We are extremely pleased to announce the 2018 Beer Bloggers & Writers Conference will be headed to Loudoun County, Virginia on August 10 – 11. Registration is open now and prices increase on September 1.
Loudoun County is based just outside Washington DC. We at Zephyr Conferences love Loudoun County due to our experience running the Wine Marketing & Tourism Conference there back in 2015, for a number of reasons:
- Loudoun County contains Dulles Airport, one of two major airports for the Washington DC region, meaning BBC18 will be very easy to access.
- Loudoun County is beautiful, with many rural areas we will visit on two dinner excursions and one Loudoun County beer tasting included with the conference.
- Loudoun County is considered “DC’s wine country” with 42 wineries in the county. However, the county also now boasts 22 breweries and is fast becoming the playground for our capital’s beer connoisseurs.
We are especially thankful for the support of Visit Loudoun, which will be arranging two dinners at local breweries and a beer reception at a third, including transporting all of us from the host hotel.
But BBC18 will not be just about Loudoun County. Given the relatively short distances in the region to major attractions, we are compacting our conference into two days, August 10 and 11, and prioritizing pre-conference and post-conference excursions. These include or might include:
- Dogfish Head Craft Brewery will be hosting an overnight pre-conference excursion on August 8 and 9 including a visit to their brewery, dinner, tasting, and option to stay at the Dogfish INN. Details are almost set and those of you registered for BBC18 will receive the information first.
- We are planning a post-conference excursion on Sunday, August 12 to Richmond, Virginia. Richmond now has 27 breweries, including our good friends at Stone’s new facility. This excursion is not yet set but we are confident we can make it happen.
- If these two excursions sell out, there are other good options in the area including Philadelphia, Baltimore, and the new Guinness brewery being built in Relay, MD.
Full details about the conference will be released soon but consider signing up today, since registration prices increase on September 1!
It appears the are no suitable venues in the western half of the USA. Maybe it’s time to have two blogger/writer conferences each year; one for the Eastern USA, one for Western USA.
Bob, you bring out a good point. We have not had the Beer Bloggers & Writers Conference in the western US since San Diego in 2014. We did have discussions with a number of western cities about hosting the conference but none of them came to fruition. Please know it is high on our priority list!