OnTap Magazine

A s homebrewers we have all heard that question as your friends cautiously sip your first offering of homebrew: are you going to start your own brewery? I was among the arrogant few that considered the possibility from the onset. I fell in love with the process, the people, and the product. This new love coincided with a rediscovery of a family entrepreneurial itch that had finally found a vehicle to fulfilment. Herein lies the rub: in considering the transition from a homebrewer to a contract brewer it is essentially the transition from a hobby to a business. Do you remember those four weeks before cracking open that first homebrewed beer? The anticipation; the angst that you did everything correctly. Even now I can vividly recall my very first brew day: reading John Palmer’s How to Brew the night before and realising that my mash tun was only half completed. After finishing the build that Saturday morning I finally mashed in later that day. The rest of the day turned into a frenzied blur as I completed two decoctions – a pretty ambitious first brew, I acknowledge. I recall waking the other half around midnight to help me lug a boiling pot of wort to our bathtub to cool it down. Those first hours waiting for the first bubbler activity followed by the weeks waiting for the bottles to carbonate were agonising. Then the pure elation with the pop of a cap, the rocky white foam rising in the glass carrying the malty and hoppy aromatics. In that first deep sip I was smitten. YOUR BREWING VOICE I soon became a prolific brewer, transitioning from clone brewing to finding my own beer voice. I brewed until I found the ingredients that moved and inspired me. I would urge you to do the same, and as you find these ingredients you will start brewing beers that differentiate you from other brewers. In parallel to getting step one under the belt it is critical to not fall into a poor-quality feedback loop. I found the best way to avoid that was to join the Worthogs, just one of the many homebrewing communities around the country. Here I got informal and real-time feedback on my beer. The homebrewing scene is the leading edge of beer innovation in any country, making it a great place to broaden your beer knowledge. But with a bunch of amateur brewers it is also a good place to taste unbalanced and sometimes off flavoured beers. Overall, it is a very good learning experience. As I gained confidence in tasting and evaluating my beer I started training for the Beer Judge Certification Program. Structured and thoughtful tasting is a great way to evaluate beer and develop your palate. Many amateur brewers shy away from a structured tasting approach thinking it would dull their enjoyment of beer. I found it very enlightening. The process of certification is more about expanding your taste vocabulary to accurately describe what you could always taste. This in turn improved my everyday drinking experience. BUILDING A BRAND My first business-focused step – and also a bucket-load of fun – was building my brand. There are a lot of good resources on the internet to guide you through the process. The best advice I distilled from all my research was the “bar top shout test”. Is it easy to order the beer across a noisy bar top? This I how I realised that Drahthaar Brewery, my original brand name, was probably not the best. This brings me to the second piece of advice around branding: do not name your brewery after the family pooch and steer clear of canine puns: there are already enough dog branded-breweries out there who do it well. Take the time to differentiate your brand just as you are doing with your beer. In the development of my brand I found identifying my target market and audience very helpful. I would never have thought that simply deciding to focus on fellow rat racers in Gauteng would be so insightful. I read far and wide to try and find a way to create a brand and space in which they could slow down. In this search I came across a Spanish bullfighting term, querencia . It describes the place in the arena to which a bull returns to refocus and rest. Legend has it that when a bull truly finds its querencia he taps into his full power, becoming truly dangerous. That vivid visual of the power that could be found in querencia inspired me. Fortunately I’d already learnt the bar top shout test, so I headed over to my thesaurus. And there it was. A name complete with an iconic logo history. It felt like I hit the jackpot. Simple, recognisable, and relatable: Pause Beer Co. The classic pause logo is now the foundation of my brand. The next leg of my journey is where the rubber hit the road, where I realised that seven years of homebrewing could only bring me so far. I needed capacity; a lot more than I could churn out on even the most epic back to back homebrew day. There are many routes to going pro. Investing in your own brewery and equipment is the option with more pub night stories. I opted to follow the contract brewing route. It has a quicker route to market, and I can get proof of concept before I commit to the financial and emotional toll that comes with launching a brewery. This would be the perfect time to reveal who I selected as my brewing partner, but I reckon it is a lot more fun to leave it as a cliff-hanger. So join me in the next issue where I share everything you need to consider when choosing a potential brewing partner. It’s a year that has seen a number of breweries and brands shut up shop forever, but 2020 hasn’t been all bad. The long periods of free time have given some people the opportunity to reflect, take stock and get inspired. Michelle Erasmus takes us on the first part of her journey to transition from avid homebrewer to commercial contract brewer. I fell in love with the process, the people, and the product ontapmag.co.za | Summer 2020 | 57