Brewbound’s first Brew Talks meetup of 2015 is set to kick off at tonight at the Harpoon Brewery Beer Hall in Boston. The event will offer more than 100 beer industry professionals an intimate opportunity to network and discuss the business of beer over a few cold beverages. For those unable to attend Brew Talks in person, we’ve made available a free live video steam the evening’s two panel discussions, which will begin at 5:30 P.M. EST.
F.X. Matt Brewing, more commonly known as Saranac, is getting set to debut a new marketing campaign across multiple platforms, including television, a still relatively untapped medium for craft brewers. Dubbed “Pour Your Soul Into It,” the campaign was developed to better relay the company’s history and its own position in the craft beer landscape, which Saranac president Fred Matt said has been unfairly disputed by some consumers.
Indiana’s largest beer wholesaler is reportedly distributing more than just suds. Monarch Beverage has been accused of illegally channeling campaign contributions to influential state lawmakers through a lesser-known company, Vision Concepts. The complaint was filed by a group of smaller distributors who argue that Monarch flouted Indiana’s campaign contribution laws by donating more money than is legal.
The Saint Louis Brewery, makers of the popular craft beer Schlafly, has brought on a new chief executive officer. James Pendegraft, a Saint Louis native and the former vice president of sales & marketing for North American Breweries, a subsidiary of Florida Ice & Farm Co., will take over as Saint Louis Brewery’s CEO. He replaces co-founder Dan Kopman.
Ninkasi Brewing is expanding its distribution footprint once again, this time to Utah. The Oregon-based brewery has inked a deal with General Distributing Company of Salt Lake City for coverage throughout the state, it announced Thursday. Beginning this week, Ninkasi beers will be available throughout Utah in both 12 oz. and 22 oz. bottles.
Over the next three weeks, Oregon’s Deschutes Brewery will miss out on an opportunity to bottle about 15,000 barrels of beer. The 27-year-old craft brewery is in the process of installing a new Krones bottling line that is capable of filling more than 560 bottles per minute, 47 percent more than Deschutes’ current system.
Green Flash Brewing has announced plans for the national rollout of Cellar 3, a series of rare, barrel-aged beers produced in its newly minted second facility of the same name. Located in Poway, Calif., Cellar 3 provides the company with 12,000 sq. ft. of additional room to expand its barrel-aging program and experiment with wild yeast, two endeavors the company’s Mira Mesa facility lacked adequate space for.
Would a Colorado craft brewery ever sell to “big beer?” That’s the question Eric Gorski of the Denver Post posed over the weekend, surveying Colorado brewery owners for their reactions to Anheuser-Busch InBev’s recent craft acquisitions. “There’s a Colorado-sized hole on the growing map of U.S. craft breweries now in the hands of corporate owners,” he wrote. Gorski checked in with a few of the state’s top craft players to get a sense of who might be interested in selling.
Brewbound has invited Boston’s most innovative brewers and bar managers to discuss the local beer scene at next Tuesday’s Brew Talks meetup, being held at the Harpoon Brewery taproom. Jean-Claude Tetreault, the founder of Boston’s third production brewery, Trillium, will join Row 34’s Megan Parker-Gray and Cisco Brewers’ national sales director Peter Burke in a conversation on building a beer culture in Boston. Together, the trio will examine reasons why Boston’s beer culture has, despite considerable development in recent years, still trailed behind other major cities.
One of the world’s preeminent nomad brewers is getting ready to settle down. Mikkel Borg Bjergsø, the Danish beer maker who travels the world producing labels under the Mikkeller brand, has forged a “creative partnership” with San Diego’s AleSmith Brewing that will include an old brewing facility AleSmith had been planning vacate this summer.
Beyond the quality of the liquid inside the bottle, strong packaging and labeling, the eye-catching face of a brand, is becoming paramount as a means of standing out on shelves tasked with propping up more and more craft SKUs than ever before. Or, as Ian McLean, founder and creative director of McLean Design and a BevNET FBU (Food and Beverage University) instructor, said, “If you’re not seen, you don’t exist.”
The executive shuffle continues at Oregon’s Ninkasi Brewing. The company today named current director of business development Per Nielsen as its new vice president of sales. The announcement comes more than one year after Ninkasi parted ways with former national sales director Marty Ochs.
Uinta Brewing today announced expanded distribution throughout Kansas, signing an agreement with the Kansas Craft Alliance, a statewide network of 13 Anheuser-Busch wholesalers. The brewery, headquartered in Salt Lake City, will begin shipping core Uinta offerings like Hop Nosh IPA and Cutthroat Pale Ale to Kansas this week.
Trillium Brewing co-owner Jean-Claude Tetreault is one step closer to realizing his dream of owning a true farmhouse brewery in New England. The Boston-based beermaker today announced plans to expand with a second production facility in Canton, Mass., about 18 miles south of the company’s tiny, 2,300 sq. ft. outpost in the up-and-coming Fort Point neighborhood of Boston.
