Jay R. Brooks has been writing about beer for 35 years, and is the former GM of the Celebrator Beer News and was the chain beer buyer for Beverages & more. He is currently a syndicated newspaper columnist for the Bay Area News Group with his bi-weekly column, “Brooks On Beer,” which appears in at least half-a-dozen papers, including the San Jose Mercury News, the Oakland Tribune and the Contra Costa Times. He contributes to most major beer periodicals, and general circulation magazines such as Playboy and Reason. He has appeared on both television and radio talking about beer, and has given numerous presentations for the California Craft Brewers Association and the Brewers Association, at their annual Craft Brewers Conference, among others. Mr. Brooks studied brewing at U.C. Davis and has judged beer competitions on every continent, including the Great American Beer Festival, the Great British Beer Festival, the World Beer Cup, The Brussels Beer Challenge and many other competitions, both local and international. In 2016, he was named the North American chair for the World Beer Awards.

He is the author of “The Bars of Santa Clara County: A Beer Drinker’s Guide to Silicon Valley,” published in 1992 and “California Breweries North,” published in 2013 by Stackpole Books. He has also contributed to the “Oxford Companion to Beer,” “1001 Beers You Must Taste Before You Die,” “The Pocket Guide to Beer,” “Best Beers,” and several other books.

In early 2015, Brooks developed a Beer Appreciation certificate course for Sonoma State University, which he taught for the 2015 spring semester. 

Brooks co-founded San Francisco Beer Week, the North American Guild of Beer Writers (for which he’s currently its chairman emeritus), and also started the Bay Area Beer Bloggers. He also writes about beer online for a variety of websites, including his own Brookston Beer Bulletin (BrookstonBeerBulletin.com) and the BANG’s Eat • Drink • Play blog.

In 2014, Brooks was made an honorary “Knight of the Brewers Mash Staff” in Belgium, knighted by the Belgian Brewers Guild.