Spindletap Brewing - Houston

I've been following them on twitter. Looks like they're currently in the "friends & family" phase.

Also looks like they VERY quickly built a nice looking place. Seems like there must be a LOT of money behind them based on what they tweet.

And finally, one of their tweets implied they'd be launching with four core beers. The image that accompanied it implied that they might be their only four beers for some time. You know, the 11 Below model.

 

Don't know on timing but they did tease an IPA series a few weeks ago

https://twitter.com/SpindleTap/status/647449438043172864

 

They replied to a tweet recently saying they were targeting Nov 7th for their opening.

 

From my understanding is that they have some oil money behind them - I am guessing it is guys from the oil business who left the oil business to start this. I also understand that they have a purpose built building....but are renting half or more of it to one of it to store O&G equipment for a company (I am guessing a company associated with one of them).

With that said, they plan on canning their beer, have a nice taproom, and all the usual stuff now.

I will go back and see if I can find pictures of their cans, I saw it at some point.

 

With an seemingly uninspiring starting lineup of a blonde, pale, DIPA & ESB what is the differentiating factor for these guys?

 

Isn't that how most breweries start? I know that we all love the sours, BA stuff, more interesting areas, but the bulk of most of these brewery's sales will come from the basic beers.

Make good beer in this market and you will survive. If they have a taproom that is open a lot (one that almost acts like a bar), then it won't really matter - they will do enough sales just there.

 

On the east side of town? Really? Better hire somebody who is armed and trustworthy to watch your car while go in to have a beer.

 

The building is shared with some of the other businesses the owners have... which saves everyone money.

As a fan of Texas history, the name is just tremendous. Spindletap... and they are on the east side, so a bit closer to Beaumont.

 

Breweries often go into not the greatest neighborhoods.

I really have no idea about Houston areas that aren't great, but I figure they will do just fine. I am guessing that there are enough places where people work in that area, as well as near a highway, that they'll draw people with beer.

And honestly, having a beer with a risk of being shot just adds something to the experience.

 

Hello fellow beer drinkers. Thought I'd log on and address some of these VICIOUS ACCUSATIONS.

Just kidding. Most of the above is pretty on point.

We are definitely in a somewhat lower income part of town, but it isn't really an issue for us because we have 12 acres completely fenced in and are about a block away from a police station. My partners have been at the same location for 7 years and haven't had a single issue. That said, if you'd like a malt liquor with your craft beer, it's readily available.

On our varieties: We are going to be canning the 4 staples off the bat, but we have way, way more than those that'll be rotating in the taproom and around town. We have a IPA series called "Hop Option" that is basically the same beer brewed with different hop varieties and hopping techniques so people new to the craft beer scene can get a feel for what they like, don't like, etc. That'll account for 5-10 by itself, but they'll be released over the next year. Our guys also just free-lance all the time and that'll be stuff we sell out of the tap room exclusively. They dry hopped 21 lbs into what was looking like a failed effort (due to weak hops we won't be buying again) at our pale ale and it came out pretty damn badass. I will say that you're probably not going to see us doing a whole lot of the more esoteric brewings, but we'll eventually cover a wide spectrum.

Our brewmaster is a guy that we plucked straight from the home brew ranks. He's been doing his own stuff for around 10 years and is extremely detail oriented. In addition to the middle of the fairway stuff, he's really good at Imperial Stouts and whiskey seasoned varieties. He's obsessed with making beer to the point of possibly quitting a very lucrative career to focus exclusively on brewing, though we've sorta told him to tap the brakes on that until we at least get off the ground. We have very high confidence in both Shaun and our ops manager Garrison who has a degree in microbiology focused on yeast cultivation. They have brewed 7-8 times so far and, in my obviously very biased opinion, absolutely nailed it right off the bat.

Our tap room/facility is awesome. We built it specifically to have large events like bbq cookoffs, game watching parties, corp team building, etc. We've got 10 tvs, surround sound, and a projector that can put HD on 110 inches of wall within the actual brewery. We also have a beer funnel that runs 75 feet up to the roof of the warehouse that will shoot beer at terminal velocity straight down your throat and out your butt. Okay, I made that up.

Anyhow, if anyone has any questions or wants to know the inside scoop in anything we're doing, that's what I'm here for. Hope you guys come out and see for yourself why we're super fired up to open our doors. Guarantee you'll have a good time and there's at least a high probability you won't get shot. Well, "high" might be a stretch, but there's a decent probability at minimum.

Cheers!
Cameron Banks
Spindle Tap Brewery

 

They are polishing the concrete floors in the tap room as we speak. The only thing remaining after that is the behind-the-bar cabinetry. But we should be ready to party very soon. We're hoping to open up before the grand opening on Nov 7, but not sure if it'll happen.

 

thanks for chiming in. it's always nice to hear straight from the source. good luck!

 

Thanks, we sponsored a few Ocktoberfest parties this weekend and got really good feedback.

Thursday night 70 guys floated 2 half barrel kegs, one of which was 7.2 ABV, so it's safe to say good times were had and there are a lot of wives that didn't like us Friday.