February 11, 2008 [ Updated July 27, 2008 ]
This is a grocery store. Albeit they do have a better than average beer selection (at very good prices). And, they do carry beer with their name branded on the label. I still shop here because of the food, not the beer.

July 15, 2007
Great store in general. They have interesting foods and beers at very good prices. The cheapest place to buy beer and wine by far, but their selection is limited.

April 1, 2007
This place rocks. Good hard to find food and a nice selection of low priced off name beers.

November 2, 2006
Visited the one in Santa Monica. Very good selection of American micro and good foreign macro beers. Was allowed to break six packs, which hasn’t been the case at other stores in California (I do it all the time in europe.) The food there is also very good and pricing very affordable.

August 5, 2006
In the Grossmont area their selection is on par with neighboring Cost Plus but well below BevMo. Everything on hand is usually of the craft brew variety. Typically bombers and the odd single can be found. The rest are six and four packs. Nothing refrigerated. Prices are competitive. I’ve not seen any rare type beers but they can have stuff that is in limited distribution which is nice. I’d only get beers here if I was already shopping for other stuff. If on a beer run then BevMo is usually the call.

November 13, 2005
Lots of stuff that is hard to get anywhere else, including their own brand of beer. None of it is very highly rated of even that great, but when you are just looking for beers to rate, there is a lot of variety, and they sell singles for sometimes less than $1.

July 3, 2005
La Jolla location. I gotta admit I was a little dissappointed after reading the comments here. They didn’t have much that I hadn’t already found at BevMo. What I did find wasn’t anything I was interested in. BevMo had a much better selection.

August 15, 2004 [ Updated June 15, 2007 ]
I love this place. I usually hit the La Mesa store. The prices are great. Good selection of CA micros and some obscure foreign brews. You can also buy singles of anything. So you can get some singles of crappy beer just to try ’em out and give ’em a rate for like .60-.70 cents. Have cut back a bit on amount of brews to make more room for wine.

February 27, 2004
Trader Joe's definitely has some of the freshest and I guess what you would call underground beers available. My only complaint would be the hippies you always wind up seeing in there, seeking that which is organic. I've found quite a treasure or two in Trader Joe's. They are great as they do allow you to purchase single bottles. Their prices are absolutely the cheapest around! Service-wise, most of the employees seem fairly knowledgeable. Not many complaints about this store!

February 7, 2004 [ Updated April 19, 2004 ]
A decent beer selection that is always changing. One day they have Dogfish head 60 min, the next day it’s gone, but the prices are the best. Old rasputin for 4.99 a four pack, or the best prices on chimay and duvel. I may be a bit biased since I work there, but you can get a decent brew and some good grub.