Jace Marti, Brewmaster, August Schell Brewing Co.

Jace Marti started working summers at Schell’s when he was 18, and, since graduating college and completing two brewing internships in Austria and Germany, he’s been working at his family’s brewery full time. “My dad made sure I started at the bottom, and I worked my way up from there,” says Marti, who’s part of the family’s sixth generation to work at Schell’s. “Having the opportunity to work every day with my parents and my brothers carrying on the family tradition is pretty special.” So in December, when the Brewers Association named Schell’s on their list of breweries they do not consider “craft,” Marti took to the internet. His protest letter to the Brewers Association went viral, and became symbolic of the strong reaction many had to the list (which the organization has since redacted).

What inspired you to write the letter to the Brewers Association?
I was just finishing up with work for the day, and getting stuff ready to go speak at a homebrewers meeting that night. I checked my email one last time, and saw the press release from the [Brewers Association]. It was like a punch to the gut seeing their “black list” of brewers, and to see Schell’s on it. … I felt like we were being unfairly lumped together with the big guys. I felt that they were implying that our motives and business practices were the same as those, and that’s not true. I felt like something had to be said to defend our brewery, and clear our name. I slept on it that night, and felt the same way about it the next day, so I wrote the response.

What’s your argument against the Brewers Association’s definition of “non-craft brewers”?
The part that I take issue with, in regards to Schell’s, is that we’re not considered a “craft brewer” because we are not traditional. Whether you like American lagers or not, we’re still one of the oldest breweries in America, and we’ve been brewing with corn for over 100 years. We did it to produce the best possible product we could, with the ingredients that were available to us at the time, not to cut costs. We’ve continued to traditionally brew that same style of beer, as well as introduced a full lineup of all-malt, specialty beers. Just because we brew one style of beer with corn doesn’t make us strictly an adjunct brewer. … We are open and honest about the beers we produce, and the ingredients that we use to produce them.

Does the definition of the term “craft brewer” matter?
Yes and no. The [Brewers Association] has done a lot of really good things to advance the awareness and knowledge of craft beer, however you choose to define it. What I think they fail to realize is that these so called “crafty” beers are ultimately a good thing for the craft beer movement. They open doors to places that have never carried craft beers before, act as a gateway beer to the craft beer world. And if you’ve got a good sales staff, they should be easy targets to replace on tap and on the shelves with your better beer, or at the very least, start the conversation about trying different kinds of beer. Whether it be craft or crafty, it’s opening the eyes of consumers to the infinitely wide range of beer flavors and styles that are out there—and that’s a beautiful thing.

How will this debate affect Schell’s?
This debate isn’t anything new for us. My dad was actually on the [Brewers Association] board when they came up with this definition of what a “craft brewer” is, and then they said we weren’t one. … I think getting too caught up in things like this is bad for the beer industry as a whole, and can turn people off from beer altogether. Beer is supposed to bring people together, not drive them apart. Let’s not forget that! ■