California Fights Back Against Keg Theft
California keg thieves, you’re on watch. California Gov. Jerry Brown has signed a bill, sponsored by the California Craft Brewers Association, that makes it illegal to obliterate, mutilate or mark out a manufacturer’s name on metal kegs.
It is already illegal to recycle kegs inscribed with the name of the manufacturer without its written consent, but opportunists attempted to circumvent that by scratching or grinding out the name before recycling it for cash. The new law will make defacing the manufacturer’s name a crime itself.
According to the Brewers Association, keg loss costs craft brewers between 46 cents and $1.37 per barrel of annual keg production. In January 2013, it launched KegReturn.com to help return missing or stolen kegs to breweries.
The law will go into effect on Jan. 1, 2015.
Great program! It is ridiculous that the deposit on a keg is often less than the scrap value of the steel. Retailers selling beer-by-the-keg to consumers should increase the deposit until there is no incentive to steal the keg. If the consumer is honest, he gets his deposit back, so it doesn’t matter how much it is.