The 2014 American Beer Bloggers Conference starts this week, taking place in San Diego, California, and I’m looking forward to attending! We (my wife and I) haven’t been able to attend since Portland in 2011 so I’m really looking forward to the Conference this weekend; they have a great agenda lined up and one thing I will be interested in seeing is how the Conference has progressed and matured since Portland (which was only in its second year at that time).

Here’s that agenda:

Friday, August 22, 2014

• 12:00 PM – Registration & Opening Lunch hosted by Reyes Beverage Group
• 1:30 PM – Trade Show
• 3:00 PM – Conference Opening
• 3:10 PM – Introduction by Julia Herz of the Brewers Association
• 3:40 PM – Panel of San Diego Craft Brewers
• 4:50 PM – Working Together: Bloggers and Beer Brands
• 6:00 PM – Depart hotel for Karl Strauss Brewing Company
• 9:00 PM – Evening Party with Lagunitas Brewing Company

Saturday, August 23, 2014

• 9:30 AM – Breakout Sessions
  • Beer Blog Photography presented by Alan Kropf of Mutineer Magazine
  • Supercharging your Blogging with WordPress.com
• 10:40 AM – Breakout Sessions
  • Beer Blog Videography presented by Alan Kropf of Mutineer Magazine
  • Free Beer and Other Quandaries for Beer Writing Ethics
• 11:45 PM – Depart for lunch at Yard House (return 1:45 PM)
• 2:00 PM – Keynote Speech – Ken Grossman of Sierra Nevada
• 2:50 PM – Advanced Social Media Strategies for Bloggers
• 3:45 PM – Live Beer Blogging
• 5:00 PM – Depart hotel for Stone Brewing World Bistro and Gardens (Liberty Station)
• 8:00 PM – Beer Social – integrate all forms of social media with beer tasting (back at hotel)

Sunday, August 24, 2014

• 9:30 AM – Blogger Reports – Five-Minute Reports from Eight Bloggers
• 10:20 AM – Marketing in the Beer Industry
• 11:25 AM – Cooperative Blogging Panel
• 12:20 PM – Wrap-up
• 12:30 PM – Conference Finish

There is also a Thursday pre-Conference excursion that starts at Golden Road Brewing in Los Angeles (which we’ll miss), and they have added a Bottle Share event Saturday evening after the Beer Social (which should end by 11pm, at which point the Bottle Share will start).

There will be a lot of beer flowing, of course—it is the Beer Bloggers Conference after all—but there are also some really good and interesting sessions, particularly (for me) the WordPress and Ethics ones.

So, expect this blog, along with Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Untappd, and more I’m sure, to be taken over by the BBC for the weekend. We should be reporting on some great topics, not to mention drinking great beers!