Looking Ahead to Tacoma Craft Beer Festival 2010

Last year the first-ever Tacoma Craft Beer Festival was a huge success. We attended the event and were amazed at how well the organizers put together the inaugural event. Last night we talked to Chris Miller—owner of Tacoma's Red Hot and one of the festival organizers—about the 2010 version of the Tacoma Craft Beer Festival, which will be held on October 1st and 2nd.


Once again, the event will take place at The Foss Waterway Seaport and the proceeds will benefit the Emergency Food Network. In addition to the fact that this year's event will be generally bigger and better, here's some new stuff.

• A total of 50 breweries will be represented compared to 44 last year.
• Parking - while we had no problems parking last year, apparently it became a bit of an issue as the day wore on. This year, there will be parking at the Tacoma Dome Station parking garage with free shuttle buses to get you to and from the venue from there.
• Two days instead of one! Friday October 1st (from 5pm-9pm), and Saturday October 2nd (from noon-8pm).
• The event space will be reconfigured to better accommodate the crowd. Essentially, some of the museum-type stuff will be moved aside for the event.
• Friday night Firkins. There will be a special firkin tapping event within the larger event. Basically, a whole bunch of firkins will be tapped at once on Friday night at 6:00 p.m. We'll confirm the exact time and the number of firkins as the event nears.