DRAFT Magazine

By Justin Shady

You would think that the second largest city in the country would have an enthusiastic and active craft beer scene.

Unfortunately, you would be wrong.

Even with a population near the four million mark, Los Angeles struggles to get its own personal hold on the world of craft beer. Some beer enthusiasts feel it’s behind much smaller cities, like Portland and Denver, by as much as a decade; and when placed next to its sister city to the south, San Diego, Los Angeles pales in comparison… at best. So what does Los Angeles need to spark a craft beer community?

Apparently, it needs a cabal. Or, more accurately, a C.A.B.A.L.

Unlike your average, everyday cabal, the Los Angeles Craft and Artisanal Beer Appreciation League (L.A. C.A.B.A.L.) isn’t interested in secretly plotting to overthrow the government. Instead, this group of a half-dozen passionate beer lovers has made it its mission to bring the City of Angels out of the craft beer stone ages.

“It came about one evening nine months ago when Kevin Kansy, Bob Kunz, and I got together to try some fun beers we had,” says one of the group’s founders, Alex Macy. “We got to talking about the local beer scene, lamenting about the lack of a good craft-oriented beer festival in the area. We decided the city needed one, and since no one else was going to do it we decided to just do it ourselves.”

Los Angeles C.A.B.A.L. became a reality soon thereafter, with six members sharing responsibility of the group: Alex Macy is currently heading up the beer department for Bottle Rock in downtown Los Angeles; Bob Kunz is a taste maker at the prominent Father’s Office in Culver City; Kevin Kansy runs a boutique distribution company called Artisan Ales; Ben Ling runs the vegan pub Pure Luck Restaurant; and Alex Brown and Evan George are the beer geeks behind the veggie blog Hot Knives, as well as organizers of the bi-annual Grand Crew L.A. bicycle tour of the best beer stores in the city.

But with each of the organization’s members already playing some kind of role in the craft beer world in Los Angeles, why has it taken the city as a whole so long to connect the dots and form a community?

In Macy’s opinion, the enormity of Los Angeles has been part of the problem.

“Greater Los Angeles is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, and these various establishments are so spread out that it takes some effort to build a strong beer scene here,” he says.

It was a challenge the C.A.B.A.L. set out to overcome when they organized the First Annual Craft Beer Fest on May 9th at the Echoplex north of downtown. The event boasted over a dozen of the state’s best breweries, showcasing gourmet pub grub and nearly 30 different handcrafted beers.

But the question was, would Los Angelenos come out?

“It went better than we could have imagined,” Macy says. “Leading up to the event, we were fearful we’d find ourselves standing around with a dozen of our friends, trying to make use of thirty kegs, but we had a much larger turnout than we even thought possible.”

It was so large, in fact, that the event had more people waiting outside than they could legally let into the building. Luckily for the organization, Los Angeles’ craft beer lovers are patient people.

“The enthusiasm people had around trying different beers, and their willingness to wait in rather long lines to be able to take part are strong signs that our local beer scene is on the verge of blowing-up,” Macy says.

By the end of the night nearly 1,000 people had attended the event and almost $10,000 had been raised for 826LA, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students with their creative and expository writing skills.

So does this mean Los Angeles can expect a Second Annual Craft Beer Fest? Or will the scene fade away like a forgotten movie star?

According to Macy, the craft beer-loving citizens of Los Angeles can count on a sequel.

“The goal for next year’s festival will be for it go bigger and better… and outside.”

– Justin Shady is a freelance writer living in Los Angeles.