John’s Grocery - The Blog

Another Iowa City Brewfest has come and gone. Yesterday, September 22, marked the 12th Annual Iowa City Brewfest and it was the largest event ever. Everyone at John’s, Old Chicago, and the American Heart Association were thrilled with the turnout. The two factors leading to the great attendance were the perfect weather (mid to high seventies) and the late start of the Iowa Hawkeye football game (7 P.M.). The final numbers aren’t available yet, but only a couple of hours into the event the big tent was packed. I’m was told we did have to send a volunteer to purchase additional spools of tickets twice so patrons were purchasing plenty of drink tickets. We really didn’t try to do anything new this year and it is very pleasing to see that our tried and true formula works.

Check out photos from the event.

If you missed out on the Iowa City Brewfest, there is still time to get tickets for the annual Brewnost at the National Czech and Slovak Museum in Cedar Rapids. See the details here.

John’s Grocery was robbed early Saturday morning on 9/15/2007. This was our first robbery in over twenty years so we count ourselves pretty lucky, however, this time a gun was involved. That’s pretty serious stuff. At least there is a little comedy in the details.

For starters, the perpetrator of the crime was either a complete novice at committing a robbery or was just really off his “A” game. He visited the store twice during the evening before he decided to demand money from the clerk and was even kind enough to purchase items during each visit. He was even nice enough to use his EBT card for one of the transactions. Thanks to the miracles of modern technology this was all recorded digitally in video and electronic receipts. When the robber finally got up the nerve to demand money from the clerk, our clerk said “NO!”. Looking at the video he seemed a little shocked at her response and instead of walking off with a big bag of loot he swiped a small bag of change off the counter.

The Iowa City Police didn’t have much of a problem tracking him down after showing his photo from our video footage to people at the Shelter House a few blocks north of the store. He was arrested within a few hours and charged with a Class B felony. What can future criminals learned from this incident?

• One, notice the cameras all around the place you are going to rob. There’s a good chance they are real and working.
• Two, don’t use a credit or debit card before you commit the crime. If it was stolen, you’ll just draw more attention to yourself. If it’s yours, think to yourself if you’ve really thought this whole life of crime thing through.
• Three, don’t tell a mother of a two year-old what to do. She is an expert at saying “no” and doesn’t like taking guff from anybody.
• Leave the gun at home.

Iowa City Press-Citizen coverage of the incident

Daily Iowan coverage of the incident

This past Monday marked a very important day for the Beer Staff of John’s Grocery. It was the day we could finally answer the question “When are you guys gonna get Fat Tire from New Beligum?” with a resounding “check out the big towering display of beer behind you!”. Yes, that’s right Fat Tire is in the house. Bright and early Monday morning a parade a bicyclists rode from Old Capital Brew Works to the John’s Grocery parking lot, with Elvis on the official Fat Tire retro bike in the lead, to rollout the New Belgium Brewery line here in Iowa.

Currently, the only labels from the brewery that are available in Iowa are: Fat Tire Amber Ale, 1554 Brussels Style Black Ale, and the Mothership Wit.

Check out photos of the rollout