Fully agree that dreaming is good.
While I have the book Brewing up a Business as well as The US Brewing Industry as well as my favourite of the three so far Satarting your Own Brewery (which is an eye opener on some fronts), it would not be very common to start with a small Sabco system and become a viable microbrewer. The transition from a 50 liter system to a 2000 liter system is very expensive and since the GFC, banks have become more hesitant at lending money.
At the end of the day it comes down to your definition of a successful / viable brewery.
For some folks, they may not mind spending 12-14 hours per day and often 7 days per week to make an hourly rate equivalent or less than the checkout girl at Coles because it permits them to pursue a love for brewing. There is nothing wrong with that and I take my hat off to these folks. Bear in mind that if this is your dream, then you probably just need to make minor upgrades to your current setup and polish your sales skills. The transition as demand increases would be hard as you would basically have to invest big $$$'s to get to a system that you don't need to upgrade again in a few months.
For others it might be a setup that they build up as a business which has some room for growth if the product becomes successful which may ultimately provide them with an income stream at retirement or a lump sum if they sell the business. This requires some careful planning (including a business plan), some decent sales skills and at some stage marketing.
Neither are wrong but different people have different approaches, both of which produce good beer.
Is it possible to find out what was included in the $200K
Regards
Roller