Quality and shelf life are very important to us here at New Belgium.
Fun fact: we were actually one of the first breweries to print best-by dates on our beer!
We have unique best-by dates chosen for each brand based on several factors, including raw materials, alcohol content, consumer studies, and our expert taste panel data.
If you are unsure where to look to find the best-by dates, we can help you
here!
Why best-by dates and not born-on/packaged on dates?
We
choose to print best-by dates for transparency and ease for our customers. We want you to be confident you are getting fresh product so you can focus on enjoying the beer instead of deciphering confusing codes.
We decided against born-on dates in favor of best-by dates because born-on dates fail to indicate how long you can drink your beer before
the flavor falls away from what was intended. Two weeks? Four years? You just
don’t know as a customer without knowing the recipe, panel data, brewing
process, etc.
There
is an exception though, because we will print “born on” dates with some sour
beers from our Foeder Forest. We’ve noticed those get.. well, more unique with
age and our fans have fun seeing how those beers age with the confidence that
that’s what we’ve intended!
We
have a top-notch field quality team that asks our distributors and retailers to keep our beers cold after a short display period and pull them off the shelves
by that best-by-date.
But I really like knowing when my beer was born... :(
While we stand behind the best-by dates and are confident your beer will have the intended flavors within that timeframe, we get it- and we are here to help!
Many
of our beers typically fall into different buckets of 21, 26, or 52 weeks,
whichever one ensures the freshest experience. To determine your beer's "birthday", subtract the shelf life from the best-by date!
21 weeks/4.75 months:
- Fat Tire Ale
- Voodoo Ranger IPA
- Voodoo Ranger Juicy Haze IPA
- Voodoo Ranger Imperial IPA
26 weeks/6 months:
- Voodoo Ranger Juice Force
- Voodoo Ranger Fruit Force
- Voodoo Ranger Tropic Force
- 1554 Black Lager
- Mountain Time Lager
- Accumulation IPA
- Holiday Ale
- Old Aggie
- Voodoo Ranger 1985 Mango IPA
- Dominga Grapefruit Paloma
36 weeks/9 months:
- Trippel
- Honey Orange Tripel
52 weeks/12 months:
- Voodoo Ranger Hard Charged Teas
- Wild Nectar Hard Juice
- Fruit Smash
- Voodoo Ranger Atomic Pumpkin
- Oakspire
Since we are consistently releasing new beers, if you are not seeing a brand listed above, feel free to
contact us! We will do our best to tell you the information if it is available.
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