so I thought it was a brew store...

"brew your own beer" the sign said. So I pulled a U'ey and pulled into the parking lot. I went inside all ready to pick up some ingredients to experiment with a new batch....BUT to my dismay, there where no shelves...there was no store clerk...no grains, no yeast, no hops..... (FOR SALE at least) But there was giant brew kettles, and large dispensers of different malts and such...

I walked past another room and saw what looked like lots of little cubbies with all different brew buckets and carboya fermenting away.... "wierd" I thought.

well it turns out, you brew your beer right at the store. They provide you with EVERYTHING you need to brew a normal 5 gallon batch of beer.... fermentor, cooking equipment, and even the grains/malt/hops/water and the different recipee to match EXACTLY what beer you want to brew..... crazzy !:rockin:

All for a small fee of $120 a batch !!! ............

are they Nuckin Futz ??? for 120 bucks I could pay RETAIL price for an entire brewing and bottling KIT, with EVERYTHING I need, THEN buy all the ingredients, brew a batch, and STILL have money left over.....

whata u guys think ? would u shop there ??

are suckers...I mean people really paying that much to do that there in the store? Man I wish I would have thought of that...

Novelty brewers, thats it. I wish there was one of those "brew your own places around" I would pay a decent fee to have a place to brew and then bring it home to ferment. I dont have a turkey fryer and me hose is off during the winter so brewing is hard. Apfelwein on deck it is.!!!

I guess if you have that kind on money to spend it would be nice. Just go brew a batch and let them clean up the mess. I wonder if they bottle it for you too, just come back and pick up the finished product?

IIRC at least one member of our forum owns or works in one of those brew your own shops..I wouldn't diss it, just because it's not your cup of tea. Betcha BYO shops are gateways for quite a few people to enter into our obsession...it give people a taste.

And not everyone WANTS or has the space for the gear, or is obsessed with beer as we are, and this fill the niche for those whit the income and inclination...

The way I see it, anything opening people's minds about the hobby and beer in general, is a good thing. This is another offshoot of Charlie Papazian's influence, that we have people with buisiness such as these...people living the dream of being bear evangelists...

It's also another opportunity to teach someone that all beer isn't fuzzy and yellow and filtered...

Hey, it's Thanksgiving, rather than trash a legitiment and hopefully profitable venture that exposes people to something beyond bmc and may even spread positive light on homebrewing, we should be grateful that we live in a country where they don't cut your hands off for making alcohol...or that you live in Utah, where it's still illegal..

The way I look at it, a patron of that place, or the residents in a community that has one, in one less person to think,

1)You can go blind from drinking homebrew
2) it's illegal
3) you're making meth in your garage
4) budweiser is the best and only beer in the land...

Hell, I wouldn't dis it, I'd get to know the owner and the staff, maybe bring a few beers of my own to them...You never know when they might have a hard to find hop, or specialty grain in their inventory when you need them and the lhbs is closed, or out of it...or maybe they'll let you use their bottling machine if noone is...I hear those small bottling machines for BYO shops are sweet...

illnastyimpreza said:

"brew your own beer" the sign said. So I pulled a U'ey and pulled into the parking lot. I went inside all ready to pick up some ingredients to experiment with a new batch....BUT to my dismay, there where no shelves...there was no store clerk...no grains, no yeast, no hops..... (FOR SALE at least) But there was giant brew kettles, and large dispensers of different malts and such...

I walked past another room and saw what looked like lots of little cubbies with all different brew buckets and carboya fermenting away.... "wierd" I thought.

well it turns out, you brew your beer right at the store. They provide you with EVERYTHING you need to brew a normal 5 gallon batch of beer.... fermentor, cooking equipment, and even the grains/malt/hops/water and the different recipee to match EXACTLY what beer you want to brew..... crazzy !:rockin:

All for a small fee of $120 a batch !!! ............

are they Nuckin Futz ??? for 120 bucks I could pay RETAIL price for an entire brewing and bottling KIT, with EVERYTHING I need, THEN buy all the ingredients, brew a batch, and STILL have money left over.....

whata u guys think ? would u shop there ??

Click to expand...

I know two people who have done this. It was a business deal. They were taken there by a sales rep. and had a great time. They brewed one day, designed a label, and returned in about a month to bottle. They said they had a great time. They were allowed to sample house beers while they were there. Plenty of time for samples = needing a sober sales rep to drive them home. hahahaha.

They haven't continued with the HB process, but I inherited 42 - 22 ounce bottles from the adventure. YEA!

The local brew on premise promises 50-22oz bottles of beer from your own batch. That is closer to a 10gal batch. The costs are around $120 and you don't have to worry about the mess or the equipment. Its not a bad deal if you want to do group brews occasionally or you just want to try the hobby without investing in the equipment.

Myself I just bought the starter it and started brewing. Decided I wanted to do it at home on my own schedule. But I do see the point in brew on premise stores. The people I know who have used them enjoyed the experience and usually the beer also.

Craig

There is one of these in NJ. They will sell ingrediants to home brewers. Did you ask them? I kind of like buying stuff there, I think it might be fresher since they go through so much stuff for the people who brew at their facility.

Just a thought . . .

Say your local pub is interested in your buying some of your beer, but that's not legal. If you ran one of these BYO's and he sent his dishwasher over to help on brew day you could charge him a fee and he gets the beer.

Lots of holes in this one

dzlater said:

There is one of these in NJ. They will sell ingrediants to home brewers. Did you ask them? I kind of like buying stuff there, I think it might be fresher since they go through so much stuff for the people who brew at their facility.

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Heck even if they didn't NORMALLY sell to homebrewers...a good connection with them could net all matter of freebies or deals....Slugs of yeast...equipment they are getting rid of...who knows.

If I had one in town, I'd even consider working there a couple nights a week, or a couple saturdays a month, just to help out...Imagine bringing in your own batches to bottle on their system at least.

The owner of my tiny lhbs down the street is considering adding that feature to his shop...I told him I'd come in and help out on occassion and trade supplies for labor...Work for four hours and walk out with a 50 pound sack of two row?

There's one of these about 9 miles from me,closer than any LHBS,and they have sold me ingredients before. Just had to bring my own containers. Very nice people who appeared to not be in the business just as a way to make money. One of the things I noticed when I've been there is the social aspect of brewing this way... it looks like a group of old friends getting together for a brew session. If it wasn't too much money I might do it that way now and then myself.

Brew Camp!

A friend of mine use to hold running camps. He’d hire a few elite runners and coaches, rent a facility in a remote location. Did a weekend filled with seminars and group runs with some one on one instruction thrown in. Never had a problem getting enough new runners or those just looking to improve to pay for the service.

Has this ever been tried for brewing? Would be some great stories for the “how I spent my summer vacation” discussions in the office. Bet people would pay a good buck to attend something like this.

Shhhhhh . . . . lets keep this a secret :cross:

AnOldUR said:

Brew Camp!

A friend of mine use to hold running camps. He’d hire a few elite runners and coaches, rent a facility in a remote location. Did a weekend filled with seminars and group runs with some one on one instruction thrown in. Never had a problem getting enough new runners or those just looking to improve to pay for the service.

Has this ever been tried for brewing? Would be some great stories for the “how I spent my summer vacation” discussions in the office. Bet people would pay a good buck to attend something like this.

Shhhhhh . . . . lets keep this a secret :cross:

Click to expand...

You could really be on to something there. Develop a curriculum for one day and weekend camps. Get folks introduced to the concepts, nomenclature and do a guided brew session. I know lots of community colleges have outside folks come in and teach specific units of a given class, maybe tie in with that concept? I think the idea has great potential.

I thought I'd seen it all...The price seems kinda steep, but if they clean up the mess, well, I'm sure they'll be people interested. I look at it this way, if they get just a few people after brewing their batch there to try it at home, then they can potentially become advocates for brewing at home as well, and the enjoyment of craft brews.

TeufelBrew said:

You could really be on to something there. Develop a curriculum for one day and weekend camps. Get folks introduced to the concepts, nomenclature and do a guided brew session. I know lots of community colleges have outside folks come in and teach specific units of a given class, maybe tie in with that concept? I think the idea has great potential.

Click to expand...

We can get the likes of Ed, Bob, Revvy, Yoopers to conduct the seminars

Or maybe Ed can open a Brew university in his shed

www.brew.edu

illnastyimpreza said:

whata u guys think ? would u shop there ??

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Umm.. not so much...

At the place near me you do a 12gal batch and the prices start at $125.00 and go up to $200.00 depending on what your brewing.

Sounds like a good idea. I know that a gift card was given to be and I hadn't home brewed yet, this would seal the deal and I would jump in with both feet! It would seem to make sense to sell ingredients as well though for those that tried it and bought their own equipment.

It sounds like this kind of place has a lot of potential as a place to meet other homebrewers, talk about, learn about brewing, so after I had a couple of simple batches (E.g. Coopers extract kits) under my belt, I thought I'd check out the local U-brew.

I figured I'd do a batch, hopefully learn some new ideas for moving beyond the simple kit-in-a-cans, but the owners really discourage customers from participating in the brewing process beyond the minimum required to qualify as a brew-on-premises. I don't know what the laws are in other places, but in Ontario, the only part of the brewing process that has to be done by the customer is pitching the yeast. Basically the entire focus is of the operation is producing beer that is cheaper and marginally better than BMC, rather than on enjoying the brewing process. The customer is simply expected to come in, dump a pack of dry yeast into the already prepared wort, then come back a few weeks later to bottle.

Unfortunately the U-brew is the closest we've got to an LHBS in Thunder Bay. They will (reluctantly) sell hops pellets and bulk malt extract, but the times I been in they sure didn't seem interested in talking about recipes or brewing or anything. I guess it's all about how the business is run.

They have wine places like this as well. They charge $300 for 30 bottles. If you buy the kit at your homebrew shop it costs $100.

Someone will do it ......once.

Forrest

There's a place like that about an hour from here, but you do 12.5 gallon batches and they have copper steam-heated kettles and nice conical fermenters in temp controlled chambers and whatnot. I could see doing it with all that.
How it Works

Ive never heard of this before. It sounds great for someone who wants to learn how to brew before making the big investment, and you get to do your first brew with someone there to help you so you don't mess it up and waste money.

We did this for our wedding. IIRC, it was a 10 gallon batch and included the bottles. We did two batches. Also, we bottled using CO2 so there was no sediment, and we didn't have to wait a month to drink it. I only have a 5 gallon pot, so for the amount of beer we needed it made sense.

Haven't used an on-premises store myself, but a friend in Orange County says it's a good way to crank out 10 batches of beer in a weekend. He has a setup, but was asked to provide homebrew for a wedding. He's even more grateful for the semi-automatic bottler!

Brew-On-Premise (or BOP) stores have been around since pretty much the beginning of the craft beer industry. I rather like 'em. Yeah, you pay a premium over buying equipment and using your own space, but consider this...

Who among us is pressed for time and space? Who among us has steam-jacketed kettles and mash vessels? Who among us has temperature-controlled, jacketed, glycol-chilled conical fermenters? Anyone?

BOPs provide a valuable service to lots of different people. First is, as has been noted, the rank n00b who wants to dip his toe into this brewing thing under expert tutelage. Second is the neat experience for someone who enjoys beer but doesn't really understand the process; run him through a session at your local BOP, split the cost of the batch, and you each walk away with 24 bombers of excellent beer. Third is the person who, also noted, wants a special-label, special-occasion gift.

The list goes on.

Now, somebody mentioned training camps. My LHBS - Keystone Homebrew - regularly conducts instruction days at their Montgomeryville, PA store. It's a great idea. If you have an active local homebrew club, suggest such a thing at your next meeting. One of the members is sure to have space available; one the members of my club (Lehigh Valley Homebrewers) has a farm the barn of which is used every year for Teach A Friend To Homebrew day. Get your local experts to conduct beginner's hands-on sessions at a central location. The experts don't brew; they just watch over the n00bs, gently correcting where correction might be needed, teaching all the while.

Odd that someone should mention the local community college as a possible venue. In fact, members of LVHBC recently gave a tutored tasting class at one of the Lehigh Valley community colleges. I am given to understand it was a particular success.

Bob

I have thought of something like that but never really knew if a lot of people would do it. But for $120 a batch i bet i could make some bank on it. But its always cool to get homebrewing recognized and get people into it. nobody knows how much they are getting ripped off....they just don't know yet

BobNQ3X said:

Now, somebody mentioned training camps. My LHBS - Keystone Homebrew - regularly conducts instruction days at their Montgomeryville, PA store. It's a great idea. If you have an active local homebrew club, suggest such a thing at your next meeting. One of the members is sure to have space available; one the members of my club (Lehigh Valley Homebrewers) has a farm the barn of which is used every year for Teach A Friend To Homebrew day. Get your local experts to conduct beginner's hands-on sessions at a central location. The experts don't brew; they just watch over the n00bs, gently correcting where correction might be needed, teaching all the while.

Odd that someone should mention the local community college as a possible venue. In fact, members of LVHBC recently gave a tutored tasting class at one of the Lehigh Valley community colleges. I am given to understand it was a particular success.

Bob

Click to expand...

Yeah Bob I've been toying with the idea of teaching some beer related classes at the local communtiy college...I've thought about a brewing class, but have been having trouble coming up with the layout of the class...how does one teach a class about a process that takes about a 7-8 weeks for it to be completed...I've thought about starting a thread asking for brewing teachers to send me their syllabi, so I can get an idea...

I've also thought about teaching one shot beer tastings and beer with food pairing seminars...

Interesting I've gone from teaching workshops on sex, men's issues, spirituality, to wanting to teach about beer.....

hmmm


(Oh I've also wanted to hook up with the musuem in town...they host a "feast of St Clair" weekend that recreates the voyageur, american, british and indian experience during the French/Indian war in our area....They recreate the Fort that was up here...I thought it would be interesting to do an historical brew there...Some guy has inspired me...)

The HBS within 35 minutes of me is a brew on prem. The batch size is something like 11 gallons and the price is what I'd expect given the overhead. They're holding your hand, paying for the energy costs, fermenting in a temp controlled walk-in, printed labels, etc. I think at least 10% of my homebrew club membership got started by running a few batches at the BOP. It's not for me but I get it. My biggest gripe is that they don't offer any all grain options.

I've coupled up with an adult school and advertised brewing classes for 3 seasons straight with absolutely ZERO bites on the class.

Sager Brewing Co. said:

It sounds great for someone who wants to learn how to brew before making the big investment, and you get to do your first brew with someone there to help you so you don't mess it up and waste money.

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That's what I was thinking. I often wonder how many people start to research this hobby out, find Internet forums and get overwhelmed by talk of sanitation, off flavors, infections, oxidation, bottle bombs, boil overs.

This gives them an opportunity to see the process, get hands on experience and have the resource of someone to ask questions.

Revvy said:

Yeah Bob I've been toying with the idea of teaching some beer related classes at the local communtiy college...I've thought about a brewing class, but have been having trouble coming up with the layout of the class...how does one teach a class about a process that takes about a 7-8 weeks for it to be completed...I've thought about starting a thread asking for brewing teachers to send me their syllabi, so I can get an idea...

I've also thought about teaching one shot beer tastings and beer with food pairing seminars...

Interesting I've gone from teaching workshops on sex, men's issues, spirituality, to wanting to teach about beer.....

hmmm


(Oh I've also wanted to hook up with the musuem in town...they host a "feast of St Clair" weekend that recreates the voyageur, american, british and indian experience during the French/Indian war in our area....They recreate the Fort that was up here...I thought it would be interesting to do an historical brew there...Some guy has inspired me...)

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I for one would take the trip to Mecca....ahem....Port Huron.

Seriously Rev. If you taught a class, brew the first week after providing an outline of the steps in brewing.
Then spend the next 7 or 8 weeks discussing history, ingredients, equipment, problem solving...

Then take the beer that was brewed first week and have a final

This falls in with my '12-pack analogy' that I use when people ask me about my homebrewing hobby. The question is invariably asked, "Isn't it cheaper just to go down to the store and buy the beer?"

So I explain that a 12-pack of premium beer cost $15 (with all the CRV & taxes) and there are about 4, 12-packs in a 5 gallon batch (+/-)= $60. Ingredients for homebrew cost about $30 or so. Couple that with the idea of tayloring the brew to your own taste, etc., etc.

Now if you apply this analogy to the 'brew-your-own shop' ($120 for 50-22oz), it falls just short of buying the beer at the store. However, if you factor in making the brew to your taste and not having to clean-up the mess, etc., etc., then it starts looking more attractive. I like it.

there's a place called "u-brew" like that here in australia, but they only charge a bit above the ingredients price, it's pretty reasonable. so reasonable in fact that my landlord is confused why i bought all this equipment when i can just brew there

I agree that the brew on premise bit is a great idea. Hell, there's a place in portland ( 1 1/2 hrs north) that has a brew on premise thing - I almost drove there to pay extra... simply because of the initial investment, cleanup time, fear of failure, etc. Had I lived closer to a brew on premise place I would have started brewing far earlier (Notice... member for 3 years, 15 or so posts....) because it would have been the baby step I wanted.

20 days ago I finally got around to brewing my first... a heffe... If I'd had a brew on premise close by I'd probably be 3 years in by now....

I started at a u brew place back when I lived in Vancouver. It was about $110 for a 48 litre batch (prices have gone up a little since then). It was a great way to start and was a lot of fun. The people there really love beer and it was an awesome place to spend some time on a saturday afternoon. They'll give you a couple pints of whatever they have available as you're brewing. I had no clue what I was doing the first time, but they walked me through it (I also got a lot of help from the friendly regulars). I even tried to clean up after I had a boil over, but they wouldn't let me.

They only do extract with steeping grains, but i recently read on their website that they are getting set up for an all grain option. That would be really cool.

Beer Evangelist...I like it

I heard our LBH is looking to offer this feature in their store too.

It is funny how the things that use to be unthinkable luxuries, over time, come closer to necessities. When I was a young buck I backpacked all over Europe, AK and the western US. The thought of an RV was blasphemy. Now as I knock on the door of 50 I kinda like the idea of a nice mattress and a hot shower. Brewing in a comfortable location, not having to step over and around kettles and fermentors in a little home might be a nice thing. I wish them well.

The LHBS I use has a 6 week homebrew class (one night per week). I took it after I had been brewing on my own for about a year. I wanted to see what I was doing right. There were quite a difference in the experience levels of the students. Some of them had never brewed anything. Overall I'm glad I took the class.
With the amount of beer drank during the class, I think they guy that runs it must just break even. It was nice to be able to taste a lot of different styles of beer without having to buy a 6-pack of each. We brewed a partial mash/extract beer the first night, and the last night, we brewed an all grain beer.

Revvy said:

IIRC at least one member of our forum owns or works in one of those brew your own shops..I wouldn't diss it, just because it's not your cup of tea. Betcha BYO shops are gateways for quite a few people to enter into our obsession...it give people a taste.

And not everyone WANTS or has the space for the gear, or is obsessed with beer as we are, and this fill the niche for those whit the income and inclination...

The way I see it, anything opening people's minds about the hobby and beer in general, is a good thing. This is another offshoot of Charlie Papazian's influence, that we have people with buisiness such as these...people living the dream of being bear evangelists...

It's also another opportunity to teach someone that all beer isn't fuzzy and yellow and filtered...

Hey, it's Thanksgiving, rather than trash a legitiment and hopefully profitable venture that exposes people to something beyond bmc and may even spread positive light on homebrewing, we should be grateful that we live in a country where they don't cut your hands off for making alcohol...or that you live in Utah, where it's still illegal..

The way I look at it, a patron of that place, or the residents in a community that has one, in one less person to think,

1)You can go blind from drinking homebrew
2) it's illegal
3) you're making meth in your garage
4) budweiser is the best and only beer in the land...

Hell, I wouldn't dis it, I'd get to know the owner and the staff, maybe bring a few beers of my own to them...You never know when they might have a hard to find hop, or specialty grain in their inventory when you need them and the lhbs is closed, or out of it...or maybe they'll let you use their bottling machine if noone is...I hear those small bottling machines for BYO shops are sweet...

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Oh CRAP! I just brewed a dunkel yesterday. Please don't call the cops!