F.X. Matt: A Beer for Every Time, Reason

by Paul Ruschmann and Greg Kitsock

The Biblical advice, "To everything there is a season," applies to beer as well. Take the F.X. Matt Brewing Company, a 114-year-old family-owned operation in Utica, New York, that produces the award-winning line of Saranac beers.

The brewery released its first seasonal, a dark lager called F.X. Matt's Holiday Beer (since renamed Season's Best), in 1983. That was during the infancy of the craft brewing movement. Most beer drinkers, at the time, regarded a Christmas beer as a six-pack of Budweiser decorated with holly sprigs or a case of Beck's you splurged on to impress the relatives. Probably the only other brewery, at the time, doing a holiday seasonal on a regular basis was Anchor Brewing Company of San Francisco. "My father F.X. and Fritz [Maytag] were pretty good buddies," laughs vice president for marketing and sales Fred Matt, when apprised of this fact.

Today, F.X. Matt produces a beer for each season. The current offering, Saranac Oktoberfest, is brewed with two-row and crystal malts and hopped with Saaz and Tettnang. With a two-month window for sales, Oktoberfest is the brewery's fastest-selling seasonal, asserts Fred Matt. "We're oversold!" he exclaims. As of the second week in September, the company had already shipped out 90 percent of its scheduled production. Spring and summer seasonals are moving targets, changing yearly. In 2001, F.X. Matt greeted spring with Saranac Single Malt, a malt varietal brewed exclusively with Scottish Maris Otter malt and hopped with Fuggles. Summer saw the return of Mountain Berry, flavored with several varieties of berries native to the Adirondacks.

In addition, every year the brewery releases its Saranac 12 Beers variety pack, containing an assortment of year-around offerings, limited-release beers from previous years, and two new products not available elsewhere. This year's collection, according to marketing coordinator John Brennan, will contain past favorites Saranac IPA, Caramel Porter, Stout, Single Malt and Chocolate Amber. Making their debut will be Saranac Hefeweizen and Dunkel.

In addition, the 12 Beers package will include, for the first time, Saranac Light, an all-malt, 130-calorie product aimed at light beer drinkers who, says Matt, haven't been totally satisfied with the taste of mass-market brands. Saranac Light has been available in select markets in New York State and in Rhode Island, and is set for a wider rollout in early 2003.

Producing so many seasonal beers is expensive in that the brewery needs to print up new labels and packaging for each new brand. However, as Brennan observes, special-release beers "create talk value around the whole Saranac brand."

Ironically, one of the few seasonal styles that F.X. Matt hasn't offered is a bock, traditionally America's favorite seasonal beer. "I haven't seen a lot of bocks sell well," says Fred Matt. "A lot of people's perception is that it's from the bottom of the barrel. Our goal is to overfulfill our customers' expectations, and bock doesn't fall in that camp."

Matt is concerned about seasonal creep...the tendency of breweries to release their limited-edition products sooner and sooner each year. "I've seen summer beers coming out in early March," he mentions. He prefers the term "limited release" because it better reflects the company's philosophy: move the beer through the system, run out and make the public holler for more!

Matt relates the story of a Virginia customer who, frustrated because he couldn't find Saranac Caramel Porter, rented a plane and flew to Pennsylvania to stock up. He later estimated that he had paid the equivalent of $60 a case. "He wrote to the brewery, asking, Did I get screwed? We told him, Of course not!"

Good news for that customer: Matt says he's toying with the idea of re-releasing the Caramel Porter for his spring 2003 seasonal offering.

Saranac beers are available in 13 states from New England down to North Carolina, and as far west as Ohio. The Saranac 12 Beers package will go out October 10 and should be available by around Halloween, promises Matt. The 2002 edition of Season's Best will be shipped as of November 1 and should be on store shelves easily in time for Thanksgiving.

This article originally appeared in Mid-Atlantic Brewing News, October/November 2002.