Breweries Opening in the Austin area

ABGB

 

It's almost three years since Moonlight Tower posted anything but the website's still up http://moonlighttowerbrewing.com/

 

I spent a few minutes combing through each of these sites. The common link: IPA. Goddammint why doesn't somebody brew something different? The market is super-saturated with <shitty> IPA's, red ales, and "easy drinking" blondes. Solid rock had a few low ABV stouts on the list, and one of the SA breweries had a porter. But everything else seemed to be middle of the road stuff.

Uninterested.

BK

 

Cannot like this post enough.

 

Until Solid Rock gets sued by Rolling Rock, and 5 Stones gets sued by Stone, FWIW.

 

I think the popularity of IPAs relative to other styles is so high right now that, rather than acknowledge the saturation and focus on other styles, breweries are trying to cash in and just hoping that their IPAs are superior enough to stand out.

I think we're reaching a tipping point, though. There seems to be more and more vocal opposition to the "all hoppy, all the time" attitude in brewing... a smart brewery should pick up on that demand and start differentiating themselves through diversity rather than outdoing others on yet another IPA offering.

 

Totally agree. There are many other under appreciated styles out there that would KILL in Texas, especially during the summer. Berliner Weisse, 60/80/90 Schilling, Dortmunder, Helles, etc. All very flavorful and NOT dependent on an unstable hop market. Plus, it seems like many of the new breweries now are still behind the 'hop curve', producing very bitter and unbalanced IPAs that rip the tastebuds and rebuke non-craft nerds. Not the flavorful, aromatic, hop-forward yet easy drinking IPA's like on the West Coast (think Pliny) that garner so much attention.

Which of these new breweries is going to hire me as a consultant? Will work for beer.

BK

 

Does anyone know where Celis is in their reopening process? Since announcing their return a year or so ago there's been basically zero overt signs of progress... emphasis on "overt" but they maintain a social media presence that is shockingly devoid of any real news. IE any photos uploaded to Instagram are more likely to be pets or backyard BBQs than pics of an actual brewery buildout.

 

I think the daughter of the Celis family, whose name escapes me, did a Belgian beer tasting there. But I did not attend so I can't give specifics.

 

Celis -an initial splash last summer but no word on progress since. Anyone heard anything?

 

I recall reading that they would be present on their FB page, but I don't think they specified whether they intended to have beer there so I assumed it was more of a "meet and greet" type thing.

 

Exactly. I'm used to at least seeing pics of open warehouse space with a pile of lumber laying around well within a year of a brewery announcement.

 

Of that list. Solid Rock seems interesting. I at least like the styles they are going to offer. Nice to have another ESB and Cream Ale to choose from. A solid session stout is always welcome as well.

 

The Celis thing at Growler Room was just her showing off some new Belgian beers that she imports. I didn't hear any mention of their own beers or brewery construction.

 

I thought I'd heard that they were going to gypsy brew at S. Austin Brewing until they got their place up and running down the line. Not sure if thats still the plan, though.

 

I'm Rob and I'm part of the Busted Sandal Brewing crew. I'd have to agree that the market is saturated with IPAs but the reality of it is that the style is incredibly popular right now so you get placed into a position where you almost have to offer one. Other than the fact that I am a fan of the style myself, the hope for us is that the IPA functions as a gateway to introduce Busted Sandal and leads to trying our other offerings. By "covering the bases", it allows us to get established and then we will have the freedom to expand into some of these voids.

We already have recipes for some of these less available styles plus I personally think that porters and stouts aren't as plentiful as they should be which is why a porter is one of our initial offerings. And as far as our IPA is concerned, we believe it is a well balanced beer which provides contrast to some of the hop bombs that some in the industry are trending toward.

We will likely have our first production beer out at the end of June or beginning of July. We hope you'll give us a chance to earn your business. In the meantime, feel free to follow our progress on Facebook if you would like.

Thanks,
Rob
Busted Sandal Brewing

 

Christine is the Beer Liaison for Authentic Beverage Mgt. Bringing in Belgium brands, some are small breweries.
Celis Brewery plans are 2014 time frame currently and 8500bbls production capacity. Couple original Celis employees are potentially avail to help get it going too. So, plans, but I didn't press for more details when we talked a couple weeks back at an event.

 

Rob,

Thanks for your post and participation on the forums. Always cool when we (the consumers) can have an open dialogue with the brewers.

But I have to disagree with your philosophy that every new brewery "almost has to offer" an IPA in the current market. For one, the ABV is quite different from BMC offerings, which will always throw people for a loop. Especially now that the bar for ABV in IPA is steadily increasing. Secondly, I think that the style itself is polarizing, with some drinkers really salivating over high levels of hops while many others don't like the bitter component at all. I think other styles (Dort Export, Helles, Northern English Brown, Scottish 60/70 schilling, bohemian pils) are much more conducive to being gateway styles, especially for BMC drinkers.

I hope y'all succeed, but I think it's important to separate yourselves from an increasingly homogenized marketplace to garner long term success.

My idea: traditional lambic brewery in ATX. Lambic, kriek, framboise as flagships. Gueze after 5 years. Boom. Walez bro. Anybody have $1,000,000 they want to donate?

BK

 

It's a bit difficult to just start making those styles on a whim. As a homebrewer, I consider those to be very challenging styles to make. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the homebrewers who have done it and the commercial breweries that give it a shot. Hopefully JK can pull it off over the next few years.

 

New Braunfels Brewing was opened over a year ago and was only available in the NB area. I think they had consistency or quality control issues so they bought all new equipment and had a consultant come in to overhaul their operation. They posted on twitter yesterday that they delivered kegs to Austin but didn't name specific locations.

I've never had any of their beer though, just read about them online.

 

I live right near Austin Beer Garden Brewing and there's been quite a bit of activity the last month when driving by. I know I saw a squad of plumbers there yesterday, so I assume they're at the stage of renovating and installing the Brewhouse.

 

My 2 cents... Love IPA's but avoid the "standard" (seems that ya'll have the right idea e.g. hop bomb) Lone Pint did a good job, Hops & Grain Mosaic and Pinthouse Pizza's "Calma Muerta" tastes nothing like anybody elses..

I feel like they are high on flavor (Citrus!!) on very low on the piney/resinous/bitter flavors. (There is a place for them tho)

Love to have more local options!!!

 

The market is wayyyy oversaturated, but if even one of these new breweries makes an amazing beer that I get to try at some point, I can't complain.

 

I might have another brewery for Austin, TX coming in 2014 if all goes well for me. I'm currently wrapping up my MBA this fall semester and once I get that out of the way I can focus 100% on getting the brewery going. I agree with the post there are many IPAs out there, I'm not hating on IPAs I love a good hoppy beer but the market is saturated with IPA's. My idea is to brew session beers made with the best possible ingredients, brew beers with lots of flavors but easy on the alcohol, I would like for them to range between 4-6%. I believe Austin and Texas alike are barely scratching the surface as far as microbreweries go, there is plenty of room for more wonderful Texas beer.

 

Go to Denver and tell me that Austin is saturated. You can't walk 10 feet without tripping over a new brewery!

 

I'm not sure if one can make direct comparisons to other cities as far as saturation goes. It really depends on what the buying public wants. In cities like Denver and Portland, the people there support their craft beer. I think Austin is another city that has a higher saturation point, primarily because of its college town culture and emphasis on supporting local business. But for other cities, I think the saturation point is lower.

Either way, I don't think there's any way we're going to sustain the current growth we're seeing. We may sustain the level we've grown to, but not the growth rate itself. I suppose the point of all this is enjoy these times of exciting new things happening in craft beer at every turn, because (and I'm sorry) it won't last forever.