When we moved into the house in 1998 I was just starting to homebrew and I had my dorm fridge, purchased in 1985, as my DBF. As the hobby progressed I either purchased or was given a fridge from a friend and I used it for beer and fermentation. It died not long after and I purchased a fridge and an upright chest freezer which was for fermentation, and beer. Eventually I got an 8’ long bottle cooler. We purchased a side-by-side and I think I gave away the garage fridge moving the house fridge out there. It was much more energy efficient having been bought in 1994. Well over time things have died. The bottle cooler died and I was sad for days. Loved that thing although it was an energy hog. The upright freezer crapped out and it had to go. I was left with my single fridge from 1994 and my wife started taking over space to where I no longer had a DBF.
Fast forward to last year when my wife wanted to ferment some kraut so I setup the old dorm fridge on a temp controller. So now at least I had something which wasn’t ambient temps to store beer. Recently my wife reminded me we had never purchased a fridge for the kitchen which we remodeled in 2011. I broke down and purchased a fridge which was delivered yesterday and we moved our side-by-side to the garage. The beauty of it all is I now have my DBF back and of course if I needed to I could load up the side-by-side. My wife had been mentioning how much beer I had in the garage fridge so I made it a point to move here beers, wines, and ciders to the side-by-side. As it turns out she had almost as many beverages as I did in the DBF.
Anyway, I am celebrating the return of a DBF to the house. Sure I have some water and Gatorade in there as well as sausage casings, dry yeast, etc. But just having the fridge back is a wonderful feeling! 