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MillerCoors celebrated the first day of summer by kicking off a summer sweepstakes that will send one winner and four friends deep into the heart of the Blue Moon Brewing Co. @ the Sandlot where they can hang out with the brewmasters and spend the day making beer with them.
The “Artfully Crafted” Facebook promotion will also dole out daily prizes, between June 21 and August 31, including branded coolers, barware and merchandise. To qualify, beer drinkers need to upload a summer photo to Blue Moon’s Facebook page, which will be changed into a pastel-y looking painting on Blue Moon’s Photo Crafter tab.
But the grand prize is the all-expenses paid trip to the Sandlot inside Coors Field — and not just because brewing beer in the nation’s only brewery-inside-a-ballpark would be awesome — but because head brewer/janitor John Legnard and his crew will keep them entertained. Irreverent, outspoken and a lover of beer, Legnard — who has worked there since day one — is never at a loss for words, especially when it comes to the 36 medals the Sandlot has won at the Great American Beer Festival since 1995.
The sweepstakes winners will also get to plan and design a recipe in advance with Legnard and Coors brewer Keith Villa and then make that beer on the day they are there.
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Blue Moon — along with the other Blue Moon seasonals, like Summer Honey Wheat and Harvest Pumpkin — was created and is still made at the Sandlot and served in Coors Field. Extra kegs are combined with the Blue Moon that is made at the Coors plant in Golden and distributed in the Denver area or nationwide.
And while the Sandlot is owned by MillerCoors, it’s much less high-tech than even the average small craft brewery. There are no scientific equipment in the cramped quarters underneath the restaurant or automatic cleaning systems, and quality control is done by the brewers themselves. “I tasted my first beer at 7:15 this morning,” Legnard says.
What is different is the number of awards hanging in frames and draped over the tiny office: a total of 36 since the brewery was founded in 1995.
Follow Westword‘s Beer Man on Twitter at @ColoBeerMan.
