Did you break even yet?

[lebucheron]

Yes. It's very easy to break even in Quebec because of the outrageous prices beer commands. Cheap beer is almost always 1$/beer, even in cases.

It helps if you have a ghetto setup and never upgrade anything though.

If you think that's bad, even BMC beers here in Saskatchwean are $40 for 24 ($1.67 each)

my cheap beginner beer consists of
$20 - base kit
$3.50 RO water
$10 -DME
$4 - hops
= 37.50 / 60ish 355ml bottles = 63 cents (38% of store bought price)

Now, I definitely drink more home brew than I would buy (because it's cheaper) so I can't quite make the argument that I'm making back $1.04 every bottle (or $62 per batch if you prefer) but it is significant.


I keep "breaking even" then going and getting cooler equipment and supplies.

This is a really cheap hobby though. Think about golf. Time isn't money. Do you calculate how much golf costs per hour on the course?
Don't sweat it if you're a bit "behind".

 

[xdalisx]

I keep buying new equipment, so any chance I have of breaking even is continuously pushed farther and farther away

plus I still buy craft beer, and drink at bars.

 

[JohanMk1]

I can't even contemplate breaking even. Since I started throwing malted barley extracts into buckets with yeast I've been drinking more beer than ever before.

I was never a big beer lover, most likely because of the shortage of good beer. My brother used to work for a tiny brewery many many years ago and I used to enjoy the beers they made there. Because it was far away I obnly had their beers when he was home. Now not only do I have some very drinkable beer comming out of the afore mentioned buckets, but I have a palate that needs educating. For palate education I have been visiting way out places to buy imports and craft brews. I was shocked to find that there are so many craft brews in South Africa now.

 

[Malticulous]

I'm way ahead. If I had to buy beer I would drink significantly less. I don't spend much on my brewery anymore and I never have. Almost all of my brewing expense in on ingredients.

 

[Crito]

when you make a cherry vanilla milk stout. Your cost savings goes into the negative

 

[HawksBrewer]

I used to try to calculate such nonsense and foolery, but have since realized that it doesn't really matter one way or the other.

 

[rwinzing]

At the rate I am going and spending I think 2075 is my target year. I brew because I enjoy it and like to consume what I make. I don't do it to save money. That being said I just upgraded my brewery and sunk a ton of cash but I am now buying grain in bulk, buy hops by the pound and harvest some of my yeast. The raw material is not my expense it's all the "stuff" I have gotten.

I also currently grow my own hops (not enough) and I am working on plans to grow 1/4 acre of barley. But now I need to build a way malt and store it. Expand and Spend!

 

[matt2778]

I'm really surprised how few of the hbrs out there actually save money brewing. I'm realistically into the hobby for under a grand and have since brewed around 40 batches. Ballparking my cost per batch at $40 versus the $80 it would cost for the commercial equivalent I'd say I'm well past breaking even. I should do significantly better next year as I'm going to stock up on bulk hops purchases and I'll no longer have to make any large equiptment purchases. I really have no desire at this point to purchase flashy equiptment but I certainly understand others desire to do so. I find it makes for a happy wife is I appear frugal.

 

[E-Mursed]

I can't imagine how much I have spent on equipment - but the batch I just brewed...a rye pale ale...cost me $19.41 according to Brewsmith.

Theres bulk grain and hops to thank for that - but a lot of capital expenditure in the process.

 

[jeepinjeepin]

I don't even need to start thinking about it to say no.

 

[oakbarn]

I figure I am down to about $38.96 per 12 ounce glass now. I enjoy it with my $64.67/lb deer sausage. But boy is it worth it. We make great beer.

 

[jfr1111]

I don't get the "you drink more beer, so you don't break even" argument. If I were made out of money, I'd be drinking the same amount of commercial beer. I had an interest in the commercial stuff before. Still have, but it's hard to justify spending 8$ regularly for a pint at a bar when I can brew a similar pint for pennies at home. It's because it's too expensive that I don't drink as much commercial beer.

For myself, I think I'm vastly ahead. I don't have a kegging setup, no temperature control (except from a big washing bucket) and apart from tubbing and one auto-siphon, everything old has been repurposed and is still in use. Old buckets ? Tomato plants growing in them right now. I jumped into the simplest (and cheapest) possible AG setup from the get go. I have a 20$ cooler, a 60$ turkey fryer setup and maybe 40$ invested in buckets and other equipment. I sold of few carboys for the same price I bought them. And that's it. I remember spending 120$ at a bar on a single weekend when I was young and foolish.

As far as ingredients go. I buy all my malt and hops in bulk. Yeast I wash and reuse, or I use dry yeast. Most of my batches come under 15$ TOTAL for 15L. I still have hops I bought from last year, so I probably won't have to buy hops before March at the earliest. Not brewing supper-duper triple extreme IPAs (aged on bourbon infused virgin tears, thank you), also helps

It's once you start "investing" into grain mills, keggerators, 15gal brew kettles, fridges and conicals that breaking even becomes impossible. That, and brewing 150gal a year while you're the only one in the household drinking beer. This means that you are giving away (and not throwing away I hope!) a good amount of your savings.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

 

[hecliff]

I broke even when I tasted that first homebrew and I liked it. I also broke even when I retasted Coor's and I didn't like it.

 

[chalmer9]

I never got into this hobby with the intention of saving money. But if I think about it, there's definitely no way. One of the primary reasons is I would never buy this much craft beer from stores anyway.

 

[Skagdog]

I'm broke, even though I brew my own!

I haven't kept track of costs or any of that but the feeling I get when someone tries my brew and likes it is priceless.

I'm somewhat of a square when it comes to partying, big gatherings and what not but I thrive when I gotta get up a 5a to fire up the smoker.

Once the meat and the beer (all the random other crap) is served and everyone is quiet from stuffing their faces and washing it down, I break even...

 

[passedpawn]

I figure I am down to about $38.96 per 12 ounce glass now. I enjoy it with my $64.67/lb deer sausage. But boy is it worth it. We make great beer.

!

 

[broadbill]

This is a really cheap hobby though. Think about golf. Time isn't money. Do you calculate how much golf costs per hour on the course?
Don't sweat it if you're a bit "behind".

Time is money when you are counting...The problem I had was that previous posters were only counting equipment and material costs. If you are going to count, you have to count everything, including the biggest cost: labor.

Or, you do what most of us do: call it hobby and don't worry about it, admit you are losing money and not worry about it. Saying it is/isn't cheaper than another hobby isn't valid because its all a wash anyway because its a hobby.

For those who are counting: There is NO WAY you can EVER come out ahead when you factor in labor.

e.g. take someone who has a annual salary of 50K....that is $24/hour. If it takes 6 hours for an average AG batch that is a labor cost of $144/5 gallons. Each beer costs you $3 in labor. That is BEFORE adding in material costs. Think what you can buy a sixer of the best craft beer for.

Heck, say you do 10 gallon batches: that is still $1.50/beer. You'd still be hard-pressed to produce beer for what you can buy it.

You may value your time more/or less, but the point is the same...there is a big cost in your time, and where you decide to apply it. There are plenty of people who give this hobby up because its too much work for output. There is a reason behind that.

 

[Ambrozyne]

I have more than broken even here in Japan where prices for a good craft beer at a store (or on the Internet) runs from $4 (Japanese craft beers) to $7+ (imported craft beers).

sorry if this is off-topic
JiBiru8,were are you located in Japan? Wonder where you get your supplies. There's no lhbs's anywhere around where I live so I order everything online at 2shops i found.

To answer the other poster about brewing over 1% abv being illegal in Japan, yes it is, but mainly on paper. As long as you don't try to sell it you're pretty much ok.

 

[fbaillargeon]

What area of japan are you in?

 

[jfr1111]

Time is money when you are counting...The problem I had was that previous posters were only counting equipment and material costs. If you are going to count, you have to count everything, including the biggest cost: labor.

Or, you do what most of us do: call it hobby and don't worry about it, admit you are losing money and not worry about it. Saying it is/isn't cheaper than another hobby isn't valid because its all a wash anyway because its a hobby.

For those who are counting: There is NO WAY you can EVER come out ahead when you factor in labor.

e.g. take someone who has a annual salary of 50K....that is $24/hour. If it takes 6 hours for an average AG batch that is a labor cost of $144/5 gallons. Each beer costs you $3 in labor. That is BEFORE adding in material costs. Think what you can buy a sixer of the best craft beer for.

Unless you miss work or decide not to take up a second job because of your hobbies, you are not losing any revenue by partaking in an activity because in absolute terms, your time is worth nothing in dollars and there's thus no need to factor it in the calculations. Do you also count your "losses" from sleeping, eating and interacting with family ? Sure you could do other things (golfing, reading, etc.), but these other activities do not actually give you a salary either. Sure you have to choose how to best allocate your time, but when you choose to spend your free time doing A instead of B, there's still no monetary value to your time expenditure.

"Sorry honey, I have talked to you for all of 2 hours today, and since my hourly is 30$, it's starting to get expensive. See ya tomorrow at breakfast, or else I'll blow my budget!"

You may value your time more/or less, but the point is the same...there is a big cost in your time, and where you decide to apply it. There are plenty of people who give this hobby up because its too much work for output. There is a reason behind that.

Time is a finite quantity. It's because people have better things to do or just don't have time for the hobby that they quit, not because they reason that at the hourly they earn, homebrewing is just too costly. Hobbies are hobbies, your time doesn't cost you antyhing per se, but it's true that you have less time for other (non money earning) activities.

I have recently planted a garden in my backyard. I have tallied all my costs, but I don't tally my labour. Why ? Because I wouldn't be working if I weren't growing delicious vegetables, I'd be watching TV, reading a book or doing other non value productive activities (ie. I get stuff to eat for cheap when I garden).

 

[Ambrozyne]

I'm in Hyogo prefecture, not too far from Kobe but in the sticks. You in Jpn too?

 

[kh54s10]

I have a spread sheet of my costs and the amount I have bottled and the total is now at $1.92 per bottle.

I would say that I am a LONG way from breaking even because before homebrewing I might have spent about $10 a month on average for beer.

 

[tchamber]

I'm not counting. This is a hobby to me, not an economy drive.

 

[fbaillargeon]

Na, I'm from Quebec but visited Japan twice already. I loved the Akita region for it's strong sake's and heartwarming fellows I have met.

 

[Ambrozyne]

Na, I'm from Quebec but visited Japan twice already. I loved the Akita region for it's strong sake's and heartwarming fellows I have met.

Lucky you... I don't mean for not living in Japan, but for having visited Akita and tasted its excellent sake.. Haven't been so far up north yet myself but would love to. Got one of your fellow countrymen in my village though!

 

[broadbill]

Unless you miss work or decide not to take up a second job because of your hobbies, you are not losing any revenue by partaking in an activity because in absolute terms, your time is worth nothing in dollars and there's thus no need to factor it in the calculations. Do you also count your "losses" from sleeping, eating and interacting with family ? Sure you could do other things (golfing, reading, etc.), but these other activities do not actually give you a salary either. Sure you have to choose how to best allocate your time, but when you choose to spend your free time doing A instead of B, there's still no monetary value to your time expenditure.

"Sorry honey, I have talked to you for all of 2 hours today, and since my hourly is 30$, it's starting to get expensive. See ya tomorrow at breakfast, or else I'll blow my budget!"



Time is a finite quantity. It's because people have better things to do or just don't have time for the hobby that they quit, not because they reason that at the hourly they earn, homebrewing is just too costly. Hobbies are hobbies, your time doesn't cost you antyhing per se, but it's true that you have less time for other (non money earning) activities.

I have recently planted a garden in my backyard. I have tallied all my costs, but I don't tally my labour. Why ? Because I wouldn't be working if I weren't growing delicious vegetables, I'd be watching TV, reading a book or doing other non value productive activities (ie. I get stuff to eat for cheap when I garden).

You have totally missed the point.

 

[rhamilton]

You have totally missed the point.

You want to value labor @ your 'career' rate.
He's saying he values his time as $0/hr since if he wasn't brewing, he'd be sitting on ass.

I have to agree with him. I bill anywhere from $50-$100/hr for work. I work 8 hours on a good day and have no interest in working any longer than that so after 5pm, my rate is really $0 since I like to sit on ass too.

 

[DPBISME]

I'm in Hyogo prefecture, not too far from Kobe but in the sticks. You in Jpn too?

I have to look that word up.... I mean I knew it was some kind of administrative district...

I now can go home, drink beer, and "veg" in front of the YV since I have learned ONE thing today....

Kolsch,,,, I think I will have a Kolsch...

 

[Curtis2010]

I assume I am way in the hole, but not counting.

If I just wanted cheap beer then I can buy a case of mass produced brew here for about $13US. Ultimately, way cheaper than brewing it myself.

 

[broadbill]

You want to value labor @ your 'career' rate.
He's saying he values his time as $0/hr since if he wasn't brewing, he'd be sitting on ass.

I have to agree with him. I bill anywhere from $50-$100/hr for work. I work 8 hours on a good day and have no interest in working any longer than that so after 5pm, my rate is really $0 since I like to sit on ass too.

You choose to value your time not spent working at $0. That doesn't means it still doesn't have value. Time has inherent value because its finite (as pointed out previously). You ignore time's inherent value under certain circumstances....and that's OK, I do the same thing.

My original point was to those who said they were actually coming out ahead by brewing their own, but were not taking into account their labor. My point was if you are going to count, than count right. Otherwise, do what the rest of us do and blindly ignore the fact there no way you are saving yourself money doing this, other than severely undervaluing your time in which to do it.

That's all I'm saying.