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The I-70 Series: Schlafly vs. Boulevard

Continued from page 2

The air-conditioning inside the van blasts as Gary Briggs, western Missouri salesman for Schlafly Beer, rolls through Kansas City. The boxy Dodge Sprinter 2500 van is painted with pint glasses and Schlaflys company slogan, The Craft Beer From Americas Beer Capital. One side has holes for tap handles that run from kegs kept inside. For maximum brand recognition, the Schlafly name has been printed backward, ambulance-style, across the hood.

"We're not that prevalent here. We're gonna be," Briggs says of Kansas City.

Briggs is the antithesis of Colgan. Not particularly flashy, he's 40, with a shaved head and the imposing build of a construction worker. With Lunar, Boulevard offers five full-time beers and four seasonals. Schlafly brews six year-rounders, seven seasonals and four more special releases for what they call "the drinking holidays." That means that if a bar owner wants a different style lager or flavored ale, chances are Schlafly offers it. Briggs was hired last September. Schlafly first announced its presence in Kansas City in 2005. Before that the company had focused on building a presence within a 100-mile radius of the Arch. Since then, they've expanded their reach to tap places in Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi.

One of the biggest hurdles for Briggs is teaching bar owners how to pronounce the brewer's name. (For the record, it's "shlaff-lee. ") In less than two years, the brewery with a tough name to pronounce has placed taps in Charlie Hooper's, Kelso's, Grinders, Waldo Pizza and the Hotel Phillips.

"The truth is, we want to be on anywhere we can get on," he says. "But this is Boulevard country — I take what I can get."

Today he has five stops to make. At World Market in Westport he heads to the back room to grease the palm of a sales manager, offering him a bottle of Export India Pale Ale for his own fridge, then a sample of Raspberry Hefeweizen. "The chicks will dig it," Briggs says of the berry flavor.

Briggs heads to Charlie Hooper's, where he gives the assistant manager a neon Schlafly sign to put up next to a Golden Tee machine because the bar previously agreed to carry his brand.

Briggs moves on to M&S Grill, where he hands Geordie Pollock, the restaurant's food and beverage director, an unfiltered wheat called No. 15 Ale. The bar has two Boulevard Wheat handles. Briggs wants one. He nods toward the bar area. "I think the duplicate Wheat handle [should go]," he says. "It just makes sense."

Pollock responds sarcastically, "What do you think about just moving all the Boulevard out? It's overplayed! It's old!"

Briggs nods seriously. Pollock stops joking. He tells Briggs he'll consider the offer.

Briggs heads downtown to Paddy O'Quigley's, dropping off more samples. Next he cruises a few blocks west to John's Big Deck. He silently appraises the place, figuring correctly that it's a blue-collar bump-and-grind spot after dark. He grabs a Raspberry Hefeweizen. Inside he spots Jimmy Monaco, a stocky manager, flipping stools. Monaco sees the bottles and stops him.

"You guys are from St. Louis, aren't you? How do you say it? Sh-a-flow-ee? Sh-ef-a-fly?"

Briggs places the Raspberry Hefeweizen on the bar. "This is our Raspberry Hefeweizen. It's our summer seasonal. It's a pretty good summer drink for the ladies."

"Like a Smirnoff Ice," Monaco says.

Gary swallows his pride and nods. Comparing beer to Smirnoff makes beer geeks cringe, but he knows plenty of women are drawn to what he calls "fruity-type drinks."

A week later Monaco calls Briggs to tell him Schlafly's Raspberry will replace Lunar. Next he learns M&S Grill will bump off a Wheat handle for Schlafly American Pale Ale. And World Market agrees to carry the Raspberry Hefeweizen. A week after that Briggs lands additional taps at three other KC watering holes.

He isn't concerned that most of the managers who have picked up Schlafly can't pronounce it. "As long as they are trying, that's all that matters," he says.

Schlafly is after the same customers that McDonald describes as serious beer drinkers. But Schlafly owner Tom Schlafly coyly claims he's not looking for a head-to-head fight. "We are definitely going after the same customers, but our approach to Kansas City is absolutely not going to be, 'Choose between us and Boulevard,'" he says. "It's more about expanding your horizons a little bit."

But when Schlafly and McDonald cross paths at Kansas City's Central Library on a late June day, that rhetoric sounds like a setup for a surprise attack.

Schlafly's in town to give a reading from his new book about his company's struggle for survival in an Anheuser-Busch-saturated market. The book is titled New Religion in Mecca: Memoir of a Renegade Brewery in St. Louis.

McDonald had agreed to introduce him. They go back. Schlafly began his company out of a brewpub in 1991, two years after McDonald founded his brewery. When Schlafly ran out of some beer styles a few weeks later, McDonald shipped him some. There has always been a bit of cross-state support.

Times have changed. As McDonald steps off the elevator into the library, he faces a full-on Schlafly sales blitz. In front of him stands a five-foot pyramid of empty Schlafly six-packs, adorned with plastic pint glasses and coasters. In a corner nearby is Briggs, offering samples of seven ales.

Standing near the bar, Briggs looks up to see McDonald, the baron of Kansas City beer. Briggs notices he is running out of everything except Wheat and Pale Ale, the Schlafly brands that directly compete with Boulevard. "People really want to try something different, which is good," Briggs concludes.

Sipping a Schlafly Pale Ale, McDonald looks confident and unflustered. He approaches Schlafly, hands him a copy of his book and asks for an autograph.

Placed along the massive wraparound bar inside Gomers liquor store in the KC suburb of Parkville is a row of short-stemmed snifter glasses, grape-embroidered towels and a metal bucket meant to act as a communal spittoon. The wine-tasting paraphernalia has been repurposed for beer. Nearby stands Jason Oliver, a 34-year-old in a black T-shirt that reads: Lord of the Beers.

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