Breweries that open without a bottling/canning line

From our experience, we found its a great way to start. We opened an additional tasting room before we bottled or canned, it helped get the brand out, at the same time we used the extra revenue to buy more equipment. Having said that, I believe wider distribution gives a brewery long lasting stability. If a brewery can get into that side it should, But I think its becoming difficult for a lot of small breweries to find distributors that will take their products. The retail market is certainly getting tough. Grocery stores, etc, have only so much shelf space, there is not a lot of money in selling draft. For the first time, I have found a lot of breweries making great beer, doing very little business.

 

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Your belief is contrary the Federal legal definition of a "brewery".

Selling packaged beer to-go at breweries is also illegal according to the alcoholic beverage laws and brewery licensing regulations of many states.

 

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Yeah, many existing state laws suck, but I've noticed a lot of improvements in recent years, to loosen up some of those laws to help craft brewers out.

I love the small micro-distribution movement in craft. Just frustrating when I go on beer travels and adventures to sample at a brewery tap room, find a delicious beer, but many of these places offer no practical means to take that beer home to share with others or have a few more to enjoy myself. Growlers are just very impractical IMO (there's enough talk on other forum posts on that so let's please not high-jack this thread on growler opinions).

 

Well, 750ml and 64oz glass growlers or aluminum cans ("Crowlers"). The 750ml package was added to state law in 2007.

Yes! The ability to legally sell growlers enabled Minnesota's brewpubs and small breweries to reach many who might not have the time to visit the brewery or brewpub.

But in the past year, those Brewpubs (with food licenses / kitchens) and Taprooms (without kitchens) which have cleared it through their city/township can even sell take-away packages on Sundays; Prior to this, they couldn't sell those packages on Sunday.*

*No Sunday retail sales of beer stronger than 3.2% in Minnesota. No wine or spirits sold at retail on Sunday, either -- Minnesota has peculiar, un-loved beverage alcohol laws for which many in the beer hobby are rightly embarrassed.

 

I think with current state of social media, the word gets out fairly quickly as to who is making great beer in the most remote and tiniest of places without much frills. The small non-distributing brewer may stay invisible to the local non-beer-geek community, but you can guarantee that all the neck beards will come in hoards to support if its a superb IPA, or something amazing being done in a barrel.

If you are making mediocre beers or great German lagers, English styles or Belgian Tripels and Quads, you need to serve great food and great atmosphere and good location to do well.

 

http://qz.com/637540/why-startup-beer-brewers-are-skipping-stores-and-selling-directly-to-locals/

 

So many breweries where I'm at don't can or bottle or if they do can they have someone come in with a mobile canning line to do it for them the trend seems to be that they do that until they're big enough to justify investing the capital in their own canning rig without going under. A sort of testing the waters for the demand of their product before spending the $$ but whoever owns the mobile canning company up here must be KILLING it right now.

 

It's the norm here,most breweries are cask only.It avoids the need for expensive equipment and most customers prefer it over bottled or canned

 

I get nostalgic thinking of the local Marston pub serving cask Pedigree just days old. There is a lot to be said for the English tied-house system. I'm sure much has changed since I was there in the 1980's, though.

 

Dave, look 4 posts up ^^^^

Cheers!

 

Oops thanks deleted

 

The tied house has less going for it than in past years. Small breweries find it difficult to sell their beer in them and the paternal attitude to the tenants has largely gone. In the day, landlords paid a peppercorn rent (maybe around $60 a year equivalent) and just sold the brerwery's beer for them. If the pub did food, it was the landlord/landlady's perk. Now they are screwed so hard for rent that many simply cannot return a living profit.Those owning their own pubs do well though.

 

A lot of these places want to succeed but maybe do not have the capital at this time. I wish them luck and hopefully they will be able to expand sooner thsn later

 

my point exactly. Yall did fantastic without regularly bottling your year rounds. It was more of a point against the original post.

 

I think this is something we are going to see a lot more as smart brewery owners recognize their limits and realize they're doing well enough financially with mostly tap room sales and going into full distribution is a much harder business.

I talked to a group of people who haven't even ordered equipment who proudly informed me they planned to be distributed in major retailers within a year. They didn't appreciate that I laughed in their faces. The packaging and distribution route is obviously a point you have to get to if you want to make 10k bbl or more (the number is probably lower, but the exact number is beside the point) but if the brewers know their limits, just staying small is a great place to be the beer business

 

Starting out without packaging is fine, even if you grow to bog for the taproom you can always distribute kegs locally.

 

There are mobile bottling lines. They do quite a bit of business here in the Sacarmento area.

 

Everybody should have a goal I suppose, but I can't help thinking the folks you're describing would be just as happy selling widgets if they could make more money.

 

I'm seeing quite a bit of variations from all walks of breweries.

State laws recently changed to allow more than 1 taproom (I think it's up to three) without the breweries having to going through extra hoops. So some places are offsetting no distribution by being in more than one location either statewide or city wide.

I see some that have just opened and they are doing bomber bottling. It may be by hand, but its definitely on the smaller batch side (less than 1,000). Sales seem to be okay because they are constantly doing it. Why sell the same beer in a growler if they can sell it in a 1/3 of the size vessel for the same price?

All I know is, with the battle happening at the taps and on store shelves and with every month passing, and 1-2 new out of state products entering, breweries need to sit down and really focus on what their goals are.

Most breweries around me seemed to have started off without canning or bottling for at least a year. Some took 5+ years. Now it's gotten so competitive, some new guys who haven't even established themselves are buying canning lines and want to get their product out there ASAP.

Everyones different financially with their debt and brewhouse size etc.. I just don't know anymore. I'm seeing 20 year old brewpub only outlets that now want to bottle/can and get their products out. Pretty crazy.

 

maybe it's been said...but it could very well be the money/financial backing.

I have a local one that does not have canning/bottling but they make good stuff.

There is another local one that has been open maybe a year...cans and bottles already. Water-cooler talk is they have big money backing them