Bauman’s Cider was created as a passion project by founder and head cidermaker Christine Walter, combining her family’s farm roots and abundance of apples with her love of science and fermentation. After a decade in business, Christine and her cidery are leaders in making high quality cider and finding ways to connect more consumers with the segment.
In this week’s edition of A Round With – our Q&A with industry leaders, created exclusively for Brewbound Insiders – Christine looks back at Bauman’s journey over the last decade, how the company and the overall hard cider segment have evolved, and what she’s learned from her work with trade groups.
Here’s the full conversation, edited slightly for clarity:
You come from generations of farmers, but you were the one that brought professional cidermaking into the mix. What about the cider industry made you want to create Bauman’s Cider?
Christine: First and foremost, I am a science nerd! When I went off to college at 18, I majored in Japanese and international business. I don’t really know why – it seemed cool at the time to a small town country girl. It quickly left me wondering what I could possibly have been thinking.
I took a break from college and pursued some hobbies, like metal-working and reading every book I could get my hands on. I dabbled in some community college classes to figure out what really might interest me and I remember like it was yesterday: I was sitting in an anatomy and physiology seminar and I felt more alive than ever before. I literally was so excited to learn every single thing about cells and genes and bacteria. I was insatiable.
Fast forward 20 years to when I tasted my first cider and had to reckon with how I grew up on an apple farm, pressing apple juice every fall, and it had never occurred to me that apple juice could be fermented. My earth shifted!
I sought out and grilled every cider maker I could find and asked them everything from how they chose yeasts, how they chose apples, what made their ciders unique, etc. I insisted that my family members who still lived on the farm and picked and pressed apples every fall try their hands at making hard cider. They didn’t believe my rantings about how great it could be to make cider right on the farm. So I bought some gallon jugs of juice from them and showed them. And then showed them again and again. Hundreds and then many thousands of gallons later, they are the biggest believers.
Bauman’s is celebrating its 10th anniversary. How has the cidery evolved since 2015?
Christine: In the early days, I insisted on everything in my ciders being grown right on our family’s farm. It was how I grew up, eating primarily what we grew, when it was ripe or preserving it ourselves. I wanted my cider to reflect that same seasonality and commitment to local eating, respect for the land and its resources.
I’m not quite as much as a stickler about that now. We can’t grow enough to supply our need for 100% apple juice, and there are so many wonderful orchardists and farmers both in the Willamette Valley where we are, as well as Hood River and even up into Yakima and Wenatchee, Washington. Not only does this support our broader agricultural base in Oregon and Washington, but it helps us hedge our bets against years when our harvest isn’t as strong or the wildfires in our area make harvests poor or non-existent. A little diversity in sourcing is good for everyone.
Beyond that, we are a much bigger company! I was essentially a one-woman show for a few years, and worked a full-time job alongside my evening and weekend cider making. It became less and less amenable as a hobby, and I hit a point where I could not do my best at both and had to choose.
I chose cider and it has been amazing. This is my fifth or sixth year being honored as a Cidermaker of the Year in the Northwest at the Northwest Cider Cup, and almost as many as Cidermaker of the Year for the U.S. at the Great Lakes International Cider and Perry Cup.
How does Bauman’s now compare to how you initially envisioned it being at the 10-year mark?
Christine: I don’t know that I ever could have imagined this level of growth for Bauman’s, not to mention the industry.
The cider industry has essentially seen slow and steady growth for the past 10 years. It’s not an easy time for the alcohol industry at large, but the commitment of the craft cider category to making high-quality beverages from 100% juice sets us apart in so many ways. It feels very authentic and wholesome, to be honest. I am so proud to be a member of the cider community.
For Bauman’s specifically, I never envisioned having such a strong traditional cider program. I came to cider from initial exposure to Angry Orchard and then some local urban cider makers. I didn’t really get a taste for what the Europeans were making with cider apples for a few years. Now I feel like my understanding of and appreciation for French and English cider methods play a huge role in the cider we are making.
You’ve been involved with the Northwest Cider Association, the American Cider Association (ACA) and the Cider Institute of North America. What have you learned from being a part of these trade groups that you may not have otherwise?
Christine: I have taken on leadership roles within the industry because cider in America is a very young community, relative to others. We are in that critical teenage era where we have a ton of potential, but also require a lot of strategic guidance.
When I ran for a position on the ACA board a few years ago, it was because I saw the need to further the industry through strategic advocacy and hold ourselves up to the highest standard as a community. It is all too easy to follow trends and get caught up in small-minded and selfish decision-making.
We were and are such underdogs, less than 5% of the size of the beer category. It’s easy to see the total pie as small and each of us as fighting to get a bigger piece of it. But I know that the pie could be much bigger, and that without strong leadership, we would never realize that potential.
My role in the Cider Institute is part a reflection of my love of the science of cider making and part the belief that if we make sure that every cider maker we meet is making their very best ciders, then as an industry, we all do better. As a nascent industry begins to grow, if there are objectively flawed ciders in the market, every would-be cider fan who first tries that cider might be turned off and walk away thinking “I guess I don’t like cider.”
We don’t have the luxury of an industry like beer, where the styles and categories are so well-understood and defined in the market. If someone tastes a stout and it’s too rich for them, they would easily understand that perhaps a stout isn’t their style, but they know that other styles exist. Sometimes I feel like one wrong cider has turned a lot of drinkers to believe that they aren’t cider fans. The Cider Institute does a brilliant job of providing tools, so every cider maker who takes a class or tunes into an online video walks away with the tools to make their very best ciders, in whatever style and variation of cider that suits them best.
Similarly, one of the greatest things that the Northwest Cider Association does is not just to foster and strengthen the cider community in the Northwest, but they put on the NW Cider Cup every year and it challenges each one of us to make and present our very best ciders, and put them up against our colleagues and friends in rich competition. Truly, the quality of ciders coming out of this little corner of the world are some of the very best I have found, and it is due in large part to the work of the NW Cider Association.
The PNW is dense with cideries and apple production. What has been key to Bauman’s staking its own claim and connecting with consumers when there are so many options?
Christine: Being farm-based was a huge help. Our connection with our own apples leads us to respect every little decision that goes into orcharding – from integrated pest management, cover cropping, organics versus conventional sprays, thinning, picking versus ground harvest and any of the hundreds of decisions that go into every harvest and every orchard. That doesn’t even touch on the terroir impacts like soil, climate, the air quality any given year, etc.
Being tied into this aspect of the cider making process literally grounds us, and drives us to make ciders that honor the apples and the farmers in the best way we know how.
Beyond that, I understand the market forces that dictate the importance of making “modern-style ciders” versus traditional ciders, in that they build a diverse customer base and meet many consumers where they are. Cider can be very inclusive, and while I realize that you can’t be all
things to all people, I think that there really is a cider for everyone and we do our best for consumers when we respect their values and opinions and offer plenty of excellent choices.