Show of hands: Who doesn't want to go into commercial brewing?

When I worked at Deschutes I would see brewers work their way up the corporate ladder to Head Brewer and end up hating it as they didn't brew anymore once they did.

If you were brewing specialty beers at the Pub or working for a place like Dogfish I think it could remain exciting but the thought of going in day after day to brew batch after batch of Black Butte would get old in a hurry.

BendBrewer said:

When I worked at Deschutes I would see brewers work their way up the corporate ladder to Head Brewer and end up hating it as they didn't brew anymore once they did.

If you were brewing specialty beers at the Pub or working for a place like Dogfish I think it could remain exciting but the thought of going in day after day to brew batch after batch of Black Butte would get old in a hurry.

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That's the "industrial process" part that doesn't seem as appealing to me. Brewing in a brewpub setting, talking with the consumers on site, etc is a lot more personal.

It's such a social drink but the industrial process wipes that out once you reach a certain point.

I still have aspirations, but it is more about building a brand than anything else.. For now, I will gladly settle for my own personal brew pub / brewery I've built in my backyard.

Randar said:

That's the "industrial process" part that doesn't seem as appealing to me. Brewing in a brewpub setting, talking with the consumers on site, etc is a lot more personal.

It's such a social drink but the industrial process wipes that out once you reach a certain point.

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Yeah, Cascade Lakes has a 6 bbl system at one of their pubs that I have seen used once and only once. I am going to talk those guys into letting me do a guest brew one of these days with it. Now THAT sounds like it would be fun.

EinGutesBiersSWMBO said:

Is there anyone else out there that feels the same?

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Strictly a hobby for me. My guess is the failure rate for commercial brewers is probably above 95%.

good question. I suppose if I won the mega millions and I didn't have anything to do except fish and brew I would maybe open a small craft beer joint. just one location though. The whole keeping up on the money aspect would be a pain.

It's sort of weird. I do dream of owning my own brewpub (or chains if it became popular enough) but wouldn't actually want to do the brewing. I'd more or less like to be the one who thinks of the ideas but actually has someone else brew. I'd want to do more of the general oversight of the whole restaurant.

I have absolutely no interest in turning a hobby into a business. I did that once many years ago. Ended up not doing what Imloved but spent all of my time on the business end ( which i hated ). Totally turned me off to that hobby. I don't want to do it with another one....


Brew for fun and enjoyment. Leave the business stuff to someone else.

If I turned my hobby into a job, I would have to find a new hobby.

well im partial on this one. have been restaurant background for 10 years and have done everything from being a host/busboy to cook/prep to server and management, so i know what it take to do it.. ive always wanted to open a pub/alehouse type deal for a long time and i know i would do great at it. but i also realize the time it takes for a owner to become successful can be a while... BUT if you love doing something so much then why not do it.. you cant knock the ones who do because if you dont try, how will you ever know..

just like jfr1111, you going to school for law.. going to spend a hell of a lot of money doing that, your not becoming a lawyer just b/c you think you can make lots of money at it, your prob also doing b/c you think/know youll be good at and become your own firm someday or a judge, (and talk about long days). or the engineer up the page a little bit. both of those jobs take lots of time to become good and make money.

now, if you have no business trying to become a big brewery then lets be real, think it through a little more than that, but if you have the skill set and knowledge, and a good business plan then i say go ahead and do it.. Hell, what if Sam Calagione said theirs no way i can do this.. we wouldnt have a lot of great bear im sure much of us enjoy..

thanks for reading folks,

jamesnsw said:

I already ruined 1 hobby by making it my job, and brewing became my new keep-me-sane hobby. So I'm hoping to stay amateur- I don't think that will be a hard goal to attain.

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Been there and done that. Had a hobby. Was good at it. So good in fact I became a local "go-to" guy. Turned it into a business. Things were cool - loved the work and the side income. Then the recession hit - any my business dealt in livestock - so I was stuck. Now I am greatly scaled back , converted said business back to a hobby, albeit on a huge scale due to the buildings and structures I acquired over the life of the business, and I enjoy it again.

No way I would want to ruin the special times I have brewing with trying to make it into a business.

If there was anything I would like to be different, anything at all, it would be the lines of selling the beer I make at the costs it takes to make it, but only on a friendly and small cost negating scale. Thats all. Not a wink and a nod, or a "Here's 10 bucks for lunch", but brewing as much as I have lately IS expensive - and if my friends wanted a batch for a party or something, and I could charge them only for materials, then I could dig that. As it is, I have three times now had folks come over and brew using my equipment, and then come bottle it, just to make sure I am in no way infuriating the beer gods that be.

lmacmil said:

Strictly a hobby for me. My guess is the failure rate for commercial brewers is probably above 95%.

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In the most recent issue of Taps magazine, I saw that number closer to 25% in 5 years. I'm not sure if that is a worldwide figure or just in Canada. I know in the technology field, the failure rate is 95% within 1 year, mostly due to under capitalization, but much to do with just simply too much risk in the product itself.

Beer itself is inherently a low risk business compared to the other kinds of businesses out there, but because of the nature of the market. An example here in Alberta is that we consume around 300,000,000 liters (just under 2.6m bbl)of beer annually. Unfortunately in Alberta, doing a startup brewery is difficult because from the first day you fire up your brewery, you have to be pumping out 500,000 liters (4273 bbl) of beer within 18 months, then maintaining that minimum consistently year after year.

So yah, here you will be brewing a lot of beer to start, but you had better have your mind on marketing and sales in a hurry otherwise you will lose your license and go under in a hurry.

Having said that, I think I'm in the minority here. I got into home brewing with the ultimate goal of starting my own brewery. I'm a serial entrepreneur, so I like business, and I like that beer is a significantly lower risk than anything else I've done, and... well I just simply love beer. The idea of building a brand, telling a story, supporting local business and farmers is really exciting, and doing my damnedest to make sure the flavor of the beer backs up the business that is supporting it. And of course, build a great team to support the business.

dcarroll86 said:

just like jfr1111, you going to school for law.. going to spend a hell of a lot of money doing that, your not becoming a lawyer just b/c you think you can make lots of money at it, your prob also doing b/c you think/know youll be good at and become your own firm someday or a judge, (and talk about long days). or the engineer up the page a little bit. both of those jobs take lots of time to become good and make money.

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You know how they call lawyers who aren't in it for the money ? I was hoping you could tell me

No way! It's a hobby and going pro would make it a job.

This is a difficult concept for me. Currently I'm enrolled in college (scheduled to finish in about a year), but I also help out at a local brewery here from time to time and I love it.

I'm not sure if I would still enjoy it as much if it became my means of supporting myself + a family. I love the brewing aspect (homebrew/commercial), and its always been a small dream of mine to open a microbrewery (while working a "legit" job to help fund the dream), but it seems like the micro itself would be at a loss for quite some time.

Personally, I loved going in and grinding up the massive grain bill (800+ lbs), sanitizing everything, transfering the wort, etc. I find it very soothing to put some headphones in my ears and spend a good portion of the day sanitizing 15 bbl fermentation tanks.

I've rambled far to much in this post, the bottom line is I'd have to say I'm undecided. I love brewing (including the experience I've had in commerical brewing), but I don't know if I would feel the same if brewing had become something that MUST be done for me to live, have a house, etc. Hence the reason I'm still finishing up my college education. Regardless of how much fun it is, I can't say that I'd be 100% comfortable to rely on brewing being my only source of income.

Alcohol taxes, government, competition, reputation, location. So many things add up to be once massive headache, as well as a massive money pit if you are not careful.

I have dreams about it where its awesome, but in reality I couldn't see myself doing it. I've got a really solid job that I really do enjoy (Insurance Broker) and supports me. I brew often enough and am always trying to make my system better, make better beer. I'm deep enough in the hobby that it keeps my mind stimulated and I enjoy everything I do with it (well maybe not the cleanup, but I digress), that I don't see the need to change things.

With my current setup requiring an outdoors/driveway brew session, I don't brew in the winter or the dog days of summer, which allows me time to just enjoy the beer I have stockpiled from the spring/fall, read up on new techniques and gadgets, getting me all excited for the next brew season. If I made brewing my living, I wouldn't have the ability to just decompress and get away from it if I needed to.

Ideally, I will continue to make better and better beers, and figure out what it is that I need to do next to make my beers better. Eventually I would love to have a bigger space and be able to build a real brewshed/mancave, but its one step at a time.

Now that I think about it yes I would. I am waiting on a zombie infestation and plan to do my part to become a key member of whatever town I end up by brewing the beer. I really don't want to cut off zombie heads.

I don't think I'd want to go into business for myself, but I'd love to work for an established brewery somewhere. That's livin' the dream. No pressure of owning/running the company, just brewin' all day every day.

I would love to make beer for a living, but I'm in the camp that requires the pay I make now at my engineering job. I guess folks like Jim Koch and Sam Calagione make a lot of money, but most in the industry... not so much... I drool over the ProBrewer.com job postings, but realistically, I know that with no brewer training, I wouldn't be able to make ends meet.

One day when I suddenly have 2 million dollars in the bank, I'll start a brewery. But until then, it's not happening.

jfr1111 said:

You know how they call lawyers who aren't in it for the money ? I was hoping you could tell me

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i know the money is good once you get est. but til then u work your ass off to gain trust of people, im a union electrician in the washington dc area making 6 figures. but id still take a paycut to do something i love

dcarroll86 said:

i know the money is good once you get est. but til then u work your ass off to gain trust of people, im a union electrician in the washington dc area making 6 figures. but id still take a paycut to do something i love

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I was only reflecting on the fact that a lot of students around me are bragging about the bottles they'll be buying in 4 years while we are in the worse market for law professionnals in the past 80 years. Most certainly like practicing or studying law, but the main motivation isn't always "doing what they love" as much as "being a lawyer is my only shot at a middle class income after getting my worthless BA in History".

You know when that 5 gallon batch doesn't quite come out like you expected and you don't serve it to your friends out of embarrassment? Do that with 7BBLs and have to dupe your customers into paying for it anyway. Probably feels like kicking a dog.

I'd be into it with OPM (other peoples money). I've done the retail end with food and it was frustrating dealing with customers who did not appreciate quality over price. I've had success in other businesses but retail food/bev is very difficult. Properly capitalized and staffed it's not grueling back breaking work, otherwise it probably is a low paying slave job.

Aside from the not wanting to turn a perfectly good hobby into work, brewing professionally would also require me to hire employees. I'm already sick of supervising people in my current job. I damn sure don't want to be having to deal with the BS that would come from dealing with my own employees.

well I had an interest up until I had a new venture creation class last semester where we had to put together a business plan for a new business, of course I chose a brewery. After several sleepless nights crunching numbers there is really no money in it, like at all. At the end of the third year selling over 2000 bbls a year we could only manage to pay the 5 employees a total of 100k in salaries a year without having serious cashflow problems, and without significant growth of the business which would be very costly I could not see it getting much better in the following years. Not to mention the number of legal hoops you have to jump through to even sell beer. And if I'm going to start a business and risk everything and invest all my time into something it better pay off eventually.

But it was a great project, loads of free beer from local breweries.

"Don't?" OK, I don't.

No interest in turning a pastime I enjoy into work.

remilard said:

Less than zero interest here.

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Less than that here.

When would I have time to ski?

I didn't want to. but considering my desire to get by on things I create. a brewery is looking to have better odds and easier than getting my own independent cartoon studio off the ground. And price is really a toss up. Between permits, equipment and ingredients, etc, and assorted programs, licensing fees for programs and music, web design that I can't do, eventual dvd production equipment, printing. Brewing is probably cheaper in the long run.

I'm sure it sounds great (at first). I retired in my mid 50's and I took up brewing as one of my hobbies. There's way too much that I love about not working to let those thoughts get much traction in my mind.

Ace_Club said:

Totally agree. Although I sometimes dream of a LHBS where you also serve samples of homebrew. A place where someone can come in and say "What good recipes/kits do you have?" or "Does homebrew actually taste good?" and you could say, "Just walk over to the bar here and let me give you some tastes."

In the end though, I just enjoy expanding my hobby and creating my basement brewery.

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One of the LHBS places I go to often has brew on tap that you can sample. I've pondered the legality of that, but it's brewed on premises (although not a house or home) and the samples are free, so technically they are gifted.

I think it gives people a chance to see what they could be making.

It doesn't hurt that the owner is also the mayor...

Homercidal said:

One of the LHBS places I go to often has brew on tap that you can sample. I've pondered the legality of that, but it's brewed on premises (although not a house or home) and the samples are free, so technically they are gifted.

I think it gives people a chance to see what they could be making.

It doesn't hurt that the owner is also the mayor...

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Our LHBS owner rents our homebrew club a room in back of the store. It's connected through the store but it also has an outside entrance and its own bathroom. The club keeps brews on tap there, so its a great way for us to build membership if a interested homebrewer walks into the store. Plus its a great for the LHBS owner to show off what his wares can become.

As long as it's not being sold, it's not a problem.

Homercidal said:

One of the LHBS places I go to often has brew on tap that you can sample. I've pondered the legality of that, but it's brewed on premises (although not a house or home) and the samples are free, so technically they are gifted.

I think it gives people a chance to see what they could be making.

It doesn't hurt that the owner is also the mayor...

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So your saying I need to run for Mayor. Interesting, maybe I can give Rahm a run for his money.

jfr1111 said:

I was only reflecting on the fact that a lot of students around me are bragging about the bottles they'll be buying in 4 years while we are in the worse market for law professionnals in the past 80 years. Most certainly like practicing or studying law, but the main motivation isn't always "doing what they love" as much as "being a lawyer is my only shot at a middle class income after getting my worthless BA in History".

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I go to school with a lot of people who are going to law school because their parents are lawyers and they had to go just to get into the family business. I also go to school with a lot of people who went to law school because they didn't think they could go out and get a job. Fortunately, both those crowds seem to be on the bottom half of the class ranking.

I don't really get that attitude that law school is the only opportunity for a job to anybody who didn't go business in undergrad. Only people who went business in undergrad really believe that nonsense past graduation. I have a BA in political science from a small public school and four years out of college I was in management at a brokerage firm. I'll likely start out of law school making less than I was before law school but with a cool six figure debt load.


To the topic of the thread, I can't say I haven't imagined owning a brewery or brewpub but it is more in the way of imagining creating awesome beer, giving tours, talking about beer and seeing people enjoy the beer. I don't day dream about having to fight to keep tap handles in local bars, scrubbing out fermenters, having to do all the accounting, fixing bottling lines when they break, etc. If the day ever came that we were allowed to sell an amount of beer away from our own doors I might take an interest in that but realistically that's about it.

rico567 said:

No interest in turning a pastime I enjoy into work.

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This for me as well.

After reading some more posts, I do think it is important that whatever business you decide to open you should understand it well and enjoy doing it or you probably won't succeed. Only extremely rich people can afford to hire people to run their business for them and not know anything about it and still succeed.

So, unless you worked at a job that taught you how to do something, knowledge of how to do something well will probably come from some sort or interest or hobby.

The only way I'd consider going pro would be to open up a LHBS and teach classes, support other brewers, and foster a local Homebrew club. I'd never want to go into the production side of brewing, that would ruin a great hobby for me.

ReverseApacheMaster said:

I go to school with a lot of people who are going to law school because their parents are lawyers and they had to go just to get into the family business. I also go to school with a lot of people who went to law school because they didn't think they could go out and get a job. Fortunately, both those crowds seem to be on the bottom half of the class ranking.

I don't really get that attitude that law school is the only opportunity for a job to anybody who didn't go business in undergrad. Only people who went business in undergrad really believe that nonsense past graduation. I have a BA in political science from a small public school and four years out of college I was in management at a brokerage firm. I'll likely start out of law school making less than I was before law school but with a cool six figure debt load.


To the topic of the thread, I can't say I haven't imagined owning a brewery or brewpub but it is more in the way of imagining creating awesome beer, giving tours, talking about beer and seeing people enjoy the beer. I don't day dream about having to fight to keep tap handles in local bars, scrubbing out fermenters, having to do all the accounting, fixing bottling lines when they break, etc. If the day ever came that we were allowed to sell an amount of beer away from our own doors I might take an interest in that but realistically that's about it.

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Law school isn't a good decision for 90% of the people who enroll, especially in the US due to the insane debt load (I'll have 12k debt max after graduation and the interest is deductible from my taxes). Pretty much like opening up a brewery I suspect

I'd like to open up a LHBS that doubles as a brew club though, just to have other people to brew with and a wide array of ingredients. Won't happen though since my village already has a LHBS and the local crowd is more into making hooch to get wasted than having great, craft-like brew on hand.

I have dreams of it.

I'm still in college and don't have a fantastic job, but brewing is all I think about. I've thought about looking in to the LHBS business since there's an area around me that would be great for one.

Professional brewer?

No, not for me.

Professional beer taster, though--that's something I'd be interested in!