Selling my beer!!!!!

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dirtymike1

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Does anyone here sell any of there brews? Who knows the laws and such (depending on the state that you live in) to be able to sell. A friend of mine in VA Beach is looking at buying a bar and asked me what it would take to sell my beer?! This might go from hobby to business if I can play my cards right!!!
 
dirtymike1 said:
Does anyone here sell any of there brews? Who knows the laws and such (depending on the state that you live in) to be able to sell. A friend of mine in VA Beach is looking at buying a bar and asked me what it would take to sell my beer?! This might go from hobby to business if I can play my cards right!!!

This is a regular topic around here. The long and the short? You'll need a license from the state ABC, which will run you in the thousands of dollars. This license also requires, if I remember correctly, that you have a working professional brewery that complies with OSHA regs, etc, and that you brew something on the order of 10,000 gallons/year at the very least.

In other words, brewing up a few 10-gallon batches on your patio and selling them to your buddy who owns a bar is not feasible.
 
You have to sell a lot of homebrew just to cover your licensing fees and other bull crap taxes before you even make one penny of profit.

I've thought of it, but then it will become work instead of a hobby I enjoy.

Bee Cave Brewery will become a reality this month, but it will remain a private amature venture for my own enjoyment as well as my guests. No tip jar needed.
 
Not to rain on your parade at all, but I just feel like people ask this question about once per week without even considering how difficult or how much a PITA it will be... Aka, they aren't very serious, but pretend to be....

If you are truly planning on doing this, you best start your research and it best be more than asking HBT for their opinions. Further, it's probably going to be a few years before you can put your "business plan" (drafting one of those up should probably be your first goal) into action.

From the little I've researched and read, you'll need to acquire the appropriate licenses, be inspected by the FDA or other health organizations, etc. Further, you are definitely going to need to expand your brewery beyond 5-10g batches, if you want to do this seriously. Equipment = money, so get that business plan drafted and hope a bank will finance you (unless you are really loaded). You'll need boiling equipment, fermenters, and conditioning tanks (SS isn't cheap), you'll need a bottling line or kegging line if you plan to distribute, etc. You'll need a location... you probably can't run something like this in a garage (and make any money).

Then of course, you probably don't want to go through all this hassle to sell to your one friend's bar. You are going to want to sell to many bars and distribute... So, you better have a good marketing plan and some good beer - beers that have probably taken medals, etc. would be best, but aren't 100% necessary. Many professional brewers have attended schooling at USC-Davis, Seibel, etc. and REALLY know their stuff. Wayyyyy beyond what most of us understand from reading 6-10 homebrewing books...

It's definitely not going to be as easy as that cell-phone commercial makes it look where you just go out and start soliciting bars to take your beer... so if you are serious, it will be a while before you "sell" your first legal beer. If you have just recently started brewing (45 posts?), I would say you have a ways to go before you'll be able to make this into a successful "business". Also, keep in mind, turning a hobby into a business may not always be the best idea...

I wish you luck, God knows I wish I could just up and quit my job and open a brew-pub, but I just don't have the ability (read: my bank account is pretty good, but not THAT good!) to quit my job, nor do I think I am a good enough brewer after only 1.5 years brewing with extract and 6 months brewing all-grain, to really make a go of it. Maybe in 10 years or so...

If you asked simply out of curiosity, cool, but run a search and the question has been asked MANY times (with only a very select few honestly taking it on) but if you are serious, then I would get serious... There is some good knowledge on this board, but you'll definitely need to go outside the board also. And like I said, it you are serious, go at it full-bore starting now. It's going to take a little while to do this correctly.
 
Evan! said:
This is a regular topic around here. The long and the short? You'll need a license from the state ABC, which will run you in the thousands of dollars. This license also requires, if I remember correctly, that you have a working professional brewery that complies with OSHA regs, etc, and that you brew something on the order of 10,000 gallons/year at the very least.

In other words, brewing up a few 10-gallon batches on your patio and selling them to your buddy who owns a bar is not feasible.

Why didn't I just type this... would have saved myself paragraphs. This is exactly what I was trying to say, but in 5,000 less characters. Ha-ha. :mug:
 
Boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.......

I hate how the Fed's and the State have to have there hands in everything. Well I'll see if I can talk him into converting it into a brewpub insteed of just a bar! He's the one with all the money anyway.
 
Even running a brew-pub isn't going to be easy... almost all of us (thousands) here have considered it and only like... 1? 2? 3? have actually taken a stab at it and put their plans into motion (Brewtopia is the latest... he might be able to lend some insight - it's probably one of the linked threads above).

Not sure if they've been linked above or mentioned above, but there are some books on the subject (Brewing up a Business) and a probrewers forum similar to this one...
 
I lurk over at ProBrewer just for ****s and giggles, and the consensus seems to be that starting out with anything less than a 7bbl system isn't feasible. If you're going to do this commercially, in addition to all of the legal issues you need to make investments in serious equipment, which means financing. A bank and any reasonably intelligent "angel" investor is going to require a viable business plan.
 
Yes this ways more out of curiosity then anyhting else, and I know I should have searched before just posting a new thread. But I was looking to see if anyone had tried it here in this wonderful Common Wealth that I live in (VA) because it seems that everything in this CW is nothing but a headache and a nightmare.
 
No problem... with the very few here who have actually tried it, I can't recall any from VA.

Your best bet is to search the legal codes, probrewers forum, read a book or two. And maybe the best idea would be to seek out the owners of your favorite brew-pubs while you are hanging out and see what they can tell you...

Good luck!
 
dirtymike1 said:
Yes this ways more out of curiosity then anyhting else, and I know I should have searched before just posting a new thread. But I was looking to see if anyone had tried it here in this wonderful Common Wealth that I live in (VA) because it seems that everything in this CW is nothing but a headache and a nightmare.

Dude, it's not just VA. This country is getting more and more authoritarian, to the point that you gotta get a license to take a piss. Restricting who can open a brewery is actually pretty low on the lengthy list of gov't intrusions into our lives. Hell, the gubmint takes about about 50% of my mother's income because she's a small business owner. Fifty percent. FIFTY. Meanwhile we have the highest imprisonment rate among developed nations, much of which is related to the war on [certain] drugs. I'm not gonna rant too much on it, but suffice to say, we're on the way to hell.

I'm rarely surprised anymore when I learn that the gubmint restricts something or taxes something. :(
 
We are very fortunate in the state of Washington in that, the licensing for a microbrewery/brewpub is very cheap.

Microbrewery = $100 (Annual Production up to 60,000 bbls but no less than 250 gal.)
Restaurant/Bar = $120 (On-premise sales beer/wine)
Off premise sales = $120 (Kegs, growlers & packaged beer to go)

It's the 65 pages of paperwork that the TTB requires that's the biggest PITA!

I began researching and writing my business plan for Naked City over 5 years ago.

We have had a few homebrewer's open up commercial production operations in Seattle in locations called ActivSpace. Each of them brew on 1/2 bbl homebrew systems and self distribute to local bars or just sell direct to customers from the brewery. Schooner Exact was the first to do this and opened a little over a year ago. They have been successful and just purchased a 7 bbl system. They are currently looking for warehouse space.

You can read the stories of two of these small homebrew startups by clicking on the links below.

Schooner Exact Brewing Co.

Two Beers Brewery

Not sure what the laws are in your part of the country for this type of operation but, if you just want to supply a couple of local bars, this would be the way to go.

You will however, have to keep your day job.

Good luck. :mug:
 
Evan! said:
Dude, it's not just VA. This country is getting more and more authoritarian, to the point that you gotta get a license to take a piss. Restricting who can open a brewery is actually pretty low on the lengthy list of gov't intrusions into our lives. Hell, the gubmint takes about about 50% of my mother's income because she's a small business owner. Fifty percent. FIFTY. Meanwhile we have the highest imprisonment rate among developed nations, much of which is related to the war on [certain] drugs. I'm not gonna rant too much on it, but suffice to say, we're on the way to hell.

I'm rarely surprised anymore when I learn that the gubmint restricts something or taxes something. :(

Oh no, here he goes again :D

To the OP - we all think about it from time to time, but as others have said above, turning this hobby into a profession takes years of planning, tens of thousands of dollars and requires many licenses and paperwork.
 
ohiobrewtus said:
Oh no, here he goes again :D

To the OP - we all think about it from time to time, but as others have said above, turning this hobby into a profession takes years of planning, tens of thousands of dollars and requires many licenses and paperwork.

Kinda takes all the fun out of brewing imo. :(
 
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