🍻 Welcome to Fingers!

Fingers is an independent newsletter by me, Dave Infante, about drinking in America, read by thousands of people each week. It’s a smart, funny, and utterly unorthodox mix of award-winning journalism and cultural criticism about how, what, and why we drink—and the money, power, and politics that shape the answers to those questions.

With each edition of Fingers, you’ll get new, thought-provoking, original coverage unsoftened by mainstream publishers’ “brand safety” concerns, and unbought by the booze business advertising dollars they’re concerned about in the first place.

🏆 Awards for Fingers

• Second place: Best Newsletter - North American Guild of Beer Writers Awards (2024)

• Finalist: Best Newsletter - International Association of Culinary Professionals Awards (2024)

🗣️ Praise for Fingers

• “i love dave's newsletter. you will too!”—Charlie Warzel, staff writer at The Atlantic and co-author of Out of Office

• “Dave is one of my favorite newsletter writers. I started reading him last year when I saw one of his beer memes.”—Lyz Lenz, 3x author and publisher of Men Yell at Me

• “Dave is the best beer writer in America. Smart, informed, funny, and occasionally outraged. He’s equal parts enthusiast and gadfly, and well worth a few measly bucks a month.” — Joe Keohane, journalist, editor, and author of The Power of Strangers

• “I love Fingers”—Walt Hickey, executive editor of Sherwood News and editor/publisher of Numlock News

• “Fingers… is largely focused on the spirits and drinking world, but it’s also got a very healthy muckraking streak to it, and reports on a lot of labor issues in the beverage industry that anyone who cares about working conditions will find fascinating whether or not you know what a double IPA is which I still do not to be honest.” — Luke O’Neil, editor/publisher of Welcome to Hell World

• “As beer writing (and craft beer itself) seemingly gets more boring with each passing year, Dave somehow manages to continually produce a beer business newsletter that is wildly entertaining and totally subversive. How does he do it?!” — Aaron Goldfarb, drinks reporter and author of Hacking Whiskey, Gather Around Cocktails, and more 

• “The content is good.” — Kate Bernot, beer reporter and editor, Sightlines and Craft Beer & Brewing

• “A particularly astute and hilarious reporter who covers drinking culture, being online, and beyond.” — Austin L. Ray, Georgia Brewsletter

• “David Infante’s free and highly entertaining newsletter about beery matters.” — Stan Hieronymus, Appellation Beer

🤝 Consider becoming a paid Friend of Fingers!

Fingers is a reader-funded newsletter. When you become a member, you get:

• Every full-length new edition of Fingers, packed with original reporting, deep expertise, and incisive commentary about drinking in America.

• The Fingers Weekender, a news digest optimized for hungover Sunday scrolling that I send to paying Friends of Fingers every Sunday.

• Full access to the entire Fingers archive with 2.5 years (and counting!) of coverage.

• Full access to all the interviews and bonus reads on The Fingers Podcast.

• Commenting privileges and subscriber-only discussion threads.

• The warm and fuzzy feeling of knowing you’re supporting independent journalism.

All for just $8 per month, or ~17% off when you buy an annual subscription:

Do you work in beverage alcohol or an adjacent industry? Great! Use this handy form letter to convince your boss to let you expense Fingers.

📰 Fingers in the media

• How Modelo became America’s new favorite beer (Vox)

• Lite Power (TrueAnon)

• The NRA Loves Kids! (Family Meal)

• Farewell to Anchor, For Now (Brewbound)

• The Rise and Fall of Bud Light (The Atlantic)

• Sinking Without A Trace (The Business of Beverages)

• World Business Report for 7/13/23 (BBC Worldwide)

• Anchor Has Brewed Its Last Beer (InsideHook)

• When Beer Goes Flat (Slate)

• Bang! Bus feat. Dave Infante (Chapo Trap House)

• Jester King’s Jeffrey Stuffings on Speaking Out About Anti-Drag Bill in Texas; Plus, Dave Infante of Fingers (Brewbound)

• The Bud Light boycott, explained as much as is possible (Vox)

• Numlock Sunday: Dave Infante on a shocker of a hard seltzer verdict (Numlock News)

• Thirsting for a Selfie (Brew York)

• Lessons To Learn From Stella Rosa, America’s #1 Imported Wine (VinePair/VP Pro)

• The Brash, Chaotic, Enduring Taboo of Four Loko (Punch)

• Saturday links: habitual loneliness (Abnormal Returns)

• My Internet: Katie Way (Embedded)

• Sodas vs. Seltzers - An Ombibibulous Omnibus (The Business of Beverages Podcast)

• Everyone Loves to Hate the IPA (Punch)

• Litigation Rules the Nation — Beer’s Trademark and First Amendment Disputes Draw Lawyers’ Attention (Good Beer Hunting)

• Numlock News: June 15, 2022 • Internet Explorer, Sriracha, Nightcrawlers (Numlock News)

• Working Class Drinkers (Beer Sessions Radio)

• Numlock Sunday: Dave Infante on the trial of the century (Numlock News)

• BrewDog Closes Indianapolis Taproom (Brewbound)

• Jury Awards Stone Brewing $56 Million in Molson Coors Suit (InsideHook)

• Numlock News: March 28, 2022 • Vampires, McPlant, Red (Numlock News)

• What we need for an indie sleaze revival (Crosspost with Garbage Day)

• Drinking in the Despairverse (Low Culture Boil Podcast)

• Breaking Down Provi's SevenFifty Acquisition (VinePair/VP Pro)

• Dave Infante on the World of Booze (LitHub)

• Booze-Free Bottle Shops Are Making Dry January Easier Than Ever (Vogue)

• 30. Manifesting a Better Beer Year in 2022 (Hugging the Bar)

• Carolinas Food Writers and Photographers Name Their Best Restaurant Meal of 2021 (Eater)

• What to Read: Meredith Haggerty is on alert for heiresses (On Substack)

• Kelsey Grammer owns a Christian-themed brewery in the Catskills (Boing Boing)

• Michelin FLA, Retreat TFG, Frasier FAB, and more... (Family Meal)

• Striking against "corporate greed" at Kentucky's biggest bourbon distillery (Reprint in The Flashpoint)

• The Sota Pod Ep204 Feat. Dave Infante - The Twin Cities: A Hotbed for Craft Beverage Unionizing (The Sota Pod)

• How the Twin Cities Became a Hotbed for Craft Beverage Unionizing (Reprints at Racket MN and Workday Minnesota)

• Ep. 331 - Dave Infante Parts One & Two (Steal This Beer Podcast)

• WTF Brewdog? - The real controversy you probably missed (The Business of Beverages Podcast)

• I Tried to Recreate the Original Four Loko to Prepare for a Summer of Chaos (Vice)

• Dave Infante Thrills Us (The Beer Edge Podcast)

• Minnesota Wild - The Sota Pod - EP82 - S1 Featuring Dave Infante & Chase Crawshaw (The Sota Pod)

My recent coverage of the beer industry as a writer-at-large for VinePair can be found here.

🤳 Follow Fingers on Instagram

The boozeletter’s memes and shitposts about drinking in America are always free, and you’ll love ‘em. Follow Fingers today.

📚 Buy your books via The Fingers Reading Room

Stiff Bezos and get your books via Fingers’ curated Bookshop page, where I’ve listed personal recommendations for books on booze, labor organizing, climate change, and more.

I receive a small cut of the profits if you purchase a book through my shop. So if you’re not sure you’re ready to commit to a subscription, but still want to support this project, The Fingers Reading Room is a great way to do it.

👨🏻 More about Dave Infante

I’m two-time James Beard award-winning journalist with a strong voice and a passion for storytelling. My work has appeared in The New York Times, Fast Company, Splinter, HuffPost, The Guardian U.S., Thrillist, PUNCH, and others. In addition to publishing the boozeletter, I work at VinePair as a contributing editor and columnist covering the beer business. For more, follow me on Bluesky, or check out my website. I live in Richmond, Virginia.

If you’re an editor, podcast host, or video producer who wants to commission or book me, or discuss reprinting one of my stories, or anything else, please get in touch: [email protected].

📧 More about Fingers

Fingers’ logo and banner art were drawn by the very-talented Friend of Fingers Daniel Fishel. Check out his work, then pay him to draw stuff for you, at o-fishel.com. I make the rest of Fingers’ artwork myself, which is why it’s so bad.

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