Want To Start A Brewery Anyone?!

[seemax]

An ideal setup would be a central brewery in an industrial area with great water which services a number of direct sales outlets - Pretty much the way that Redback started up - From what I was told, they had their main production facility in one place and then had nice shiny copper vessels at the pubs which may have served as pilot breweries
Cheers

Roller

Think: 2 Brothers in Moorabbin

Only open Thu/Fri nights. Good/great beer at reasonable prices, nice industrial atmosphere, live music at times, heck even saw Colin Hay (Men at Work) there few months back. They imported the brew gear from the USA, the actual pub is essentially a concrete slab with a bar and chairs so not a huge cost to setup. Do they make money - probably not a heap but as already said it's for the love. They also bottle their beer but never bothered trying it as the stuff on tap is so close to home!

 

[hatchor]

warning: 13 pots down.......
along the lines of a previous response......

I love fabricating a recipe, tweaking previous attempts and I really enjoy the actual process of making the beer, just as much as I love drinking beer. I dream about "owning a brewery". Who doesn't?

However, how much do we really think about owning, operating, being liable for and responsible to a brewery?? I always dream about the good shit, and none of the bad, isn't that what dreams are for? I also know that I am not motivated enough to work for myself....

I am very happy leaving my beer making as a hobby, as it has worked brilliantly for a few years now. I would hate to ruin my love for this hobby by making it a "job" where I had to "work"; Rather I prefer to leave it as a home based passion and a slight obsession that I love and will continue to do as long as I can.

Having said that, I am not disinclined to work in a brewery, so if anybody starts one where they would like me to "work", and where I don't have any after hours concerns, then I would consider it depending of course on wage......

But until that happens, my brewery is big enough for me already, and I turn out stuff I really enjoy. Thats all that matters eh?
:beerbang:

 

[HoppingMad]

One of the lecturers at the Ballarat uni course said to turn a profit you need to sell over 100 000L of beer a year. Thats a lot of beer

Is that's why they're a lecturer and not running a commercial enterprise? Because its all too hard? If everyone thought this way imagine how crap the craft beer scene would be in Australia. You don't have to start making this much beer.

If you look behind the numbers you'll realise that yep, most micros started on 400L systems brewing small numbers and not turning profits right away but those who have persisted are doing well and are now brewing 150,000L per year and employing others.

Here's an example - two guys who most would have heard of by now. Basically started when Tooheys & CUB were in a pub buying war and locked everyone's distribution out of most pubs - one of the toughest times to start something like this. They started with $10,000 according to the article. Not $200,000. A little passion goes a long way - as well as a willingness to hand cap bottles in their thousands (that's what these guys did prior to being able to afford a bottling line).

Old Mountain Goat Article

Hopper.