis, etc… but it looks like they’ve wised up and sealed the bags. darn.
  - Michael Pierce
    
    I stopped buying Yuengling years ago when they busted the union, but this decision by the Yuengling family guarantees that I’ll never support them again.
    - HaileUnlikely
      
      Ditto. (If somebody else buys and offers me one, I’m not going to refuse it and give them a lecture, but I’m with you on not buying it)
  - eggs
    
    Yep we stopped buying Yuengling after that happened last year too. I do miss it sometimes. Mr. Eggs is more adamant about this than me, obviously.
  - TJ
    
    I dunno, in DC its getting bagged up with other trash and resold to the unwitting.
- Tad Cautious
  
  Without a doubt, the worst beer on planet earth.
stacksp

Pretty decent deal for your beer fridge or when you have company over and dont want them drinking up all your good stuff. Not to mention, one of these bags are cheaper than a draft at a bar. Take a bag of these to the park while the kids run around
- samanda_bynes
  
  my kinda parent!
- Anonamom
  
  Only if you pour it into a coffee to-go cup first! Although I tend to prefer sangria in mine.
- dcd
  
  “you have company over and dont want them drinking up all your good stuff.”
  .
  Hmm, I typically like my guests, and go out of my way to serve them decent food and drink. Though you do have a point with relatives – once, when we ran out of the large format Yellow Tail bottles my mother in law drinks, she suggested we open a bottle I’d been saving that was . . . well, it was a different price point. I couldn’t very well say, “that bottle’s way too good for you!”, so I just gulped, poured it for her, and vowed never to make that mistake again.
  - stacksp
    
    Your scenario is the ideal situation that would be easily diverted to the cheap stuff lol
MHR

They’ve been doing this for at least a year now. The only time I bought in was last year during the snowstorm when there were few other options!
L

Boy everybody is sooooooooo too good for everything huh? You’re the same people I have to stand behind in the self-checkout line while you huff and sigh loudly and whisper “jesus ****ing christ” because there are 10 people in line ahead of you. Sorry you have to wait what will turn out to be 6 exaggeratedly frantic minutes to get on with your fragile privileged existence. You could live in this neighborhood for a decade and you would still look as hideously out of place in the real world as you do now. Enjoy your craft beer and your superiority complex. Having some money and coming from somewhere else don’t make you better than anyone.
- please have a beer
  
  You sound like a lot of fun!
- skj84
  
  People like what they like. I’m not going to spend my money on crap beer, even if its a good deal. I’d rather pay more for a case that I will enjoy. Nothing wrong with that. Maybe you should give craft beer a chance. It really isn’t that elitist to enjoy, in fact you are supporting local/small businesses when you do so, instead of corporations that produce macrobrews. And most of them are pretty damn tasty.
  - LittleBluePenguin
    
    All very good points. Sadly I suspect L is only interested in making everything fit his/her preconceived narrative about the people around him/her, so I’m not sure how much of it will be absorbed, but I 100% agree with you.
- Anon
  
  You’re upset that people have preferences different from your own? Life must be really tough.
- anonymous
  
  From my experience working in a grocery store, it’s not the nitpicky craft beer buyers who “huff and sigh loudly” in line.
- dcd
  
  ” Having some money and coming from somewhere else don’t make you better than anyone.”
  .
  Of course not. It does mean I have better taste in beer, however.
- FridayGirl
  
  Wow.
AnonV2

It seems every 6-8 weeks Safeways around town have Founder’s All Day IPA for $15.99 (occasionally $14.99, I’ve seen it as low as $13.99) for their 15-packs of cans. That’s about the best consistent around-a-buck-a-beer deal I’ve seen and perfect as a standby beer in the fridge for guests or parties.

A liquor store when I was in college got rid of their random left overs in this jury rigged contraption that dispensed one bottle at a time from a hidden hopper. One out of every dozen beers or so was something good-to-great; this was a long time ago, so it might be something like Sierra Nevada Bigfoot or a Pyramid (remember them???) or pre-sell-out Red Hook IPA. The rest was macro junk, probably skunked imports or local swill. You paid $4 a 6-pack and drew the beers one at a time and ended up with a surprise mix in the end. Not even sure that was legal, but it was entertaining!
- eggs
  
  Double check the dates on those All Day IPAs, they’re likely getting marked down when they’re hitting a few months out from being produced (which is about the death time for a good IPA).
  - AnonV2
    
    Trust me, I’ve checked. This is fresh stock, probably bought in corporate quantity for a quick sale. They do the same thing for almost all Sierra Nevada products, too. They’ve had 12 packs of Celebration 2 weeks out of the brewery on sale for under $16. You’re not going to find anything rare there, but they usually can’t be beat for some of the larger “micros”: Sierra Nevada, Flying Dog, Lagunitas, Dogfish, occasionally Bell’s, etc.
    - HaileUnlikely
      
      Thanks for the tip. I got a 12-pack of Sierra Nevada for $16 at Safeway last weekend but figured I just got lucky.
- maxwell smart
  
  Hot take: IPA is gross and tastes like what I imagine urine tastes like.
  - dcd
    
    I could not agree more. Sadly, we are in the significant minority.
    - Anon
      
      Why sadly? There’s a plethora of other styles from a wide variety of breweries. I don’t understand your feigned resignation.
    - NH Ave Hiker
      
      That’s why there is chocolate and vanilla
    - Anon
      
      To add – west coast IPA’s have long been out of style among the cognoscenti. It’s been all about the sours as of late.
      - FridayGirl
        
        Lol, I noticed that too. And the sours make my stomach hurt. #thanksbutnothanks
      - maxwell smart
        
        That’s even worse. #catpiss
      - Anon
        
        I get the distinct sense that you’re not into drinking urine. Noted.
    - maxwell smart
      
      More so in the summer. July-PA is the worst. Sorry not sorry, I’ll drink dark beer in the summer., thank you very much.
      - Anon
        
        Cool story, bro?
  - HaileUnlikely
    
    I like some of the milder ones, e.g., Bells Two Hearted Ale (snobs will debate whether that is a legit IPA or not), Dogfish Head 60-Minute IPA, and similar, but not ones stronger/hoppier than those.
    - LittleBluePenguin
      
      Yeah, there are a few milder ones like the ones you list that are ok, but otherwise, I’m with Maxwell, I’ll still take a good cold porter in the summer than the vast majority of IPAs
      - Anonymous
        
        I’ll take a good cold porter only when all the rest of the beer in the world is gone.
      - maxwell smart
        
        Sounds like LBP and myself will already have drank all the delicious cold porter before you can even get to it! Prost!
  - stacksp
    
    WRONG !!!!!
    
    IPAs are delicious. How can you not like a dogfish 90 or 120 min IPA?
PetworthGuy

They might be terrible beers (to some)…..but good deal. Any 6 pack of those alone (coors, heineken, or even a busch light/natty light) would cost $6. So I see this as a deal for someone who would normally drink those anyway… 2 extra for free basically.
- dcgator
  
  Yap.
illinoisandjefferson

you deserve to be charged double if you think this is a deal. literally some of the worst beer ever.
- PetworthGuy
  
  the questions was never if the beers were good or not…..it asked if it was a good deal for THOSE beers
  - FridayGirl
    
    +1.
    - victoria
      
      Seriously??? Cheap bags of beers gets 62 posts? Just move on people. Plenty of cheap beer always available. $6.00 pint of Velicoff if you just need a buzz.
      - PetworthGuy
        
        oh the hypocrisy.
        “Seriously??? Cheap bags of beers gets 62 posts?”
        **continues to comment on said post**
      - Anon
        
        But how does that make you feel, really?
Lanphes

Bought two of these sacks this afternoon. 7 beers in each one.
- FridayGirl
  
  Now that’s a rip-off. Liars!
Winston

Actually the store now has a big local beer section and has significantly increased the beers they carry. Also they have Shock Top 12pks for 7.99 and Goose seasonal for 4.99 a 6pk. There seems to be new management or something.

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