Things have changed again in the world of COVID with the dominance of the Delta variant. It is more contagious, might be more serious, and can cause increased “breakthrough” infections in those vaccinated.
Our Safety Procedures
Our safety procedures are sound. We require everyone attending Beer Now to be vaccinated, have a negative PCR test, or be recently infected and recovered from COVID. We have an outdoor venue, meaning almost the entire conference will take place outside. We are now increasing our mask wearing to require masks on buses to and from the venue.
Wine Media Conference as an Example
Will this work to keep you safe? Based on our success at the recent Wine Media Conference, we believe it will.
At the Wine Media Conference in early August in Oregon, we had the same basic safety procedures. Except that we held the conference indoors and did not require mask wearing. There were many instances of wine tasting when people simply could not wear masks. The result? After many emails post-conference with attendees, we are not aware of any single case of community spread of COVID that happened at the conference.
What About Texas?
Texas has been in the news a lot, none of it good, with respect to COVID. Hospital beds are filling or full and the governor has forbidden counties, cities, and school districts to impose mask mandates. However, we should keep we will mostly be in our own group at an outdoor venue at a ranch outside of town, thanks to the hospitality of Vista Brewing. In addition, state law does not ban private businesses from imposing mask mandates. We will mandate masks when in buses transporting to and from the venue.
We were extremely heartened that every single individual who showed up to the Wine Media Conference was vaccinated. We were thrilled there appeared to be no community transmission of COVID. Let’s do this again at Beer Now 2021.