Delabear beer gets canned

Delabear — the wild black bear that went viral in December after being spotted roaming Trolley Square — has inspired a wave of related products, including Delabear ice cream from UDairy Creamery, Delabear coffee from Brandywine Roasters for sale at Brew Ha Ha, and Delabear tees from Spaceboy.

Wilmington Brew Works (WBW) got in on the action, too, with a 9% ABV Double Delaware IPA called Delabear, a triple dry-hopped brew with mosaic, citra, vic secret and Denali hops, released in the taproom in December.

Got any other good #delabear memes? pic.twitter.com/LY7PCPdVHY

— Ryan Cormier (@ryancormier) December 6, 2019

The novelty of Delabear may have (mostly) worn off, but the popularity of the beer didn’t.

“I think people initially tried the beer because of the name, but they returned for more, and purchased growlers and crowlers of it because it really was a fantastic beer,” said WBW’s COO, Keith Hughes. [Editor’s note: Ha, growlers. Get it?]

On Feb. 11, Delabear the beer, with its playful artwork of the bear’s route, will be available for the first time in cans, with four-packs on sale starting at WBW’s Flights of Discovery series that evening. They will also be on sale during regular operating hours starting on Feb. 12.

In addition to Delabear, WBW will be releasing Harmonic Oscillation, a 10.2% ABV imperial chocolate stout, in cans for the first time. The two new brews, as well as best sellers Lupulin Enlightenment and Superfluous Nomenclature, were canned on-site during a one-day production run with Iron Heart Canning, a regional beer-canning company that set up the required machinery in WBW’s production space.