That was fast: #GABF tickets sell out in record 45 minutes

Update: Tickets for the Great American Beer Festival sold out in a jaw-dropping 45 minutes today, smashing last year's record of seven days, which, in turn, crushed the previous year's rate of several weeks. Craft beer, it appears, is now as popular as a Justin Beiber concert. But the Boulder-based...

By Jonathan Shikes

August 2, 2012

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Update: Tickets for the Great American Beer Festival sold out in a jaw-dropping 45 minutes today, smashing last year's record of seven days, which, in turn, crushed the previous year's rate of several weeks. Craft beer, it appears, is now as popular as a Justin Beiber concert. But the Boulder-based Brewers Association, which hosts the annual festival -- the largest one in the world -- is going to face questions from angry beer fans who were shut out, couldn't get into the Ticketmaster system or who believe that scalpers bought most of them. In fact, some tickets are already on sale on eBay and StubHub for quadruple the price.

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Tickets for the Great American Beer Festival, which takes place October 11-13 at the Colorado Convention Center, go on sale today at 10 a.m. -- and you'll want to scoop them up quickly before they sell out.

There are three public sessions on Thursday night, Friday night and Saturday night; a Saturday afternoon session -- available only to members of the Brewers Association and the American Homebrewers Association -- has already sold out.

Last year, all four sessions -- which together account for about 55,00 tickets -- sold out in seven days, a record pace for the festival. They are expected to go even quicker this year, despite the higher ticket price.

Hours of drinking beer from hundreds of breweries across the country with thousands of your closest buddies will cost $65 per session, a $5 increase over last year and a $10 increase over the 2010 GABF entry price.

Follow Westword's Beer Man on Twitter at @ColoBeerMan and on Facebook at Colo BeerMan

Jonathan Shikes is a Denver native who writes about business and beer for Westword.

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