I went "pro" - What it actually takes to do so

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Cape Brewing said:
We were invited to the American Craft Beer Fest this past weekend and had a blast. To the half dozen or so of you guys who stopped by to say hi, thanks for stopping! The even was a ton of fun for us and it was cool to cool to catch up with some HBT'rs.

Here are two pics...
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Man, where did you get that table/booth/bar? I've seen a lot of tradeshow displays, and that is one of the nicer ones.
 
Sorry if this has been answered but are you guys still buying supplies from your homebrew sources? Or are there other companies more geared toward buying supplies at a much bigger scale?
 
KeyWestBrewing said:
Sorry if this has been answered but are you guys still buying supplies from your homebrew sources? Or are there other companies more geared toward buying supplies at a much bigger scale?
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We love our local homebrew places and we still use them for odds and ends but no, we have a commercial account at a wholeseller where we buy all of our grain in bulk. We then have a commercial account at a hop dealer and have even entered into forward contracts that meet our annual needs for hops.
 
Cape Brewing said:
We love our local homebrew places and we still use them for odds and ends but no, we have a commercial account at a wholeseller where we buy all of our grain in bulk. We then have a commercial account at a hop dealer and have even entered into forward contracts that meet our annual needs for hops.
Click to expand...

Are these easy to find a wholeseller? Or get a commercial hop account? And how much do you save by having one of those?
 
Yeah... They aren't that hard to find (at least by us they aren't too hard). We get our grain through BSG (Brewer's Supply Group) in Rhode Island which is a pretty easy for us and we have hop contracts with Niko.

50 lb sacks of grain run us $28-$30 and I am not sure what the hops are per pound but they are dramatically cheaper than retail prices.

Any of those places will require paperwork to be filled out to open a commercial a count including your TTB Brewer's Notice # and likely a credit check.
 
Cape Brewing said:
Yeah... They aren't that hard to find (at least by us they aren't too hard). We get our grain through BSG (Brewer's Supply Group) in Rhode Island which is a pretty easy for us and we have hop contracts with Niko.

50 lb sacks of grain run us $28-$30 and I am not sure what the hops are per pound but they are dramatically cheaper than retail prices.

Any of those places will require paperwork to be filled out to open a commercial a count including your TTB Brewer's Notice # and likely a credit check.
Click to expand...

Add to that minimum purchase requirements.
 
Haven't updated in a while... figured I might as well...

Well... our whole "we'll see how it goes for a year or two" plan went out the window. It's Aug. 8th today and almost all of our new 3bbl equip is in. We signed a lease on space next to ours and need to knock down a wall and get all of our new equip set up ASAP. It was a jump that was made much quicker than we had anticipated. We decided to just do a 3bbl because anything else would likely mean a move of location and since the current operations of the brewery could fund the upgrade and hold us over for another chunk of time, we thought it was the right call.

If things continue, absolutely, we'll start thinking about upgrading again... but the nice this is now, we should be able to grow capital even quicker to afford that larger brewhouse with the 3bbl opposed to the 1.5 we were on.
 
We started woth just carbing in the kegs, went to a brite, blew a seal on the brite, went back to just in the kegs, and then we just got a shiney new 3bbl brite delivered so that is getting hooked up in the next couple of days.

Going with a brite is dramatically easier. <---- understatement
 
Cape Brewing said:
We started woth just carbing in the kegs, went to a brite, blew a seal on the brite, went back to just in the kegs, and then we just got a shiney new 3bbl brite delivered so that is getting hooked up in the next couple of days.

Going with a brite is dramatically easier. <---- understatement
Click to expand...

Blowing a seal is never good....
 
Glad to hear things are going so well for you. Was reading an article in DRAFT about how the whole "craft" beer movement is really challenging smaller breweries to bring their A game right out of the gates. I give you tons of props!

In FL, where I live (now), the "craft" scene is just starting to take off but seem, to me anyway, inhibited by the terrible 3 tier system and guess which tier bribed the most politicians to make the rules (or so it seems). Earlier in the year I had a fantasy about doing this, and if I was smart I'd proceed, but I'm stupid and going to continue in my career and maintain the hobby. However, some pipedreams die harder than others, and I continue to wonder if I should consider investing in a start-up brewery at least, rather than jumping in like you've done and trying to brew myself. Huge Kudos to you, and thanks for sharing with us!

Was curious about your operations as far as ingredients, and QA/QC. There have been times I wanted to brew a particular recipe (usually an IPA that's not distributed to my state) but ingredients (usually hops) were not available. In a similar logistical nightmare, I'd be ordering from like 2-5 different mail order re-sellers in order to get everything I needed (and there is NO LHBS) and after 2-5X $7.99 flat rate shipping (or worse, ACTUAL S&H) prices, its now seeming stupid to spend the cash on brewing and just buy finished beer online! Anyway, was wondering how you've been negotiating the often unpredictable availability of ingredients. Also am extremely curious about your yeast management, as yeast is often pricey and can be considered a renewable ingredient if you harvest, and all repitch plus all that entails. Obviously (or maybe not) the next logical step might be a yeast lab, and also a QA/QC lab.

Some of this stuff is far beyond what most homebrewers attempt to tackle or consider in many instances. How have you been dealing with this? Also sort of curious if this has reached a point where side project vs full time career, or hiring employees, has developed. I could imagine you've got to be getting close.

well anyway, tomorrow morning comes early and its back to work for me.
Happy Brewing!

Rick
 
In terms of ingredients, that hasn't been an issue at all. We have a commercial account at a local wholesaler and buy all of our grain in 50 lb sacks... even the speciality grain we use. We pick it up ourselves so no S&H charges. We did have one speciality grain that was recently discontinued and we had to substitute for it permanantly. It makes up a verys mall % of one of our grain bills and luckily we can't taste the difference at all with the substituted grain. So... grain is never a problem.

Hops... we have hop contracts with a commercial hop wholesaler so we're gauranteed to get the hops we need. We basically set up a contract for the hops we'll need over a year and then take shipment on small chunks of that overall order and pay as we go. Now that we have the contracts, hops are not an issue either.

Yeast... we use simple US-05 for three of our beers, US-04 for one and then a lager yeast for one. We get the 05-04 in bricks from our grain wholesaler so that's never a problem and the lager yeast, we source differently but that's never been a problem either.

In terms of re-using yeast... It's not uncommon for us to re-use a yeast cake but we only do it once. We're not harvesting anything at this point. It's just not worth the effort and time compared to the money we would be saving. Maybe down the road we'll look into that but since we are using really basic yeasts that aren't expensive at all to just buy, there's no reason for us to spend that kind of effort.... so... no, I don't see any kind of yeast lab any time soon.

And yeah... the employee conversations are starting... we don't have any kind of time table on that but I don't think it'll be too long before we need to cross that line and bring someone on board as an actual employee. Other than bringing someone on, I don't forsee it being a full-time job for me or my two partners any time soon (I don't ever see it happening for me personally).
 
What drove the decision to go with a 3bbl system instead of going larger?

Are you inline injecting CO2 and O2 on transfer? If so, how is that going?
 
Bensiff said:
What drove the decision to go with a 3bbl system instead of going larger? ?
Click to expand...

The decision to go to a 3 bll was an easy one. We (myself and my two partners) decided when we started this that we were going to put in some money to launch it and then let the brewery grow on its own with as little additional investment as possible... by us, investors, or lenders. As of right now, we have $0 in debt (including credit cards) and we have no investors other than the three of us. So... 1) the brewery could afford it on its own

One of the biggest expenses we had, and I would imagine most breweries have, is getting the brewhouse set up. We had to install natural gas lines, plumbing inspections, electical inspections, etc. etc. It was a ton of time and cash. We could upgrade from 1.5 up to 3.0 without having to change much in the "brewhouse" at all so... 2) it was an easy jump

Lastly... and this is purely my own impression... which probably counts for nothing... but it feels like everyone needs to jump to a 20 bbl system as quickly as possible. I don't get that. Ok, I guess if it is going to be your full time job and you can handle that pressure... ok.. I guess that makes sense but for us, this isn't our full time job and we are trying to grow in a very measured way as to 1) keep the risk as low as possible and 2) keep it fun as long as possible.

Right now we have two accounts that have put us on permanantly. Between those two accounts and the bottle sales we do over 4 hours on a Saturday, we're selling all of the beer we can make. Deliveries are easy. Chasing down empty kegs are easy. Collecting payments is easy. Jumping up to a large brewhouse changes all of those dynamics VERY quickly...

It feels like we are heading towards a much larger system at some point but for the reasons above and the simple fact that we're just not in that much of a hurry... hell... we're having a blast with it... it didn't make sense to jump to a bigger system... yet.

Bensiff said:
Are you inline injecting CO2 and O2 on transfer? If so, how is that going?
Click to expand...

No.. we're not doing any inline injecting. Once we rack to the fermenters, we are still using a basic air-stone with O2. Once racked to the brite, we have a carb stone built into it hooked up to CO2. It's working beautifully that way.
 
How many times a week are you brewing? Just wondering your volume that you are able to completely clear through 2 accounts and on-site bottle sales.
 
We are brewing twice a week pretty religiously... so.. call it 90 gallons a week is what we are going through.

One account is a local bar that has two lines dedicated to our beer (one is our IPA and the other is our Burley Blonde... a 7.5% Blonde)
The other account is a bar in downtown Boston's Financial District that has given us on tap and they rotate our beers through.
... then it is fairly rare when we don't have a bit of a line of people at the tap room on Saturdays. We are only usually open 10-2 on Saturdays. That's it.
 
Thanks man, I was just wondering how many bbls you were moving through those channels. 3 bbls a week through that is good!
 
think about being open more often for bottle sales, growler fills, etc
cartons site said they were open on monday and then i stopped there on the way home from the beach and they were close. VERY DISSAPOINTED
i would think the added profit would be nice. you have to make more $/gal selling it by the pint/bottle/growler than to the bars in kegs, right?
next time im in boston i'll look for you
 
Indytruks138 said:
Did you consider going to a 6-7 bbl brite tank & fermenter so you can double batch brew?
Click to expand...

Not really..

We picked up 132 gal non-jacketed fermenters that we can coil, insulate and hook up to our glycol chiller for a fraction of what a 6-7 bbl jacketed fermenter would be (and once you got that big, you would have to go jacketed). Given the cost, we could go several 132 gal fermenters the way we did for the cost of one 6-7 bbl.... So again, the brewery could cover the cost on its own.

Plus... We have no desire to brew twice a day. That's too long of a day for us right now.

Not saying any of the above is the "right way" to do it. That is just how we decided to do it.
 
NewJersey said:
think about being open more often for bottle sales, growler fills, etc
cartons site said they were open on monday and then i stopped there on the way home from the beach and they were close. VERY DISSAPOINTED
i would think the added profit would be nice. you have to make more $/gal selling it by the pint/bottle/growler than to the bars in kegs, right?
next time im in boston i'll look for you
Click to expand...

We can't... We don't have enough beer. We sell out as it is. We keep very regular tap room hours (Sat 10-2) and that is what we advertise. That is also all the beer we can make right now.

We are in the process of setting up our 3bbl system and hopefully suppy will increase to allow more bottling hours because you're right, profit on bottles/growlers is dramatically more than on the kegs.
 
ah, i see. nice problem to have though, right?
i only homebrew so, wth is a "bright tank"?
not familiar with commercial/large scale brewing yet, but would like to be
 
Britetank is used to clear a beer and carbonate it. A lot of breweries are only carbonating in britetanks as they will filter or use gelatin finings to clear. Its just another tank that will hold pressure and has a carbonation stone in it, so you can carbonate quickly, depending on the method it can take between 3-4 hours and 5-6 days.
 
Cape Brewing, this is a great thread. Finally made my way through all of it. Thank you for posting about your adventures in going pro. It was great to see the transformation from "I doubt this will be in any way profitable, to, we're upgrading. Everything is coming up aces for you, congrats!

I'm highly interested in this thread and the information contained within it because my bro-in-law is looking to start a brewery in Connecticut and came to me to see if I would be willing to in some way contribute to the operation. I don't know what his overall plan is as of right now, but it seems to revolve around the size of the building and determining the type and size of equipment we would use to brew. We would still continue working our day jobs, and it sounds like a nano would be the logical option to start given that we wouldn't have the time to devote to brewing larger batches.

One question I have is with regard to the taste of the beer after going from grain to glass in roughly 3 weeks. Why is there such a difference between bottle conditioned beers tasting green after only 3 weeks, yet in this situation the beer won't taste "green" with a tap system? I've never understood this. I've had bottled conditioned beers taste great, but after about a month in the bottle.
 
My very strong suspicion is simply pitching rates. We, and I am fairly certain that most other breweries, pitch their yeast at dramatically higher pitch rates than homebrewers. We typically pitch well above double the pitch rates that homebrewers do so there is a lot more yeast to do an easier job... and things clean up much quicker. We also force carb so there is no bottle conditioning lag time like you're talking about. If we bottle conditioned, we would have the same time frame on the back end as you do.
 
I'm assuming you are using your brite tank for conditioning and carbing all your beer which you then package into kegs.

That makes your brite tank your choke-point unless you keg directly from the fermenter and carb/condition there.

I'm thinking aloud more than asking questions. However if I'm completely wrong, please correct me.

Even if you increase your yeast usage, you don't find that additional conditioning time enhances the flavors of your beer? In three weeks I have no doubt the beer can be finished, it just seems it would be even better if your processes could allow even a couple weeks of conditioning time. (Although, I don't know what your rollout rate is on your beer, perhaps you have something of a surplus backlog that allows your filled kegs to sit for a bit, conditioning.)

Again, thinking out loud. When I do this at night my wife tells me to roll over.
 
MuddyCreek said:
I'm assuming you are using your brite tank for conditioning and carbing all your beer which you then package into kegs.

That makes your brite tank your choke-point unless you keg directly from the fermenter and carb/condition there.

I'm thinking aloud more than asking questions. However if I'm completely wrong, please correct me.

Even if you increase your yeast usage, you don't find that additional conditioning time enhances the flavors of your beer? In three weeks I have no doubt the beer can be finished, it just seems it would be even better if your processes could allow even a couple weeks of conditioning time. (Although, I don't know what your rollout rate is on your beer, perhaps you have something of a surplus backlog that allows your filled kegs to sit for a bit, conditioning.)

Again, thinking out loud. When I do this at night my wife tells me to roll over.
Click to expand...

Yes we are using the brite to finish dropping clear and carbing but it's not a choke point. We only brew twice a week and since it only takes a couple of days to fully carb the way we're doing it, there is no choke point. As the brite empties, another beer is ready to go in.

I don't see that adding more conditioning time would do any good. The beers are done and finished before we keg them and on the rare occassion that a keg sits for any kind of length before tapping... it's not any better than the ones we tapped immediately.

All of that said... we're not simply churning every beer out three weeks on the dot. I said three weeks before as a generalization. The Mild? Hell... that's done in a week. Our Black Steam and IPA are more around a month. The Dunkel and Blonde... they're really at about three weeks.

I think waiting longer on the beers would do more harm than good as I think some of the flavors kicked off by the yeast (like in the Dunkel) or the hops (obviously the IPA) will begin to dull if it is just sitting.

We're working on a Cherry Smoked Baltic Porter now... that won't be a three week beer at all. That'll be a few months.

Try it next time you brew a "normal ABV" beer... something under 1070.... instead of pitching your normal pitch rate... triple it (except wheats... we underpitch intentionally to stress the yeast by design)
 
I'd like to mention I asked you a while back about the whole pitching rate difference and I have to agree with you. I think the ideology of homebrewers and proper pitching rates are misconstrued. I pitch double what Beersmith recommends and not only do my beers finish up quicker but they taste cleaner too.

Glad to hear things are still on the up and up. Keep crankin em out!
 
JeepDiver said:
So do you think at some near point you will be turning a profit? Guessing you may already know this, but if you don't make a profit, in 3 of the next 5 years, then the IRS will consider the brewery as a hobby, so any deductions you make for equipment, etc will be disallowed.

I've seen some people run into this issue before (well they actually expected to make a profit) then get blindsided with a big tax bill when they don't make it. Not trying to be a downer, but just giving you a heads up.
Click to expand...

Not sure if this has been addressed, but it's not true at all. The rule of thumb simply shifts the burden of proof to the business owner if a continual loss has been shown (in other words...you have to be able to prove that you are operating it as a for profit business).
 

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