Beer Coaster

A Coaster, drink coaster, beverage coaster, or beermat, is an article used to rest beverages upon. The main purpose is to protect the surface of a table or any other surface where the user might place their beverage.

Public houses usually will have beermats spread out across the tables. They are used not just to protect the surface of the table, but, as they are usually made of paper, they can also be used to absorb condensation dripping along the glass or serve as an ad-hoc notepad. Beermats are often branded with trademarks or alcohol advertising. Beermats are not to be confused with bar mats, rectangular pieces of rubber or absorbent material used to protect the counter top and soak up spilled drinks in a bar or pub.

A Drop Catcher is a small piece of absorbent paper put around the bottom part of a beer glass (usually a Pilsener tulip) to prevent its contents from dripping onto the table (not to be confused with a coaster which resides below the glass).

The beer coasters catalog on Colnect contains not only coasters and drop catchers related to beer but also non-beer coasters.

Browsing the Catalog

The beer coaster catalog can currently be filtered by the following properties on the front page:

• Countries: The country a coaster was issued in. In some cases coasters are listed in the country of the producer, but they were issued in another country for that brand.
• Brands: The brand of the coaster. One producer may have one or more brands, and it is not always easy to identify the company name (producer) from a coaster as these often only show brand names.
• Shapes: The shape of the coaster. Currently the following options are available:

• 6-Angular (hexagonal)
• 8-Angular (octagonal)
• 10-Angular (decagonal)
• Circle
• Circle with a hole
• Half-circle
• Non-standard: Irregularly shaped coasters, e.g. in the shape of a guitar, leave, or lemon etc.
• Oval
• Oval-top rectangle
• Puzzle
• Quarter-circle
• Rectangle
• Rhombus
• Scallop
• Square
• Triangle

• Compositions: The material(s) the coaster was made of. The majority of coasters are made of cardboard. Options are:

• Cardboard
• Ceramics
• Cork
• Glass
• Leather
• Metal
• Paper
• Plastic
• Rubber
• Textiles
• Wood

• Industries: Area to which the coaster belongs and which is promoted by the coaster. Current options are:

• Airline
• Beer Brewery
• Beer Hall
• Beer Related Industry
• Brewpub
• Cider
• Hotel
• Hotel & Brewery
• Hotel-Restaurant
• Other Beverages
• Promotional
• Pub / Bar
• Restaurant
• Soda
• Tourism
• Train

• Years: The year of issue of the coaster. Many coasters are in use for several years, so it is quite difficult to retrospectively identify the first year of issue.
• Recently updated: Coasters where at least one piece of information was changed in the last 30 calendar days. The last change applied is used to determine the change age of the coaster. This can be further filtered by the last 1, 3, 7, 14 and 30 calendar days.
• Newly Added: This is not a real property but allows you to quickly find coasters that were added to the catalog up to 30 days ago. You can display coasters added in the last 1, 3, 7, 14 or 30 days.
• Import Log: A list of all New Item Forms (NIFs) that have been imported since 2013. It shows date, the person who created the NIF, the coordinator who imported it, the number of coasters imported, and the country of the coasters. Please note that it is not possible to find the coasters that were in the NIF, this information is not stored in the database.

The catalog also contains other properties to further describe the coasters:

• Name: The name of the coaster. The name can have up to 60 characters.
• Company: The company or producer of the coaster or coaster's brand.
• Series: Only available if the coaster is part of a series of coasters. Clicking on the series name shows a list of all coasters in the series.
• Location: The location, e.g. town or city, of the issuing company.
• Catalog Name: The name of the catalog used for the catalog number. Currently only Colnect Codes (Colnect's own numbering system) is used.
• Catalog Code: The Colnect Code consists of the ISO 3166-1 Alpha-2 country code where the coaster was issued, a hyphen and a consecutive 6-digit number. Example: DE-000087

DE: ISO 3166-1 Alpha-2 for Germany, Federal Republic -: Hyphen 000087: Consecutive number

• Variants: If variants of this coaster have been marked, by clicking on Click to see variants all variants are listed.
• Size: The size of the coaster in millimeters. For circular coasters only one number is given (diameter), for all others, including oval, width and height are given. For irregularly shaped coasters the total width and total height is given defined by the rectangle needed to cover the complete coaster.
• Description: The coaster or how it varies from its variants can be described in detail.
• Front Picture and Back Picture: Both front and back of the coaster should be pictured, as the back often contains important information about the issuer, author, motif, number and hints to determine the age. Please follow the Picture Guidelines.

Specific information

The wiki can host information related to a group of coasters that cannot be added to individual coasters.

• Beer Coaster Company - Binding explains the differences between the Dir und mir series.

See Also

• Beer Coaster collecting
• Beer Coaster Variants