North Carolina’s Big Boss Brewing will make its first foray out of its home state this month, signing distribution agreements with four wholesalers in neighboring South Carolina.
The brewery, which launched in Raleigh, N.C. in 2006, has tapped the services of B&B Distributors, KW Associates, Bud of Columbia, and Southern Eagle for coverage in Rock Gill, Greenville, Columbia and Charleston respectively.
“We intend to build the Big Boss brand in South Carolina the same way we built North Carolina: by employing local representatives who live in the communities we serve,” brewery owner Geoff Lamb said in a news release.
Big Boss sold 8,000 barrels of beer last year and the company expects to grow more than 62 percent in 2014, to 13,000 barrels.
That high double-digit growth rate is what’s allowing for the company to extend its reach to neighboring markets, said David Rogers, the brewery’s director of distribution.
“We just got to the point with capacity where we could still grow North Carolina and put on South Carolina as well,” he said. “We don’t see North Carolina shrinking down for us anytime soon. We still want to be able to take care of the growing needs there.”
The brewery has no immediate plans to expand into any other states, however.
“We’ll stay here, make a great effort to grow our numbers in both states at the same time before we think about another market,” added Rogers.
In 2013, the company completed an expansion which included the addition of new fermentation and conditioning tanks. This year, the company is installing two 100-barrel oak foeders in an effort to grow its barrel-aging program.
“Going into the other one-offs that we’ll produce from aging and blending these beers, we’ll fulfill another market demand that’s kind of growing right now,” added Rogers. “We’ve done some sours in the past but not in the capacity we’re about to be able to produce.”
There’s no word on whether Big Boss plans to expand its arcade-aging program, however.