Williamsburg, Virginia – This holiday season, The Virginia Beer Company ushers in the 6th annual release of its Evil Santa series of Spiced Milk Stouts.
Evil Santa (brewed with Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Allspice, & Milk Sugar) returns annually with an array of variants. This year that includes Double Chocolate Espresso Evil Santa (brewed with Cacao Nibs & Espresso) and Vanilla Latte Evil Santa (brewed with Vanilla & Coffee). New to the variant lineup this year was also Peppermint Hot Chocolate Evil Santa (brewed with Peppermint, Vanilla, Marshmallows, & Cacao Nibs)!
“On Black Friday every year, we release Double Evil Santa,” notes VBC Director of Sales Michael Rhodes. “This 11.3% abv Imperial version was aged in Bourbon Barrels for 9 months. Then for the first time ever, we developed a super limited Double Evil Santa variant aged in Apple Brandy Barrels! This small batch Double Evil Santa variant is our most limited release of 2021.”
“We’ve seen the Evil Santa lineup grow from one offering in 2016 to a family of offerings in 2021,” recollects VBC Co-Founder Robby Willey. “We’ve brewed 11 variants of Evil Santa since 2016, plus numerous ‘brite keg’ one-offs that are tapped throughout the holiday season.”
In 2020, Evil Santa also went international with deliveries to folks on the Nice List in Japan, the Netherlands, France, and the UK. This year, Double Chocolate Espresso variant was actually developed specifically for an importer out of the UK.
Notes Michael Rhodes: “Evil Santa has become one of our most sought after releases of the year, so we’ve really leaned into the festive nature of the beer with our own Santa costume, Evil Santa scented candles, Evil Santa ornaments, and Evil Santa glassware. We have seen demand/interest/sales for Evil Santa increase annually since our first batch back in 2016. We’ve brewed more variants and more volume each year since that first batch, and distributed the beer farther & wider every year since 2016, for which we are very grateful!”
In Virginia outside of the brewery (401 Second Street, Williamsburg, VA 23185), the best place to find Evil Santa cans is at local bottle shops; Total Wine stores; and select grocers like Wegman’s, Kroger, Harris Teeter, and Costco. In New York, Evil Santa is available through TapRm. In Japan, Evil Santa is available through Cardinal Trading Japan. In the Netherlands and select Western European countries, Evil Santa is available through USA Beer. In France, Evil Santa is available through Brothers Loving Beer. In the UK, Evil Santa is available through Beer52.
All of the brewery’s Evil Santa releases tie in with an annual food & goods drive for the Williamsburg House of Mercy, holiday music pop-ups throughout December, and an “Evil SantaCon” coming to the brewery’s taproom and beer garden on Saturday, 12/18/2021.
Visit www.VirginiaBeerCo.com for more information about releases, events, and brewery happenings.
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