A Large German Brewery Is Opening a U.S. Production Facility

This is certainly an interesting endeavor for them to explore. I for one would gladly welcome (and purchase) more quality German beer here in America.

 

Hmmm, interesting.

 

What could possibly go wrong?

 

How do you say " Buy local" in German? The exploratory microbrewery will do fine for the area it is in. I don't see them breaking through on a production level with the bigger facility...

 

Never heard of them before, anyone have any insight into their beers? The only beers rated here have decent ratings for the style. I don't know how well a massive brewery like they're talking about could do but there is definitely room for fresh well made german style beers in the US market. Think how much stale german beer is already being bought

 

This seems like a really, really odd decision. There has to be more than this than meets the eye.

 

For their sake, I hope they configure the equipment in their brewery to also produce contract US “craft.”

 

They'll need to account for special storage for essential ingredients like vanilla, peanut butter, cereal, durian, and taco spice mix.

 

The local paper has a much better article.
https://www.newsobserver.com/latest-news/article231928643.html

Apparently the CEO had been living in the area for about a year and chose Charlotte because

They already have a local distributor and will start importing to SC in mid-July

and will team up with the local community college for training.

 

Hope they take a page from Trumer: supplying fresh, authentically brewed pilsner (perhaps as well as other styles @ 500k bbl) across the coast.

 

Not so sure a half million barrel brewery can be considered "massive" in the US or particularly even in NC, considering these announcements from half a century ago.

The German brewer, Oetker Company, opened an ill-fated brewery w/100,000 bbl/yr capacity, in Alaska in 1976 - Prinz Brau. And Henninger operated a brewery in Hamilton, Ontario in the 1970s (later sold to Heineken subsidiary, Amstel).

 

Oh no, the dreaded Green Bottle

Cool to see, would love some fresh German Beer in the states.

 

Great. Just brew it as you would in Germany.

 

Interesting to say the least. Theres certainly room, Germany has many notable breweries in a very small area, two specialized brewers can both thrive together in a city as big as Charlotte. It might up the ante to have the competition though, right now OMB dominates the styles imo. Yea NC.

 

I wish more German breweries would setup shop here in the US... I'd gladly welcome them!

 

From the local article, Gilde plans to start small with "the Embassy," with the large brewery in the plans for a few years down the road. Very likely that large brewery either never will get built or will get built with nowhere close to that practical capacity. "Up to a 500,000 barrel capacity" probably just means a very large building or even just a large plot of land that theoretically could house enough and large enough equipment that it eventually could produce 500,000 barrels if Gilde went to the trouble of filling up the space, which it likely never actually would do. To me, this sounds like chest-thumping optimism, the public articulation of an absolute best case scenario in hopes of willing it into existence (but knowing full well the reality is likely to be vastly more modest).

Interesting development for the Charlotte area, but I strongly doubt Gilde ever becomes a major player in American craft-y beer. And that's without even addressing Americans' limited appetite for non-watered-down German styles, let alone -- by most accounts -- middling-at-best examples of such.

 

The New York City Paulaner didn’t find any success.

 

I’m seeing more Pils and Lagers here this summer, perhaps as the NEIPA wanes here a bit there’s other styles to step in and take up the slack. Perhaps we underrate the ability of a classic Lager that is well done to inspire purchases. A challenging beer to make to be sure, and perhaps brewers won’t be intimidated to step up and give it a fair shot. A well done Lager or Pils is the perfect crossover beer into the craft world for AAL drinkers, and there’s far more of them than us. A simple Sam Adams imo a long time ago really set a tone, and started a movement, I wouldn’t be surprised if it came full circle