Rails & Ales amps it up, ticket sales begin June 1

Looks like some beautiful enhancements are on tap for the 2016 edition of Huntington’s Rails & Ales Craft Beer Festival. Rails & Ales seems destined to maintain its position as the state’s premier beer event.

The festival organizer, Better Beer Coalition, LLC, announced that a whole bunch more tickets will available this year—a number nearly double the amount of last year. Last year, 2,750 tickets sold out in 26 minutes.

Jessica Pressman, a member of Huntington’s Better Beer Coalition, explained the ticket breakout.

“We are going to sell a total of 4,500 tickets,” says Pressman. “We’ll have 1,000 VIP tickets and 3,500 general admission.”

All tickets will be sold online through the Eventbrite website.
UPDATE: all tickets have been sold

Online ticket sales start Wednesday, June 1st 2016 at 6pm.  The two types of tickets are:

1. VIP Tickets – $60 – includes early access to the event at noon;
2. General Admission – $40 – includes admission to to the event at 1:00 p.m.

As many as 500 other folks are also expected, including volunteers, sponsors, brewery & distributor staff, and food and other vendor personnel.

Festival footprint expands

To support the growing attendance numbers, R&A will have a much larger space this year at Harris Riverfront Park.

“We will be doubling the footprint of the festival,” Pressman reports. “We will be using the whole area the we used last year, and then we’re adding the large area on the east side of the entry road.”

They are pretty much using the entire area of the park on the west side of the boat ramp. The festival committee is currently working on the layout design to make things flow as naturally and systematically as possible.

One pleasant thing about R&A last year was its spacious, pastoral  feel down by the river bank. That relaxing openness should be enhanced this year.

“There’s going to be a lot of space for people to move around,” says Pressman. “We’re trying to spread it out as much as possible,”

Rails & Ales: we’ve got an app for that

A super new feature this year is the Rails & Ales smartphone app, which will provide a comprehensive data set of everything the festival does.

The Coalition is working with Bulldog Creative to develop the app. It will list the breweries and individual beers, food vendor fare, music schedule, designated driver info, etc. People will be able to pull up the beer that they are drinking, rank it, and add tasting notes.

“When they leave they will have a list of everything they tried and what they liked,” Pressman explains. “We’re going to try to have it as up to date as possible.

Pressman promises programmers will be on site the morning of the festival entering updates as beers and vendors are checked in. This promises to be one of the better festival apps we’ve ever seen. Watch for the link on the R&A website and be sure to download the app before heading to the festival.

Beer selection grows

Beer selection this year will grow organically with the increased availability of major craft brands in West Virginia.

“As long as new beer is coming into the market, we will continue to offer new beer,” Pressman says.

Expect to find all the new breweries that have come into the state since last summer. Beers from Oscar Blues, New Belgium, Devils Backbone, and Lagunitas will be highly visible. Adding on newer entries like Foothills; and upcoming entries like Bells and, if they get approved in time, Founders and Cascade should make the American beer selection a virtual craft beer wonderland.

Last year’s menu of Belgian imports at R&A was the best the state has ever seen at a festival. This year should be even more awesome. I guess this shouldn’t surprise you since Huntington beer maven Jeff McKay is leading the beverage procurement efforts for R&A.

Since no West Virginia breweries currently sell their beer in Ohio or Kentucky, being able to sample a good selection of WV beers at R&A is a big draw for residents from the surrounding states.

“We definitely want to promote WV breweries,” Pressman noted.

Expect several new West Virginia breweries to hit this year’s R&A. Pressman says all the new ones are invited.

Higher visibility, shorter beer lines

To help make each brewery more visible and easy to find, R&A strives to have each brewery/brewery group served from its own table/tent, rather than doubling up different breweries at the same pour station. Organizers also believe that adding more tables will tend to shorten the wait in lines.

“We never want to get to the point that our lines are too long,” Pressman says. “Every year we want have more and more beer vendors and tables so the lines aren’t getting any longer.

“We are definitely trying to figure out the best layout to control lines.”

Need for volunteers

With the growth in beer tables and attendance comes the need for additional volunteers to staff the festival. To obtain those volunteers and as a way of giving back to the community, Pressman says R&A will make donations to local non-profit organizations in exchange for them bringing crews of volunteers.

“For every team of six people, we’re donating $500 to the non-profit. We could not do this without the support of volunteers from our community.”

R&A is seeking applications from non-profits to participate in the volunteer program. Interested parties should contact R&A through contact information listed on the festival’s website.

Music, food & art

Music, which is always so welcomed at a beer festival, will be similar to last year. Four different bands will perform, including one starting at 5:00 pm when the beer service ends. Here’s the line up.

• 2:00pm – John Inghram’s Slugfest
• 3:00pm – Jeff Ellis & 40 Days
• 4:00pm – Qiet
• 5:00pm – Buffalo Wabs & the Price Hill Hustle

More food vendors are expected this year to handle the expected increase in business. A couple of new food trucks will pull up, including locals Heirloom Mobile Kitchen and Southside Sliders. An authentic Venezuelan restaurant from Elkins, El Gran Sabor, will make its debut appearance.

There will be an expanded variety of artisan vendors this year. T-shirts, cigars, and art are just some of the things to expect.

Festival organizers are still soliciting artisan vendors with one caveat: products must be consistent with craft beer culture. Artisans can apply for admission through the R&A website.

Sponsors are worth their weight in gold

We’d like to give a shout out to the businesses whose donations make the festival possible. Same as last year, Cabell Huntington Hospital is the presenting sponsor. Other sponsors include Ransbottom Law Office, Holiday Inn & Suites, HMG, and Saad Dixon Law Offices, Dutch Miller Auto is the designated driver sponsor and will be offering free rides home.

“We couldn’t do the festival without them,” Pressman said of th sponsors. “We appreciate their support.”

Boosting Huntington’s craft beer cred

To members of the Better Beer Coalition, this festival is so much about promoting Huntington.

“We want to become a destination beer festival,” says Pressman. “We want to attract people from out of town, which brings dollars to the city and dollars to local businesses.

“It’s about more than beer. It’s about the community coming together. It’s about Huntington putting its best foot forward and really showing what we have to offer.

“The reason we created the beer festival is that we wanted to create a market for craft beer in Huntington and the state. We want to continue to expose more and more people to craft beer. That’s what’s going to drive the craft beer culture in our state. We want West Virginia to be a great beer state.”

With those comments, Pressman sums it up well. It’s clear that Rails & Ales is in the highest echelon of promoters of craft beer culture in West Virginia. It should be a great time this August 13.

To see what last year’s Rails & Ales festival looked like, check out this Brilliant Stream article.

Link to Rails & Ales Craft Beer Festival Website