This Advent Calendar Is Full of Craft Beer & Will Get You Through the Holidays

beer advent calendar
Courtesy of GiveThemBeer.com
Courtesy of GiveThemBeer.com

Look, we all worry about giving gifts that won't ever be used. You don't want to be the person who gave a loved one the sweater that sits in a basement box for years. There is one route you could go that pretty much always satisfies, though. Alcohol. 

The Give Them Beer advent calendar is back this year, with 12 thirst-quenching days of beer that could make a lovely gift for someone on your holiday list or for yourself. (Probably yourself.) The giant box o' beer keeps on giving as a gift with a new beer every day. It's not Coors or Bud Light in there, either. It's all beer from craft breweries or former craft breweries that have been purchased by big beer.

The true appeal of the advent calendar is getting a new beer from a different brewery every day, which almost inevitably includes beers you can't normally track down in your neck of the woods. This year's selection of beers shifts from bottles to cans and includes beer from Stone, Cigar City, Anderson Valley, Dogfish Head, Ballast Point, Bell's, Sierra Nevada, and more. If you're worried about what styles are inside, it's certainly IPA-heavy, but there's a mix.

If hops aren't your game, Give Them Beer can also help you give them hard seltzer. If you're trying to get a friend off White Claw and into something else, this may be the gateway drug they've been looking for. It's got the heavy hitters with two cans each from Tuly and White Claw. But it also has Oskar Blues' Wild Basin, Mighty Swell, Crook and Marker, Cape Line, Golden Road, and a few others. 

The beer calendar will cost $79 and the seltzer one runs you $59. You can definitely get more beer for that amount of money, but you're paying the premium to get a variety and a few beers that aren't sitting on your local shelves at all. If that sounds ridiculous, your friends would probably also just enjoy a six-pack. It's your call.

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Dustin Nelson is a Senior Staff Writer at Thrillist. Follow him @dlukenelson.