Twin Cities Area Brewpubs and Taprooms plus Minnesota Breweries-in-Planning 2016, Part 2

Reads 9610 • Replies 77 • Started Monday, August 1, 2016 6:33:18 PM CT

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Message islay beers 3622 º places 18 º 03:26 Fri 11/18/2016 Chaz has updates for a bunch of BIPs at the other site: https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/breweries-opening-in-the-minnesota-2016-2017.375254/page-27#post-5112717 Roets Jordan in Jordan is brewing now and gradually will be opening to the public in the coming weeks/months. "Construction begins on St. Paul’s newest taproom, the Stone Saloon" http://www.twincities.com/2016/11/14/construction-begins-on-st-pauls-newest-taproom-the-stone-saloon/. I’m confused by the headline, because I think construction began years ago, and I bet other St. Paul taprooms that began construction more recently will open before it does.
Message islay beers 3622 º places 18 º 20:03 Fri 11/18/2016 An article on the upcoming Copper Trail Brewing Company, about 2 hours northwest of the Twin Cities in Alexandria, set to open in December: http://www.echopress.com/news/4161429-brewing-back
Message CLevar places 23 º 16:58 Sun 11/20/2016 I’m more skeptical of the scale of things- putting 3k bbl in oak in year one is incredibly ambitious. I don’t think a taproom is required at a small scale (through I’m biased for obvious reasons). Consider Olvalde- keeps overhead low and consistently puts out good beer in small quantities.

Message jackl beers 8677 º places 740 º 17:03 Sun 11/20/2016 Originally posted by islay Let’s just say that opening a brewery in Minnesota in 2016 without plans for a taproom sounds like about as promising a business venture as a "rock star hotel" in Hugo. http://growlermag.com/now-open-or-damn-close-cosmos-brewing-company/
Message islay beers 3622 º places 18 º 19:26 Sun 11/20/2016 Cosmos Brewing in Hugo will start distributing kegs to bars in December and "[hopes] to have a canning line up and running in early 2017." However, it appears to have no plans for a taproom. Pardon me for the following editorial: I’m highly skeptical of this approach. In the taproom era, only a small handful of breweries in the Twin Cities area have opened without a taproom at least soon following. NorthGate and 56 were limited by space (the same space, in fact). Both quickly left or soon will leave that space to a facility that has or will have a taproom. Broken Clock, the next brewery to occupy that space, does plan to have a small taproom. Similarly, Lupine quickly left its original location for a site with a taproom. Lazy Loon opened up the associated Lazy Loon Lanes, which functions much like a taproom even though the beer isn’t brewed on site. We also saw the relative market position of Flat Earth plummet while it procrastinated for years in opening its taproom. It’s going to be hard for Cosmos to garner a local following in the northeastern suburbs without a home base open to the public. Even if the company’s goal is to focus on the highly competitive kegs-and-cans market rather than to have a significant portion of sales on site, it’s eschewing a superb marketing opportunity by failing to open a taproom. My guess is that we’ll be hearing that Cosmos is correcting this strategic error sooner rather than later. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be surprised if we’re hearing about the closing of Cosmos sooner rather than later. Let’s just say that opening a brewery in Minnesota in 2016 without plans for a taproom sounds like about as promising a business venture as a "rock star hotel" in Hugo. http://growlermag.com/now-open-or-damn-close-cosmos-brewing-company/
Message TheHOFF43 P beers 2045 º places 169 º 21:55 Sun 11/20/2016 Originally posted by jackl Originally posted by islay Let’s just say that opening a brewery in Minnesota in 2016 without plans for a taproom sounds like about as promising a business venture as a "rock star hotel" in Hugo. http://growlermag.com/now-open-or-damn-close-cosmos-brewing-company/
Message islay beers 3622 º places 18 º 00:23 Mon 11/21/2016 Originally posted by CLevar I’m more skeptical of the scale of things- putting 3k bbl in oak in year one is incredibly ambitious. I don’t think a taproom is required at a small scale (through I’m biased for obvious reasons). Consider Olvalde- keeps overhead low and consistently puts out good beer in small quantities. Your BIP (Oakhold) is quite a bit different from most, as of course you know. You’re not going to be brewing the wort on site and, more relevantly, all of your beer will be sour and/or wild (correct me if I’m wrong). That’s a niche market, and you can expect a small and spread out but enthusiastic fan base, as opposed to a wide swath of the local community that will go to you for their standard styles because, why not, you’re local. For as much as RateBeerians (myself included) tend to love sours and wilds, many people who consider themselves big craft beer fans still haven’t tried them or have tried a few and actively dislike them. You’re sure to have some awkward interactions with confused, uninitiated customers if you have a taproom. In addition, you have the Fair State association to help you build brand familiarity and a following in much the way a taproom tends to do. So perhaps Oakhold is the rare exception to the it-helps-a-lot-to-have-a-taproom rule (although I remain dubious). That said, I thought you were planning an eventual satellite taproom in south Minneapolis. Is that no longer under consideration? I think of a taproom as like a stadium/arena for a sports team: Sure, the team may generate most of its money from television and merchandise, and, theoretically, it could play in front of camera operators on some sound stage, but is it really going to limit its connection with its community by not letting the people come see it in person? Forget about the forgone revenue; what about the forgone loyalty?

Message MatSciGuy beers 924 º 08:00 Mon 11/21/2016 Originally posted by islay Originally posted by CLevar I’m more skeptical of the scale of things- putting 3k bbl in oak in year one is incredibly ambitious. I don’t think a taproom is required at a small scale (through I’m biased for obvious reasons). Consider Olvalde- keeps overhead low and consistently puts out good beer in small quantities. Your BIP (Oakhold) is quite a bit different from most, as of course you know. You’re not going to be brewing the wort on site and, more relevantly, all of your beer will be sour and/or wild (correct me if I’m wrong). That’s a niche market, and you can expect a small and spread out but enthusiastic fan base, as opposed to a wide swath of the local community that will go to you for their standard styles because, why not, you’re local. For as much as RateBeerians (myself included) tend to love sours and wilds, many people who consider themselves big craft beer fans still haven’t tried them or have tried a few and actively dislike them. You’re sure to have some awkward interactions with confused, uninitiated customers if you have a taproom. In addition, you have the Fair State association to help you build brand familiarity and a following in much the way a taproom tends to do. So perhaps Oakhold is the rare exception to the it-helps-a-lot-to-have-a-taproom rule (although I remain dubious). That said, I thought you were planning an eventual satellite taproom in south Minneapolis. Is that no longer under consideration? I think of a taproom as like a stadium/arena for a sports team: Sure, the team may generate most of its money from television and merchandise, and, theoretically, it could play in front of camera operators on some sound stage, but is it really going to limit its connection with its community by not letting the people come see it in person? Forget about the forgone revenue; what about the forgone loyalty? We originally planned to contract brew our wort, but when we ran the numbers, we realized that we could get a 3.5 bbl electric brew system, similar to what the guys at Forager are using, for not much more. It also gains us the advantage of brewing with our well water and avoiding the inconvenience of working around other breweries’ production schedules. We ordered the brewery from SysTech in Ohio and (fingers crossed) it should be shipping to us next week. I’m going to avoid using the term "wild", but almost every beer will be sour and/or mixed culture, from saisons to lambics. There may be the occasional sacch-only beer, but there’s nothing on the production schedule yet. The satellite taproom is still a big priority, but as with the brewery, we’re taking our time and being methodical. We just want to make sure we’re not pushing our ability to brew beers of the quality we want. A taproom can drink you out of beer awfully quickly, so we need to make sure we have a solid stock of mature beer before we start inviting people in. It would be pretty sad to only be able to keep a couple taplines running because we’re sitting around for 2 years waiting for beer to mature. Like Caleb mentioned, we’re starting with small production goals, and there’s plenty of reason to expect that will be sustainable due to our small overhead. Joe at Olvalde has proved that this model can work just fine even with minimal marketing. But your point about loyalty is a valid one. People have really short attention spans these days, so we plan to get out there and get in front of people as much as possible before we have the taproom space.
Message sthlm beers 790 º places 147 º 19:05 Mon 11/21/2016 Originally posted by islay Originally posted by CLevar I’m more skeptical of the scale of things- putting 3k bbl in oak in year one is incredibly ambitious. I don’t think a taproom is required at a small scale (through I’m biased for obvious reasons). Consider Olvalde- keeps overhead low and consistently puts out good beer in small quantities. Your BIP (Oakhold) is quite a bit different from most, as of course you know. You’re not going to be brewing the wort on site and, more relevantly, all of your beer will be sour and/or wild (correct me if I’m wrong). That’s a niche market, and you can expect a small and spread out but enthusiastic fan base, as opposed to a wide swath of the local community that will go to you for their standard styles because, why not, you’re local. For as much as RateBeerians (myself included) tend to love sours and wilds, many people who consider themselves big craft beer fans still haven’t tried them or have tried a few and actively dislike them. You’re sure to have some awkward interactions with confused, uninitiated customers if you have a taproom. In addition, you have the Fair State association to help you build brand familiarity and a following in much the way a taproom tends to do. So perhaps Oakhold is the rare exception to the it-helps-a-lot-to-have-a-taproom rule (although I remain dubious). That said, I thought you were planning an eventual satellite taproom in south Minneapolis. Is that no longer under consideration? I think of a taproom as like a stadium/arena for a sports team: Sure, the team may generate most of its money from television and merchandise, and, theoretically, it could play in front of camera operators on some sound stage, but is it really going to limit its connection with its community by not letting the people come see it in person? Forget about the forgone revenue; what about the forgone loyalty? If the taproom had a good atmosphere, I think that you would get strong numbers of locals here in Duluth. Thirsty Pagan has numerous sours on all the time, and Fitgers seems to sell them well when they are on tap. That having been said, "standard" beers like IPAs would broaden the base of people who would want to go, and the farm would not be ideal since it requires driving and is a ways from anywhere (other than the interstate)--downtown or Canal Park would be much better. The hilltop, Mount Royal, or Lakeside would also all be solid locations to draw a good number of people. Regardless, I know that a Duluth taproom is not in the works, but I do think one could be extremely successful and beneficial for the brewery.
Message MatSciGuy beers 924 º 08:13 Tue 11/22/2016 Originally posted by sthlm Originally posted by islay Originally posted by CLevar If the taproom had a good atmosphere, I think that you would get strong numbers of locals here in Duluth. Thirsty Pagan has numerous sours on all the time, and Fitgers seems to sell them well when they are on tap. That having been said, "standard" beers like IPAs would broaden the base of people who would want to go, and the farm would not be ideal since it requires driving and is a ways from anywhere (other than the interstate)--downtown or Canal Park would be much better. The hilltop, Mount Royal, or Lakeside would also all be solid locations to draw a good number of people. Regardless, I know that a Duluth taproom is not in the works, but I do think one could be extremely successful and beneficial for the brewery. I totally agree that we would likely have a lot of support in Duluth, the issue is that Carol and I don’t want to move that far from family with the baby on the way. Since it’s my primarily responsibility to run the taproom once we get to that point, it’s got to be near me, which for now is MSP. Either way, the taproom is going to be removed from the property. We have a long-term strategy and this is just one piece of the puzzle. I do really appreciate you guys’ constructive criticism.