A pickle Gose is one of the most popular beers in the country.
In 2021, Martin House Brewing Company’s Best Maid Sour Pickle Beer is going to sell about $2.5 million in Texas chain stores, as tracked by market research company IRI. For context, that single brand is selling as much as entire brewery portfolios from the likes of West Sixth Brewing, Sun King Brewing, and Urban South Brewery in similar stores.
It’s not out of the ordinary for out-of-the-ordinary beers to find success as limited or seasonal releases, but Best Maid Sour Pickle Beer is on another level. And as Martin House’s co-founder and brewmaster Cody Martin explained this year on the Beer Edge podcast, it’s all very on-brand. Martin and his team partner with Texas institution Best Maid Pickles, which delivers 18-wheelers full of its beloved brine three miles to the brewery’s facility. The mixture is made of vinegar, salt, and Best Maid’s proprietary spice blend, and flavors the 4.7% ABV Gose designed to let that brine shine.
“I would bet quite a bit that we’re the only brewery in the world that has a 60-barrel tank dedicated to pickle brine,” Martin said on the podcast.
The pickle beer has made the brewery a Lone Star State powerhouse, and in 2021 it accounts for half Martin House’s sales in IRI-tracked retail. That success has allowed for increased store placements and spin-offs that include versions that are spicy, mimic a Bloody Mary cocktail, add grape, and more. Not to be lost among the success, Martin House’s runaway hit has also caused a controversy with Texas’ New Braunfels Brewing Company over who was actually the first to popularize pickle beer.
But even that argument underlines what a big deal this all is. A pickle Gose is one of the most popular beers in the country—so much so that we now have arguments over who gets the credit. Whatever the answer may be, the one clear-cut thing we know is Cody Martin and his team struck gold with green.
Words,Bryan Roth