Registration for this year's NHC competition will start at 2pm CST on Tuesday February 26th. They've made a number of changes this year to the comp to hopefully allow more people to participate, such as adding an 11th judging center. However, if you want to participate I'd suggest that you don't delay entering. In the past few years they've filled up in less than a day. They're still limiting judging centers to 750 entries each. (that's a total of 8250 entries!!!)
Here's a few changes of note: They are limiting entries to 15 per person, which will make the Ninkasi Award interesting. Two bottles are required for first round judging. Cost is now $12 per entry (up $2 from last year). They're still limiting judging centers to 750 entries each. (that's a total of 8250 entries!!!)
More info can be found here:
http://www.homebrewersassociation.org./ ... egulations
Good luck Beer Nuts!!!
National Homebrewers Competition 2013
National Homebrewers Competition 2013
Randy Carris
Randy All the Time Brewing
Randy All the Time Brewing
National Homebrewers Competition 2013
Man that completely pisses me off. I went online right after the registration opened on Tuesday, but the system was down. I later saw a note on their web page saying they were postponing registration until the problems were resolved. Appearently others were able to get through though because it looks like everything filled up in hours. I was really hoping that limiting the number of entries per person would make this a lot less insane, but I guess not.
I feel like this whole AHA organization is fast becoming a joke and am considering asking for a refund of my membership. This year's comp was impossible to enter unless you had the luxury of sitting at your computer and refreshing the registration page all day. Last year's conference sold out in hours and it looks like this year's did too. There were site issues for that as well with many people being shut out from registering. It also sounds like the hotels were booked before the event registration even went live. It seems like they need to scale up the size of their offerings to the size of their membership. Maybe do more than one conference per year or go to bigger venues.
I know we were planning on attending as a club next year but I don't see how that's going to be possible. It's not likely that enough members will be lucky enough to get registered in the 2 hour window that seems to be required. How do clubs manage this for club night etc? Can you register as a club and get a block of tickets?
On 02/28/2013 12:46 PM, whitedj wrote:
I feel like this whole AHA organization is fast becoming a joke and am considering asking for a refund of my membership. This year's comp was impossible to enter unless you had the luxury of sitting at your computer and refreshing the registration page all day. Last year's conference sold out in hours and it looks like this year's did too. There were site issues for that as well with many people being shut out from registering. It also sounds like the hotels were booked before the event registration even went live. It seems like they need to scale up the size of their offerings to the size of their membership. Maybe do more than one conference per year or go to bigger venues.
I know we were planning on attending as a club next year but I don't see how that's going to be possible. It's not likely that enough members will be lucky enough to get registered in the 2 hour window that seems to be required. How do clubs manage this for club night etc? Can you register as a club and get a block of tickets?
On 02/28/2013 12:46 PM, whitedj wrote:
Post generated using Mail2Forum (http://www.mail2forum.com)Apparently they closed after a couple hours. Does this imply the seats are full? or did they just close it because of the glitch?
The guy who submitted a barley wine in the Furious competition...
Randy Carris
Randy All the Time Brewing
Randy All the Time Brewing
OK, so here's the skinny. I was able to talk to Janis Gross, the competition organizer, on tuesday 2:30 our time. She was having difficulties trying to enter the ohio site and was getting a server error, just like me. I was able to register on the site (after 45 minutes!!!) but the system kept giving me the server error as I was trying to enter the beers. I only had a short window on Tuesday anyway and had to give up and see the rest of my patients. When I checked back around 4:30 the site was closed due to technical difficulties with the entry and payment parts. As I log into the registration part now, the system is still down. It says there are 470 entries for the St. Paul site currently. I hope I will be able to enter once the system is back up but I don't know. I don't have unlimited time to check it. If I don't enter no big deal. I will enter more local comps (which I should be doing anyway). There will be a lot of pissed off people over this issue, though. Good luck, AHA!
John Eikenberry
Wow, what a ridiculous process this year. I got an email earlier in the week about getting my entries in. It said the registration will re-open on wed afternoon with some changes. I would enter my beers and pay for them immediately (with no refunds) then be assigned to a region. It may not be the region I was originally planning on entering. There was no guarantee that I would be in the St. Paul region??? I already registered for that site!! So because of this I did not enter this year. The AHA has some serious work to do if they want my business any more!
John Eikenberry
I got an email Friday that said they were reopening registration Monday afternoon with about 450 spots available overall in various regions. I am also not entering this year but there are some spots coming Monday if you want to try to jump in.
Matt Franklin
Slappy Brewing North
On Tap:
American IPA
Strata Hazy IPA
Dr. Lee Orval
American Strong Ale
Friend of the Devil Belgian Golden Strong
Imperial Stout
Slappy Brewing North
On Tap:
American IPA
Strata Hazy IPA
Dr. Lee Orval
American Strong Ale
Friend of the Devil Belgian Golden Strong
Imperial Stout
From the Gary Glass, AHA Director
I'm sorry.
For this year's National Homebrew Competition, the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) used a new online registration system. That system did not work as intended, leading to multiple unfortunate issues, including frustration for those trying to register and pay for their entries, instances of overpayment, and some entries having to be moved to alternate judge centers due to capacity issues. As director of the American Homebrewers Association, I take full responsibility for the failures of the new registration system and offer my sincere apology to everyone who had a challenging experience attempting to register for the competition.
What about AHA Conference Registration?
While the user experience for the National Homebrew Competition may have seemed similar to the experience with registration for the National Homebrewers Conference, they in fact had different causes. The issue with the National Homebrewers Conference registration was an underestimation of our server capacity needs for conference registration, which led our web servers to crash. For the National Homebrew Competition, we greatly increased the server capacity, and the servers performed fine, but the registration software got bogged down under the strain of so many people trying to register at the same time. While we had conducted thorough testing of the registration system prior to launch, it was not tested under the kind of load we actually experienced when we launched registration. We were probably overconfident that the system would perform well because it is a modified version of a competition management system that has been used by hundreds of competitions over the last several years.
To a large extent, the problems experienced with the National Homebrewers Conference and National Homebrew Competition can be attributed to a level of naivete that comes when a small association like the AHA grows very rapidly. In the last five years, AHA membership has grown by 124 percent, averaging 20 percent annual growth. It is difficult to anticipate the challenges that come with that kind of growth, but we learn from our missteps. In the case of the National Homebrew Competition, we will implement more robust testing of the registration system prior to launch in 2014.
Since closing competition registration two-and-a-half hours after launch, our staff has been focused on addressing issues with those who registered for the competition. Overpayments have been reimbursed and entries in overextended judge centers have been redistributed to other centers (entrants whose entries have been moved have had their entry fees waived). The total number of entries first registered was fewer than the total number of entries the competition could accept. There were a large number of people who registered themselves for the competition but were unable to register entries before we closed the registration system. Those people were then given the opportunity to register entries. That left 450 entries spread across five judge centers. We re-opened registration on Monday, March 11 and the remaining entry capacity was filled.
A Note about Competition Growth
The AHA recognizes that there were many people who wished to enter the National Homebrew Competition but were unable to do so. For this year's competition, the AHA Governing Committee Competition Subcommittee devised several changes to the competition to allow it to accept more entries, including adding another U.S. judge center and setting a limit on the number of entries an entrant may submit. Those changes allowed the competition to accommodate 447 more entrants than the 2012 competition, an increase of 26 percent. Ultimately, the competition is limited by the number of qualified judges available to judge the competition and the locations that can handle a competition the size of a first round NHC judge center. The reality of the situation is that interest in entering the competition has outpaced the rate at which new judges have become available. For future National Homebrew Competitions, the AHA Competition Subcommittee will consider potential changes to the competition, including many suggestions submitted by members, that will allow the competition to continue to sustainably grow while ensuring the quality of the judging.
Again, I apologize for the less-than-great experience that National Homebrew Competition entrants experienced with the entry registration system. Having spent the last 13 years of my life dedicated to serving the members of the American Homebrewers Association, it is disheartening for me to know that something we did fell short. We can and will do better in the future.
Sincerely,
Gary Glass
American Homebrewers Association Director
I'm sorry.
For this year's National Homebrew Competition, the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) used a new online registration system. That system did not work as intended, leading to multiple unfortunate issues, including frustration for those trying to register and pay for their entries, instances of overpayment, and some entries having to be moved to alternate judge centers due to capacity issues. As director of the American Homebrewers Association, I take full responsibility for the failures of the new registration system and offer my sincere apology to everyone who had a challenging experience attempting to register for the competition.
What about AHA Conference Registration?
While the user experience for the National Homebrew Competition may have seemed similar to the experience with registration for the National Homebrewers Conference, they in fact had different causes. The issue with the National Homebrewers Conference registration was an underestimation of our server capacity needs for conference registration, which led our web servers to crash. For the National Homebrew Competition, we greatly increased the server capacity, and the servers performed fine, but the registration software got bogged down under the strain of so many people trying to register at the same time. While we had conducted thorough testing of the registration system prior to launch, it was not tested under the kind of load we actually experienced when we launched registration. We were probably overconfident that the system would perform well because it is a modified version of a competition management system that has been used by hundreds of competitions over the last several years.
To a large extent, the problems experienced with the National Homebrewers Conference and National Homebrew Competition can be attributed to a level of naivete that comes when a small association like the AHA grows very rapidly. In the last five years, AHA membership has grown by 124 percent, averaging 20 percent annual growth. It is difficult to anticipate the challenges that come with that kind of growth, but we learn from our missteps. In the case of the National Homebrew Competition, we will implement more robust testing of the registration system prior to launch in 2014.
Since closing competition registration two-and-a-half hours after launch, our staff has been focused on addressing issues with those who registered for the competition. Overpayments have been reimbursed and entries in overextended judge centers have been redistributed to other centers (entrants whose entries have been moved have had their entry fees waived). The total number of entries first registered was fewer than the total number of entries the competition could accept. There were a large number of people who registered themselves for the competition but were unable to register entries before we closed the registration system. Those people were then given the opportunity to register entries. That left 450 entries spread across five judge centers. We re-opened registration on Monday, March 11 and the remaining entry capacity was filled.
A Note about Competition Growth
The AHA recognizes that there were many people who wished to enter the National Homebrew Competition but were unable to do so. For this year's competition, the AHA Governing Committee Competition Subcommittee devised several changes to the competition to allow it to accept more entries, including adding another U.S. judge center and setting a limit on the number of entries an entrant may submit. Those changes allowed the competition to accommodate 447 more entrants than the 2012 competition, an increase of 26 percent. Ultimately, the competition is limited by the number of qualified judges available to judge the competition and the locations that can handle a competition the size of a first round NHC judge center. The reality of the situation is that interest in entering the competition has outpaced the rate at which new judges have become available. For future National Homebrew Competitions, the AHA Competition Subcommittee will consider potential changes to the competition, including many suggestions submitted by members, that will allow the competition to continue to sustainably grow while ensuring the quality of the judging.
Again, I apologize for the less-than-great experience that National Homebrew Competition entrants experienced with the entry registration system. Having spent the last 13 years of my life dedicated to serving the members of the American Homebrewers Association, it is disheartening for me to know that something we did fell short. We can and will do better in the future.
Sincerely,
Gary Glass
American Homebrewers Association Director
Matt Franklin
Slappy Brewing North
On Tap:
American IPA
Strata Hazy IPA
Dr. Lee Orval
American Strong Ale
Friend of the Devil Belgian Golden Strong
Imperial Stout
Slappy Brewing North
On Tap:
American IPA
Strata Hazy IPA
Dr. Lee Orval
American Strong Ale
Friend of the Devil Belgian Golden Strong
Imperial Stout