Ale Tales Albany: Craft Beer & More!
We started the store in 2017 after another craft beer company, Hopsy, decided to focus on online beer sales. From starting with 2 coolers, we've grown as a craft beer store and bottle shop to offer one of the most curated selections in the San Francisco Bay Area. Today, we feature a variety of craft beers, wines, ciders, mead, sake, seltzers, gluten-free beers, non-alcoholic beers and small batch beverage options.
We cold store all our hoppy beer and rotate our selection frequently to ensure we have the freshest best selection available. This means we unfortunately do run out of particular craft beers often. As some craft beers go fast, we may not offer all products online. We do offer in-store shopping and local pickup options. We currently do not offer delivery but now have CA shipping most orders delivered within 48 hours.
Craft Beer Store Near Me
Ale Tales Albany is conveniently located on Solano Avenue in downtown Albany, California. We're just off the 80 at the foot of Solano. We're a great option for craft beer lovers looking for a craft beer store in Berkeley or bottle shop in Oakland. We're a short 5 minute drive from Berkeley, 10-15 minutes from Oakland and a 5 minute detour for anyone traveling north to Richmond, Pittsburg, or the North Bay.
Below we'll share the layout of the store (and our online store) so you can easily shop to find local craft beers and beers from around the country you'll love
IPAs, Hazy IPAs, and Hoppy Beers
It's no surprise that hoppy beers still reign supreme in the craft beer world. We have 2 full coolers dedicated to hops as well as part of our new release cooler. One of our cooler doors is dedicated to the dank West Coast IPA we all know and love and the other cooler door houses the new Hazy IPA variant. We're regularly stocked with local brewery favorites such as Henhouse, Barebottle, Original Pattern, and Laughing Monk as well as dozens of others.
Where can I buy Pliny the Elder?
Ale Tales Albany has a regular supply of Russian River staples including Pliny the Elder, Blind Pig, Mind Circus, Happy Hops, STS, and many of their sours. You can buy Pliny the Elder by the single bottle or even buy cases of Pliny the Elder. We currently do not have a limit to the number of bottles you can purchase.
Sours and Wild Ales
Sours are one of the fastest growing segments of craft beer right behind the always popular IPA. Our bottle shop is no different, featuring nearly 100 different sours from barrel aged versions from local favorites Rare Barrel and Almanac to our PacNorWest neighbor Cascade to kettle sour versions from Alvarado Street, Great Notion and other breweries across the country. If funk and wild ales are more your speed, we have a variety of farmhouse, saisons, and other yeast forward variants to treat your palate. Not sure what you like? Check with one of our team members and we can direct you to something we think you'll love.
Barrel-Aged Beers
We love barrel aged beers. The creativity of brewers (and patience) to age an already delicious beer in bourbon barrels or tequila barrels or port barrels is inspiring. We offer a wide selection of these masterpieces from rare hard-to-find options that are released once a year to rotating selections breweries drop all year long.
New Releases and Seasonal Beers
This is the section of our store you can find most of our fastest moving beers as well as some staff picks we think deserve a look. The list of beers in this cooler is a who's who list of the craft beer industry. We won't name names for fear of leaving out some truly exceptional breweries but if you're on the hunt for crazy beers and hyped brewreies, this is the cooler you'll want to check first.
Light Beers and Easy Drinking Lagers
After a long day of work, we can't think of a better style of beer than the crisp clean lager. My personal favorite being a Kolsch (or more specically, a Kolsch-style beer.) These easy drinkers range from crisp pilsners, easy drinking blondes, tasty cream ales, and the always popular Hefeweizen and Witbiers. Stop by here for a great option for a warm sunny California day.
Belgian Beers
Belgium knows beer. From krieks and lambics to trappist ales, we carry a wide selection of beers from Belgium and American versions from local breweries. If you're looking where you can find Belgian beers, we have dozens of options for you. If you don't see something you're looking for, let us know and we'll see if we can bring it in!
Gluten-Free Beers
For the gluten-intolerant among us, we have a small but rotating selection of gluten-free beers. We regularly carry local favorites as well as gluten removed beers from breweries like Black Hammer and Moonlight.
Ciders, Hard Kombucha, and Seltzers
Another option for our gluten-free friends is hard cider. Also, for our apple and pear loving friends we carry bone dry versions, semi-dry, and even a few odd-balls like a barrel aged cider and ciders from Spain. Our cider selection is constantly rotating as well to ensure you always have something new and fun to try! In our cider cooler, we also have some of the newer trends in alcoholic beverages with hard kombuchas and seltzers. We'd recommend you try some of these lighter versions in place of a cider or easy drinking beer.
Local Wine
We added our wine section in 2020. We've chosen to offer a wide variety of canned wines. These wines are great when you don't want to open a full bottle, are interested in trying a couple different types of wine, or are planning a hike or other outdoor activity. In addition to our canned wines, we've sourced wines from local wineries, organic wineries, and those who practice sustainable winemaking. Some do all 3. While not as diverse as the big chains stores, our selection are things you won't find everyday.
Non-Alcoholic Beer
And lastly, we offer a variety of non-alcoholic beers, as well as non-alcoholic sodas, waters, and kombuchas. We love helping customers find new beers. If you're looking for a beer shop near me, check us out. And like the weather in San Francisco, if you don't like our selection just wait a bit and it'll change completely.
