Talk:List of breweries in California

Notibility
Would anyone care to explain what the criterion for notability on this list are? It seems odd that there's no discussion of it here. --jpgordon:==( o ) 04:58, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

I was wondering the same thing. Should we count only pure breweries, or do we count brewery-restaurants as well? For example, I saw Rock Bottom on the list on Santa Clara County. I would have thought of it as primarily a restaurant (besides the fact that it is a chain headquartered outside of California). If it is to be included on the list, should it be listed under every county that has a brewing location? Some other brewery restaurants to consider, at least with locations in San Diego, are BJ's, Oggi's, and Gordon Bierch. Then there's Pizza Port, who while being a restaurant, is more well known for its beer.

I would like to propose as a criteria that to be counted on the list, a company must sell beer for off-premesis consumption - either kegs, take-away growlers, or bottling for retail distribution, and that it be listed under every county for which such a distribution point exists. So for example:


 * Pizza Port: Bottles for distribution from San Diego and Orange Counties- list under both
 * BJ's does not generate a significant amount of off-premesis consumption, so it would be omitted.
 * Rock Bottom sells growlers, would be listed under Los Angeles, San Diego, and Santa Clara counties
 * Oggi's offers growlers at many locations (though I don't go there enough to know if it's all locations...); they'd be listed under their five counties

Alternatives to consider:


 * List only brewers who have won an award at a Great American Beer Festival, World Beer Cup, or other significant competition
 * Perhaps that would be a separate list, "List of award winning breweries from California"
 * List a company only at their primary location/headquarters, e.g. Rock Bottom being headquartered in Colorado would not be listed here, and Oggi's would be listed in San Diego only.
 * List only companies reaching some production volume (e.g. Airdale in San Diego, despite its wonderfulness, would be eliminated from the list. You can guess I'm against that option!)

--Mfedder (talk) 05:05, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree on the off-premises criteria; award-winnning may be a bit hazier. Either way, we should eliminate a listing of Jupiter (Alameda County), when it is simply a brewpub whose beers are contract-brewed by Drake's (who should certainly be listed).--Chimino (talk) 06:44, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Notability, redux
I am not as concerned about what specifically qualifies a brewery to be on the list. I am more concerned that we show, with references, the reason for inclusion. I have added hidden text, and i may act on what i added. this is standard instructions for stand alone lists on WP. we are NOT a directory. businesses here must be shown to be notable. i know that Jupiter exists. does that mean i should leave it here? it means i should find a reference for it, and if i find it, add it, then maybe i or someone else will write the article. The names should be added only AFTER a reference has been found. otherwise, how do we know someone didnt add "Ima J. Ackass Brewery, Chowder House and Marching Society" as a joke?Mercurywoodrose (talk) 04:30, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Agreed that they should all be notable. For those that stumble on to this page and don't have experience, you can take a look at this.Ali or nothin (talk) 20:05, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
 * If you're abiding by these strick guidelines, the title should be renamed "List of notable breweries in California". I came here to research an actual list of breweries, not a list of breweries that someone arbitrarily finds "notable". There are so many breweries that I feel belong of this list [some of which have been aforementioned in this Talk], such as: Drake's (San Leandro), Figueroa Mountain Brewing Co (Buellton), Eagle Rock Brewery (Eagle Rock; first brewery in LA city limits after 25+ years), Golden Road Brewing (Los Angeles, largest microbrewery in Los Angeles County), Craftsman (Pasadena), Hanger 24 (Redlands), Miller (Irwindale), Budweiser (Van Nuys); the list goes on. I find jumping to the conclusion that all entries to this list are immediately guilty of being fake preposterous. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.166.251.203 (talk) 06:42, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
 * These type of lists exist mainly to direct readers to other Wikipedia articles which fit into the assigned category. They're not arbitrarily listed, because they have an existing article to describe their notability. There are already great resources which list all existing breweries and their offerings, such as Beer Advocate, but that's not WP's purpose...--Chimino (talk) 08:31, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
 * In that case, it's probably time to delete this article, since the title is a lie, and just tag each brewery that has an article with Category:Breweries in California or something like that. --jpgordon:==( o ) 19:22, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Either this is a list of breweries in California, or it is simply a categorization of WP pages. Trying to reach some sort of middle ground with these criteria (specifically, breweries with pre-existing WP pages) is self-selecting and biased in favor of large brewpub chains. If this isn't a definitive list, then at least cite relevant authoritative sources for specific counties. (When you're citing an article from the Truckee Donner Historical Society, you know you've reached a new low.) Tythos Eternal (talk) 01:11, 28 September 2013 (UTC)

If one searches for breweries in California, this page shows up first in the results. It is not useful, however, as it does not contain the information promised in the title. Why does it exist at all if it doesn't contain a reasonably complete list of breweries or at least a link to a reliable list maintained elsewhere? http://www.bcca.com/services/brewery_listing_california.asp is an example of a fairly extensive list that appears to be regularly maintained.

The notability discussion above seems to take no note of the fact that the notability guidelines specifically state that they do not apply to article or list content. This topic clearly meets the criteria for notability. The sites cited above through Beer Advocate aren't intended as brewery listings but as crowd-sourced beer rating services. As such, they don't fill the need for an accessible list of breweries.199.19.248.11 (talk) 08:51, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Notability & prod
The brewing industry in California brews more beer than any other state in the union, thus it is a large part of the local economy in non-durable goods shipped and employment. This page is a useful summary of the breweries which either have their own Wiki articles or which are notable enough to be trailed by a citation. I don't think it should be deleted with a "prod" and I'm thankful to the editor who removed the tag. notability guidelines say that those guidelines do not apply to article or list content. Since the topic meets the criteria for notability and all the entries either have their own Wikipedia pages, or have citations, I think the page should stay. Ellin Beltz (talk) 21:35, 16 January 2014 (UTC)
 * This is a minor point, I know, but FYI your argument (here) that "The lists are very helpful in organizing data and assisting editors working on the topic." isn't really enough to stop a determined deletionist. If a list is solely for back-room purposes like tracking editorial completeness, it's usually more efficient to keep it out of article space! - Pointillist (talk) 21:57, 16 January 2014 (UTC)
 * I didn't include that argument here because I know that's not a guideline argument. I mentioned it only on a user's talk page as my personal opinion; it was never in article or article talk space.  Ellin Beltz (talk) 18:17, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

San Diego breweries
When I came to this page and hit control to search for Stone Brewing Company there was no match. This was a surprise because surely they are a relatively notable Californian brewery. It didn't immediately occur to me to read the entire article and discover that the breweries around San Diego aren't listed here because they are in List of breweries in San Diego County, California. Shouldn't the two lists be merged? - Pointillist (talk) 21:57, 16 January 2014 (UTC)
 * There's a large discussion on that page's talk page which points out that there are 60 breweries in San Diego County, possibly the most of any county in the U.S. I wouldn't be against your idea of including the information here to help with control-F, but I think it might make this page a little unwieldy.  Either way would be fine with me; I'm more in favor of more information less clicks than the other way around.  Ellin Beltz (talk) 18:22, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Today's FST-3 edits
I haven't filed a sockpuppet investigation over the mass of bad edits today by many single-purpose accounts adding unsourced entries for breweries surrounding Davis, because my guess is that this was not actually the work of sock-farm, but rather a course assignment gone horribly wrong, most likely from the FST "beer and brewing" course at UC Davis. I am going to see whether I can get in touch with the course instructor and find out more. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:21, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi, . Thanks for pointing this one out. I'm going to try and identify the professor and get in contact with them. Adam (Wiki Ed) (talk) 18:24, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
 * The professor is Matthew Lange of UC Davis, email redacted — contact me if you need it . I'm already in contact but I'd be happy for someone with more experience of Wiki Ed issues to take over. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:51, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
 * , I'm not a Wiki Ed person [though I'd be happy to join in that effort]. I am a faculty person who teaches brewing at another college, an experienced editor, and someone who recently learned from some mistakes with regard to having classes edit Wiki pages. Happy to help in some way. Prof. Mc (talk) 18:54, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Another of these pages has appeared at Telegraph Brewing Company. I note that the format seems to track other pages from this class. Short bit of info, then something on the awards the beer has won. It's been CSD'd. Prof. Mc (talk) 19:47, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Red-linked breweries
I know there's a lot of activity on this article at the moment, with some breweries being added without secondary sources by some editors and then removed by other editors. But, unrelated to that, I suggest that the breweries that don't have their own articles be un-red-linked. There's a consensus that it's fine to list these breweries, as long as each one has a secondary source, but most of them will not end up having their own Wikipedia articles, so red-linking them is not helpful, in my opinion. I can remove the red links myself -- I'll probably have time to get to this soon -- but I wanted to post here first and see if anyone wants to agree or disagree. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:31, 4 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I don't have a strong opinion on whether we should keep them redlinked or unlink them. But one argument for redlinking them is that then, if someone ever creates one of these articles (or deletes it as is currently threatened with Sudwerk) we wouldn't need to do anything here to keep the list in synch. Relatedly, I would like to see proper sources even for the bluelinks. Mostly this should be easy (just copying the best source from the bluelinked article) but in the case of brewery chain franchises (if we think they should be included at all) we would need sources that provide in-depth coverage of that specific location. For instance, I have already done this for two of the counties I know best (Orange and Mendo). —David Eppstein (talk) 00:42, 4 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I'd un-redlink them if only because the page just looks bad like this. They can be re-wikilinked when pages are created. Right now it's, well, "yucky." Not quantifiable, I know. lol Prof. Mc (talk) 02:34, 4 March 2016 (UTC)

Okay, I've gone ahead with the un-red-linking, here. — Mudwater (Talk) 12:59, 5 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Damn! You sure did. Personally, I think it looks much better. Great job, thanks. Prof. Mc (talk) 13:52, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I propose that the article List of breweries in San Diego County, California be merged into this article. San Diego County has a lot of breweries, but they can easily be accommodated in the List of breweries in California article -- which would then be better than before, because readers would not have to refer to a second article to see the rest of the California breweries. As far as I'm aware, all the other U.S. brewery lists are by state, and I think it makes sense to be consistent with that scheme. — Mudwater (Talk) 22:50, 19 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I also think this is a good idea. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:23, 19 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Oppose San Diego County is known as "the craft brew capital of the country". It currently houses 123 breweries, of which about 50 are notable enough to be listed here - way more than any other California county, and more than most states. The San Diego County Brewers Guild is the third largest brewers guild in the country (only two STATES have a larger guild), and it is far larger than any other city or county guild. Cramming all this into the California list would overwhelm that list. San Diego should have its own separate list. --MelanieN (talk) 00:15, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I think it is a good idea to have a separate page for San Diego Breweries because there are so many of them. But there should definitely be a redirect to that page from the California Breweries page. Trev_fro (talk) 16:06, 23 April 2015 (UTC)


 * Support An expanded San Diego County section would be make the article more useful, would not detract from the ability to give SD County (where I am from) its proper due, and would, as stated above, keep people from having to go to multiple articles for one state. What about simultaneously changing this article to "Breweries in California" and including San Diego. Dropping "List" would allow for some expansion of the article. Prof. Mc (talk) 15:09, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
 * As far as expansion goes, there is already a full article Beer in San Diego County, California, so there is no need to expand the San Diego list beyond a list. The article is narrative and mentions only a few of the very best known breweries, so it does not replace the list or vice versa. --MelanieN (talk) 21:31, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Oh, and I should make a full disclosure: I created both the list and the article. --MelanieN (talk) 21:31, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I missed the "Beer in San Diego" article. Then for sure I'd say we definitely don't need a List as well. Combine the SD and CA lists. Prof. Mc (talk) 12:58, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Consensus? Prof. Mc (talk) 18:07, 13 June 2016 (UTC)


 * I'm still somewhat in favor of merging the articles, but based on the discussion so far, I'm not really seeing a consensus to merge. — Mudwater (Talk) 22:41, 13 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Agreed. I don't see firm enough consensus either way. Prof. Mc (talk) 10:26, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

It's been more than two months and there's no consensus to merge, so I guess the articles should be left separate, for now anyway. I'm planning on removing the merge proposal tags in the near future, unless anyone objects. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:32, 8 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Okay, I've taken off the merge proposal tags, without prejudice. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:17, 16 July 2016 (UTC)

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