Free Beer is a Reality Thanks to New Mobile App

The elusive concept of free beer is made more complicated when it comes to craft breweries. While breweries that are part of the global “Big Beer” oligopoly, small breweries cannot afford to just give away their product; even tastings can put a significant dent into a craft brewer’s budget, which is why the arrival of the PintPass mobile app is certainly refreshing.

PintPass is a smartphone platform that allows craft beer lovers to earn credit towards future purchases at taprooms around the country in exchange for reviews. In essence, PintPass is rolling out a nifty strategy that gives new users $2 in beer credit, which means that developers are paying users to head to their local breweries.

A couple of dollars worth of beer money in exchange for providing feedback sounds like a good deal. The questions are what anyone would expect about a visit to a brewery; some of them include location, ambiance, type of beers tasted, quality of service, overall experience and satisfaction with the app.

PintPass pays users via an electronic debit card that is generated within the mobile app. Users can show their smartphone screens to their servers, bartenders or taproom hosts to claim their credit; the number of the debit card is displayed right on the app so that the brewery can complete the transaction.

Beer aficionados who would like to give PintPass a try should head to its website and sign up for the beta test program, which started on August 15. At this time, there is a limit of four reviews per month, which means that beta testers can get a maximum of $8 if they visit and rate four breweries.

Future enhancements to the PintPass app include Text-a-Beer, a nifty feature that allows users to treat friends to a beer anywhere in the United States. With more than 5,700 breweries expected to participate, the global menu that PintPass users can access comes up to more than 22,800 beers.

The PintPass app is free to download and install. As can be expected, users must be 21 years of age or older to be able to enter a brewery and submit a review. Personal information does not need to be shared with PintPass, although the data harvested from the reviews will be shared with marketers and craft beer industry organizations. The wide release of PintPass is scheduled to start on October 15; as of mid-August, more than 18,000 users had signed up as beta testers.