philgoddard Apr 22, 2021:

The sentence you're asking about doesn't seem to follow on from the previous one - it switches from the third person to the first.

Edith Kelly (asker) Apr 22, 2021:

the 2 previous sentences Katherine Smart (née Wood) devoted her PhD thesis to understanding how to render the abundant sediment of yeast settled to the bottom of those bottles in as tight and adhesive a state as possible. Now the sometimes intensely turbid “East Coast IPAs” represent a huge proportion of the market in the United States.

philgoddard Apr 22, 2021:

I think it probably is something to do with Bass, but I'm not sure anyone would call it "Bass's". And I agree with Chris that the previous sentence would be useful.

Edith Kelly (asker) Apr 22, 2021:

Helen please post as an answer. Now it makes perfect sense. And thanks to everyone who racked their brains.

Edith Kelly (asker) Apr 22, 2021:

Helen you are dead on ....

Chris Ellison Apr 22, 2021:

What's the preceding line? That might help us a lot with the context.

Tony M Apr 22, 2021:

@ Althea Interestingly enough, this is almost the same expression as the FR 'cul de sac' (literaly, 'bag ass'! — albeit being used with a different sense.
I was only slightly humorously seeking to imply that a Scots firm would be less likely to shy away from "calling a spade a spade", and by the way they have used the expression here, it rather sounds as if it has been assimilated into industry jargon...

Helen Genevier Apr 22, 2021:

Some link with Bass the brewer, which made Hooper's Hooch? Perhaps something like: At Bass's, at the time, we were furthermore producing drink concepts that...

Shilpa Baliga Apr 22, 2021:

@ Asker, is this a transcription? If so, @Althea, can you say "being us" in a way that a transcriber might write "bin ass/arse"?

Althea Draper Apr 22, 2021:

As a Scot, I can say that Glasgow itself, never mind the whole of Scotland, has a wide variety of accents and/or dialects depending on whereabouts in the city you are. Also, just because the company was based in Glasgow doesn't mean that the author was from Glasgow - he could, for example, be from Edinburgh's Morningside or the Western Isles which have completely different ways of speaking!
I'm inclined to agree with Tony that it's possibly some sort of derogatory term, however a Scotsman would be unlikely to use the word 'ass' (unless he had borrowed the 'bin ass' term from America ), he would say 'arse'!

Tony M Apr 22, 2021:

@ Asker From what follows, it seems to suggest that althugh at that time they were the bin ass, their products introduced at that period have now become leading innovations and popular.
I'd see 'bin ass' as being a rather vulgar (but appropriate for Glasgow!) way of saying "the bottom of the barrel" — the products that were left at the bottom of the bin (or other sales unit) because they were so unpopular, no-one wanted them and they were left till last — like being the last child picked for a sports team at school!

So from being previously unwanted products, these same products are now seen as 'pioneers', 'innovative', and have generally found popularity.

Elisa Paglia Apr 22, 2021:

being us I think so too.
I check at this link https://sounds.bl.uk/Accents-and-dialects/
If there was a transcription typo and the speaker had a Scottish accent this is a reasonable option.

Shilpa Baliga Apr 22, 2021:

Being us?? i.e. "being the kind of innovative company we are..."

(I tried to say it to myself in a Glaswegian accent...)