{"id":4937,"date":"2012-07-26T22:17:00","date_gmt":"2012-07-26T10:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/?p=4937"},"modified":"2012-08-01T13:33:42","modified_gmt":"2012-08-01T01:33:42","slug":"porter-noir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2012\/07\/26\/porter-noir\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Porter Noir’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Monteith's<\/a>
Monteith’s ‘Single Source’; the only one of their beers in my Diary<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So Monteith’s \u2014 i.e., D.B.<\/a> (i.e., Asia Pacific Breweries<\/a>) \u2014 has re-commissioned the Greymouth brewery<\/a> that they, in a near-unprecedented display of tin-eared-ness, originally decided to close back in 2001. It was essentially a museum for several years, but they’ve decided to spark it up again, to produce a range of (self-described) craft beers throughout the year. The first out the doors were, apparently an unfiltered apricot wheat beer and an IPA, which I really will have to try because a) the apricot wheat\u00a0thing<\/em> from their rival Speight’s (i.e.,\u00a0Lion<\/em>)\u00a0still reigns as the worst beer I’ve ever tasted (and I don’t\u00a0imagine for a moment the problem was merely that it, unlike this new one, was filtered), and b) a quote-unquote “IPA” from the company who make\u00a0Tui<\/em><\/a> could frankly be\u00a0anything.<\/em> They freely use those initials on a New Zealand Draught \/ Amber Lager, after all, so who knows<\/em> whatever-the-fuck they’ve just made in Greymouth. A company so apparently-unafraid of the Consumer Guarantees and Fair Trading Acts could’ve put\u00a0anything<\/em> in a bottle with that on the label; a saison, an actual<\/em>\u00a0radler \u2014 or\u00a0apple juice<\/em>, or 330ml of rainbows. I am, I’ll admit, morbidly curious.<\/p>\n

But most interesting to the local craft beer community \u2014 the real<\/em> one \u2014 is the news that they’ll be releasing a “porter noir”. A few seconds with The Google will confirm that basically no-one has used that phrase in regards beer other than the much-loved Hallertau brewpub outside Auckland. And there’s very good reason for that: “noir” (i.e., “black”<\/a>) is ordinarily redundant<\/em> if you’re talking porter \u2014 they’re\u00a0already<\/em> black (or at least very-dark-brown). Hallertau’s offering is aged in Pinot Noir<\/em> barrels, so for them, it’s an instance of the longstanding pun \/ portmanteau tradition in beer naming. For the record, I freakin’ adore Hallertau’s “Porter Noir”; you should try it, if you haven’t, and I’m frankly rather embarrassed it’s not in my Diary<\/em>. Since the barrels retain plenty of wine flavours and are dosed with \/ already home to\u00a0Brettanomyces<\/a><\/em>, the beer acquires a gorgeously tart-and-funky character. I recently had a sample from a two-year-old bottle, and it ages\u00a0stupendously<\/em> well.<\/p>\n

\"Hallertau<\/a>
Hallertau Saison (from sufficiently long-ago that the photo was taken with my old camera — my new one would’ve managed the focus considerably better than this; sorry)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What, though, could the name mean to Monteith’s \/ D.B.? Like I said,\u00a0noir is redundant<\/em>. Unless, perhaps, you’re intentionally tweaking Hallertau.4<\/sup> Despite the beer being produced for several years now, the phrase was never registered as a trademark \u2014 and I’d be up for arguing<\/a> that a good sign of the health of a\u00a0real<\/em> craft brewery lies in the paucity of their trademark portfolio \u2014 although it seems they’ve applied\u00a0today<\/em>.1\u00a0<\/sup>During what is surely by now known as The Radler Fiasco, one of the often-overlooked little titbits was that D.B. also<\/em> held the trademark on “Saison”, a word which is just as straightforwardly an unregistrable style term as “radler” ever was.2<\/sup>\u00a0Surprisingly sensibly<\/a>, they quietly abandoned the mark and entirely neglected to take a swipe at Hallertau for producing a saison \u2014 and calling it such \u2014 while D.B. “owned” the word.3<\/sup> Maybe they’ve held a grudge all this time, and this is their petty little way of having the last word years later, like some insufficiently-witty sap who thinks of the perfect sharp-tongued comeback in the car on the way home<\/em>.\u00a0This should be\u00a0fascinating<\/em> to watch play out. Pass the popcorn \u2014 and the Porter Noir.<\/p>\n

Finally, on a Small World \/ Personal History note, I recently discovered that the current brand manager for Monteith’s is a former colleague of mine from way back in my first-ever bar job, a decade and a half ago. We haven’t spoken since, but I do like the weirdness of both of us winding up \u2014 via long and circuitous arcs \u2014 in different (and, let’s face it, opposed<\/em>) corners of the the beer business. Perhaps it’s time for a catch-up.<\/p>\n

Epilogue, 31 July:<\/strong> Hallertau put up a message on Twitter today<\/a>, saying D.B. have claimed that they didn’t realise the name “Porter Noir” was in use and were undertaking to take the\u00a0N-<\/em>word (so to speak) off the label \u2014 after Beervana.<\/p>\n

D.B.\u2019s undertaking as to timing is, for a start, a dick move. The beer hasn’t been released yet, so the good-form thing to do upon discovering an innocent mistake like this (taking them, provisionally, at their word) is to re-do the labels\u00a0anyway<\/em>. That’s precisely what the Yeastie Boys did when it was brought to their attention that the\u00a0planned logo for a new company, Hops Valley<\/a>, was coincidentally rather-similar to the one they’d had designed<\/a> for Gunnamatta<\/a>. This case is even plainer, because\u00a0Porter Noir has existed for ages.<\/em><\/p>\n

Which, if you think about it, is the bigger problem for D.B.. Their claim of innocence in the matter of standing all over an existing product is equivalent to an admission of\u00a0complete cluelessness<\/em> in the business of craft beer \u2014\u00a0Porter Noir has existed for ages<\/em>. There really isn’t a middle path, no way for D.B. \/ Monteith’s to chart a course between Badness and Dumbness without touching the sides. Since Badness tends to be more legally actionable, it’s not surprising which bank they veered towards, but it’s a revealing ‘resolution’ to the #porternoirsaga<\/a> all the same.<\/p>\n

It’s a sprawling enough organisation that they’ll always be able to piece together plausible deniability, but \u2014 given their history of brandwank, distortion and the potential relevance of the old “Saison” trademark \u2014 I remain unconvinced.<\/p>\n

Post-epilogue, 1 August:<\/strong> There’s a really good write-up of the whole affair in today’s paper<\/a>. Beer-related stories are still all-too-often abysmally written and under-researched, but that piece is fair, goes into enough background, and doesn’t shy away from pointing out how embarrassing this is \/ should be for D.B..<\/p>\n

But I just can’t agree that the answer to this kind of drama is\u00a0more trademarks<\/em>. It’d be unrealistic and would amount to a nagging disincentive if breweries large and small were expected to pay IPONZ (and probably a lawyer) each time they came up with a new beer\u00a0\u2014 and if everything was filed that way, we’d quickly amass a back-catalogue of untouchable but rusting and unused names pointlessly locked away or worse, we’d encourage speculative registration-squatting and name hoarding.<\/p>\n

It is\u00a0absolutely not<\/em> Steve Plowman’s fault that D.B. were poised to steal his beer’s name, inadvertently or not; he’s\u00a0way<\/em> too generous in saying that, to the point where I hope he doesn’t believe it and is just exercising restraint and being political \u2014\u00a0which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, in moderation. The Google isn’t hard to use, and someone at D.B. \/ Monteith’s should’ve exercised the merest possible give-a-damn and\u00a0checked<\/em>. And if they did find Hallertau’s beer, or\u00a0did<\/em> already know about it, the fact it was unregistered shouldn’t matter. Civil behaviour, even in business, isn’t complicated: don’t be a dick<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

1:<\/strong> The website for IPONZ<\/a> (the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand) is fatally and inexcusably stupid in the way it ‘times out’ your session and doesn’t allow the bookmarking or linking of individual reports. But if you go and search “Porter Noir”, you’ll find a submission dated 26 July 2012<\/a>\u00a0(i.e.,\u00a0today<\/em>) from “Pacific Brew Limited”, which seems to be the official company name for Hallertau<\/a>.<\/span>
\n2:<\/strong> In the main run, spirit and original intent of trademark law<\/a>, at least. And, you know, in my own honest opinion<\/a>. Ahem.<\/span>
\n3:<\/strong> IPONZ, in their history of the mark, note that it was cancelled per an email of 7 September 2009<\/a>. That photo, above, is of a Hallertau Saison I was drinking in July of that year.<\/span>
\n4:<\/strong> It belatedly occurs to me \u2014 he says, writing on the 27th, hence the out-of-sequence footnote \u2014 that I should explicitly allow for the possibility that Monteith’s are also planning to Pinot-up their porter. I discounted that in my initial run of writing, assuming (perhaps too generously) that a) the newspaper write-up would’ve leapt all over \/ at least mentioned a detail like that and b) there just hasn’t been\u00a0time<\/em> to barrel something out of the new brewery \u2014\u00a0but then: this<\/em> company might be willing to simply dose the beer with Barrel Essence and a goon-bag of Dollar-store Pinot Flavoured Wine Substitute (he says, firmly in the spirit of satire, if the lawyers are still reading). Then it just becomes a question of whether they’re intentionally tweaking Hallertau by lifting the name, whether they’re sufficiently-removed from the real craft beer scene that they’d never heard of it (Dux de Lux, for example, Pinot’ed a porter and called it “Pinot Porter”; other names\u00a0are<\/em> possible), or whether it really was an honest mistake and they’ll now\u00a0\u2014 Hallertau have written to them to arrange a meeting next week<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 back down. Given D.B.\u2019s history, they’ll have to just excuse me if I can’t be so generous as to assume the latter is the case.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So Monteith’s \u2014 i.e., D.B. (i.e., Asia Pacific Breweries) \u2014 has re-commissioned the Greymouth brewery that they, in a near-unprecedented display of tin-eared-ness, originally decided to close back in 2001. It was essentially a museum for several years, but they’ve decided to spark it up again, to produce a range of (self-described) craft beers throughout … Continue reading ‘Porter Noir’<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blahblah"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2791,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2011\/05\/13\/monteiths-single-source\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":0},"title":"Monteith’s ‘Single Source’","author":"Phil","date":"May 13, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Once more unto the brandwank, dear friends, once more. -- Not quite Henry V This one positively reeks of being a project out of the marketing department rather than one with its origins in the brain of a brewer, beer drinker, or normal person. At the time I'm putting this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Monteith's 'Single Source'","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Monteiths-Single-Source-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7154,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2014\/04\/25\/monteiths-american-pale-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":1},"title":"Monteith’s “American Pale Ale”","author":"Phil","date":"April 25, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Over the decade I've been taking handwritten notes of my beer-drinking experiences, I have inevitably developed an idiosyncratic Style Guide.1\u00a0Broadly \u2014 though there are exceptions early on as the pattern developed, and sporadically throughout as I either forgot my own practice or thought of\u00a0some now-lost rationalisation for a variance in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Monteith's \"American Pale Ale\" (My house, 18 March 2014)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Monteiths-American-Pale-Ale.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Monteiths-American-Pale-Ale.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Monteiths-American-Pale-Ale.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":18004,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2016\/03\/29\/beer-diary-podcast-s05e05\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":2},"title":"Beer Diary Podcast s05e05: Crowd, Fun, Ding","author":"Phil","date":"March 29, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Damn these recurrent hiatuses. It happened again, as these things do. But we're back this week \u2014 rather fittingly, after the long weekend \u2014 with a little look at crowdfunding in the beer business, some reminiscences over my marvellous trip to the Mussel Inn, and looking forward to the Great\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Podcast episodes"","block_context":{"text":"Podcast episodes","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/podcast-episodes\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Mussel Inn tap bank, plus miscellany","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Mussel-Inn-Taps-and-chaos-150x150.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":449,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2008\/10\/03\/james-squires-ipa-grand-ridge-hatlifter-stout\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":3},"title":"James Squires IPA & Grand Ridge ‘Hatlifter’ Stout","author":"Phil","date":"October 3, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"In this, the first double-whammy entry, mine is the IPA. It's a tasty, mild brew which is still very-definitely an IPA. It's gently hoppy (Fuggly, to be specific) and nicely malty, and is a perfect Gateway Beer to introduce people to pale ales. I do like the Squires beers. On\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"James Squires IPA & Grand Ridge 'Hatlifter' Stout","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/James-Squires-IPA-Grand-Ridge-Hatlifter-Stout-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3682,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2012\/05\/07\/the-chosen-one-choosing\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":4},"title":"The ‘Chosen One’ Choosing","author":"Phil","date":"May 7, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"'Boundary Road Brewery' needs scare-quotes around it, because it's not properly a\u00a0thing. It's a sub-brand of Independent Liquor, who were recently acquired by Japanese supergiant Asahi, and they're trying to position themselves as a \"craft brewer\" alongside the pseudo-craft imprints of D.B. and Lion (i.e., Monteith's and Mac's)1\u00a0and elbow their\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Choosing the 'Chosen One', blind","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Boundary-Road-The-Chosen-One-tasting-session-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5301,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2012\/11\/21\/crafty-beggars\/","url_meta":{"origin":4937,"position":5},"title":"Crafty Beggars","author":"Phil","date":"November 21, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"It is, apparently, Brandwank Monsoon Season. At least I won't suffer for material.1\u00a0As was spotted by the eagle eye of Dominic (from Hashigo Zake) some months ago in the Trademark Registry, \"Crafty Beggars\" is a new brand \/ imprint \/ stealth-fake-brewery2 from one half of the local duopoly, Lion. And\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Crafty Beggars bottles","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Crafty-Beggars-bottles-300x168.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4937"}],"version-history":[{"count":55,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4984,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4937\/revisions\/4984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}