The New Kid in Town

Every once in awhile we bring you actual news - not your "Brotherhood of Man" news but real news. The kind of news and information you find on A Good Beer Blog or Seen Through a Glass. So, finally...some real news.

We would like to introduce you to The New Buffalo Brewing Company. Bill Campbell is Founder/Owner and he was kind enough to sit down and answer some of our questions - from Afghanistan.* Bill and his fiancé (spoiler alert) are both currently in the US Air Force.  Bill is serving in Afghanistan and still found time to answer our questions.

Bill, thanks for starting a brewery in Buffalo. More importantly, thanks for serving.

Background

DB: How did you get into brewing and how did it become a business idea?

BC: After I was commissioned I ended up at Goodfellow AFB in San Angelo,Texas, and started to move up the drinking ladder. I made the jump from Keystone Light to Shiner. When I started class I began drinking with Capt Dan Curry and Lt Leon Hontz. Capt Curry was one of the guys in the ‘finer things’ club, and he was also a Captain so he was making twice as much as me and Hontz and could afford good booze. His home bar must have had 500+ bottles in it, with all sorts of fine liquors, bitters, cordials for cocktails, and when it came to beer he was at the same level. I don’t know what the first one he gave me was, but it was honestly the worst thing I have ever had… a pitch black, overwhelmingly bitter beer. I was going to head right back to Shiner but he ended up pushing a Mothership Wit, and it was a revelation.

Over the next seven months I tried craft brews, Belgium Wits, Wheats, Hefewizens, and Sweet Stouts. Shortly thereafter I moved to Manhattan, Kansas. Once I got there I started home brewing some easy beers; Cream Ales (hail to Genny), Kölschs, and then headlong into English styles, milds, browns and stouts. A lot of guys in the military are home brewers. Ben Gartner was an avid and extremely skilled home brewer, and invited me to the local Home Brewing club where I met more guys who taught me allot about home brewing. Someone had to drink all that beer, so another friend, Doug Bunch, ended up consuming many, many gallons of hit and miss batches and providing feedback on what he felt would make the cut commercially. He’s a pretty seasoned drinker of craft brews so it really guided a lot of my brewing.

One of the biggest influences on my decision to start a brewery was going to Tallgrass Brewery right outside of Manhattan. Here I got a chance to start talking to owner Jeff Gill, and he shared huge information about the transition from home brewing to commercial brewing. It went from a ‘this would be cool’ to an ‘I can do this’. Shortly thereafter we started building the business plan, meeting with the city, working with realtors, and buying equipment. This was really the point where I decided to leave active duty and move back to Buffalo to open a brewery.

DB: Sounds like you guys are international travelers. Care to tell us what you’re doing when you are NOT brewing beer in Buffalo?

BC: My fiancé and I are both Active Duty Air Force (I’ll be reserve come the New Year), so we’ve been sent all over the world. Between us I think we have been to 18 countries, from Korea and China to Argentina and Colombia to the Germany and the Czech Republic. Jimmy, our brewer, has also seen such exotic places as Iraq with his time in the USMC.

DB: Why brew beer in Buffalo?

BC: Buffalo is a really interesting town, on paper you would think the place would be booming. Buffalo is one of the businesses gateways into the United States. Toronto is hardly a two hour drive to the north, and Pittsburgh is only a bit farther. Yet, as we all know, the city has struggled for years. There is a certainly a sense the city is going in the right direction, but we still need some grass roots movement to really get on top again. Brewing can be a big part of that, because Buffalo drinks a lot of beer. It’s a beer town. We also have the Niagara Brewing school and Criveller right across the river, so it ends up being a great place to set up shop.

The Brewery

DB: Will you offer beer in cans, bottles, bombers, growlers, all of the above?

BC: At first, we will be focusing on production for bars. We’ll start with 32, 64 and 128 ounce growlers, but we don’t expect to start canning until year 2.

DB: Can you tell us about the brewery system you will use (number of barrels, who designed and manufactured it, etc)?

BC: We have decided to stay local and go with Criveller. They have been a great company to work with. We have equipment designed for a 15 bbl or 30 bbl if we can find a space to fit it. Since we are still searching for a location, we haven’t committed to either system yet.

DB: How are the other local breweries helping in your endeavor? Do you peacefully co-exist or consider them friends and colleagues or bitter archrivals?

BC: I’m sure Tim at Flying Bison doesn’t remember me, as I must be one of the hundreds of people who go on his tour and tell him ‘Hey I’m going to open a brewery in a couple of years.’ He was friendly and entertained my questions. His brewer taught us a lot about physically setting up and the issues breweries have to get though with the TTB and State to get open for business. I also have spoken with Ethan over at Community Beer Works several times. He’s a real standup guy who I think is setting the right tone for brewing in Buffalo. Pearl Street breweries spoke to me several times about their beers and the amazing draft system they have over there. Flying Bison is King of the lagers, and Community Brew Works is doing some really great beers. New Buffalo is looking decidedly English/Irish. (I need to update the website to reflect this). There is so much room in Buffalo that we can all work and grow together.

The Brew

DB: Looks like you have a steady rotation of beers. Will you offer seasonals or one-off, limited brews?

BC: We like to brew (shocking right?), so we brew allot of small batches (15 gallons) of pretty much anything we think would be fun to brew, fun to drink or just want to monkey around with. (Again… I’ve fallen way behind on the website.) We are going to keep up this trend at New Buffalo and put our experiments out in our tap room. However, one of our first goals is to produce 2-4 beers perfectly and make sure they are always available at bars and restaurants.

DB: When and where can we get your beer?

BC: As I’m sure you know, the approval process is a bear for breweries and with an extension in Afghanistan I was pushed back a bit. We are still on track to have our first beers for sale in bars this summer. We are working with another brewery to see if we can get some space on their system and get started sooner. Watch for a Kickstarter campaign in the near future about just that!

Activism

DB: Brewers are pretty good at activism.  How does New Buffalo give back?

BC: Our first public tasting was at a charity event for Roswell. There are so many worthy causes it’s going to be a challenge to pick which ones we will work with. For obvious reasons we would like to work with Veterans in our community.

DB: Many micro-brewers have a bit of a green bent. Will New Buffalo be an environmentally-conscious brewer?

BC: Micro-brewing in allot of ways is almost inherently a green business. When your beer is produced locally you are using less fuel to move it around, less energy keeping it cool, as well as the spent grains we’ll give away to farmers. We have been looking into a C02 capturing system as well for our tanks after speaking with some Alaskan Brewers and about the real benefits.

Last Thoughts

DB: What three things do people need to know about your beer?

BC: Great Beer is the point for us. When everything is said and done we will make high quality, delicious beer. That’s our bottom line.

We are already growing some ‘test’ hops back at the farm, and have spoken with some farmers about getting our own runs of barley grown locally. We are looking forward to working on not just the brewing side, but the growing as well.

We are starting with distinctively English and Irish styles of beers. It’s great that a lot of breweries are pushing out some really big beers. Beers over seven percent are becoming pretty normal, but we want to put out beers that are not only delicious, but can be enjoyed in bulk or with a nice dinner. We just enjoyed some Rochefort 10 last night, and it’s an amazing beer, but you can’t really drink a couple with a meal, and it’s almost 12% alcohol (not to mention its seven bucks a bottle). We want to make sure we are putting out beers most people can enjoy as our main lines. We’ll have a lot of special beers, but those will likely only be in our brewery for short periods of time.

DB: Community Beer Works likes to “Embeer Buffalo”. They say “Our goal is not only to succeed as a brewery, but to better the beer culture of Buffalo. Our city loves beer, and has the potential to be one of the premiere beer destinations in the country. Help make that happen. Embeer Buffalo.” How will you “Embeer Buffalo”?

BC: ‘A Toast to Progress’ is on all of our work and it’s in the same vein. Buffalo truly is set up to become a Beer Destination. We have all the right ‘stuff,’ we are in a central location in the northeast, and we are seeing hops farms and craft malt houses starting to get up and running. Buffalo is still one of the cheapest cities to visit, and very convenient to the Falls and an amazing wine trail just to east of us. We also have a great philharmonic and theater selection. We have to rebuild what it means to be a Buffalonian, and a big part of that is going to be at home drinking Buffalo Brews.

DB: What else should we know about you guys?

BC: We are working on a Kickstarter video to raise some money for New Buffalo Brewing. Watch for it in the near future along with a series of tasting events.

*Bill Campbell did serve in Afghanistan but he informed me after this interview was posted that he provided responses while stateside. 

Sixpoint is in Beast Mode

Dogfish Head gets all the credit for being zany and out there with their brewery and their brews.  They may have met their match with Brooklyn's Sixpoint Craft Ales.  We asked Founder, Shane C. Welch to answer a few questions.  Well, we got answers.

This is the second in our irregular series of interviews with the industry's cutting edge brewers.  Grab a beer and enjoy the ride.

Background

DB: How did you get into brewing and how did it become a business idea?

SW: I got into brewing while drinking a stein of beer when I was two years old.  Seriously!  When I was a kid, I would sometimes nab my father's ceramic stein from the coffee table.  It was filled with cold, sweet, delicious beer, and when he had either left the room or fallen asleep the stein was unattended.  I knew it had to have something special inside...it was such a fancy glass, and my Dad always seemed to drink out of it and enjoy it.  So I hoisted that oversized ceramic container over my head with my little kid hands and chugged it!  My parents were shocked and amused by the whole ordeal...so they took a photo of me.  Birth of a brewer.

I don't know the exact point when it became a business idea...but I image it was sometime when I was making beer at home at 19 years of age and then decided to drop out of college so I could homebrew full-time and seek the job of professional brewer.  Haha.


DB: Can you highlight a few of the unanticipated challenges of starting a brewery?

SW: Where to start?  Haha.  Let's see...never having enough money, running out of beer, not enough space, can't seem to find out where your kegs went, mechanical failures in the brewery, random complaints at accounts at 1am calling your cell phone, burglaries at the brewery, getting jumped and mugged outside of the brewery at dusk, accidental fire that almost burned the brewery to the ground, you know....the usual. 


DB: When you’re not brewing what are you doing with your free time?

SW: Hanging out with my girlfriend, being a total beast and romping around the park with my dog, riding my bike, reading books, drinking tea, kicking back with a cold one, exploring NYC and beyond.

The Brewery

DB: You rather proudly brew “by hand” using your own hand made mash paddle.  Given this old school style, is consistency more of a challenge for you than it is for those more apt to rely on aluminum paddles and computers?

SW: You may think that you are stirring the mash with a wooden mash paddle, but you're actually stirring up the raging beast within yourself.  Nuff said!


DB: Anything other equipment hand made?

SW: Just about the entire brewhouse is hand made!  Everything from the custom control panels, to the vapor condenser, keg grant, CIP system, hard-pipe network, keg racker, etc.  Its a big collection of salvage parts from auctions that have been repurposed and engineered to make a bona fide Frankenstein craft brewery.


DB: Can you tell us about the brewery system (number of barrels, who designed and manufactured it, etc)?

SW: Its a Frankenstein system - a collection of tanks, vessels, and apparati from all over the world.  Its a 15 bbl system, but we have some 15, 22, and 30 bbl tanks.  Much of the recent engineering and overhaul was done by our in-house guru and engineer, David Liatti.


DB: We notice that Brooklyn Brewery is not on your list of “allies”.  Do you live in their shadow, peacefully co-exist, or consider them friends and colleagues?

SW: They're definitely an ally, and we peacefully co-exist.  We're in the process of renovating the website, and I think that section will be removed altogether.  The reason why is the issue of inclusion vs. exclusion.  Once you say, "here are our allies" then by default some people think if you did not mention someone, then you're automatically not friends with them.  Not true.  You simply don't have the space or recollection to name every single person whom you love and respect.  Thus, we're going to disable that link.

The Brew

DB: Brewing with lava rocks.  Is this legit or a marketing ploy (or a little of both)?

SW: Its totally legit.  That movie was put together on a whim and shoestring with an old college roommate and friend of mine.  We didn't know what to expect from it, and we were just having fun.  No one would have anticipated the viral sensation it became.  It actually has a historical connection and significance, and an educational aspect to it.  We're happy to share it with the world, and apparently they liked it as well.


DB: We ask this for very selfish reasons but when can we expect to find Sixpoint available in the Washington, DC area?

SW: Yikes.  Well, we can't promise anything soon.  We have all to do right now to meet the demand in NYC.  Once we can take care of our folks here, then we'll maybe consider DC.


DB: Want to tip your hand on upcoming, yet to be announced brews?

SW: We're making our first-ever pumpkin beer next week.  Its going to be a collaborative effort among the entire brewing staff at Sixpoint.  The dudes are psyched!

Activism

DB: Your love of Brooklyn is unabashed.  Do you support local events in and around the community?  How does Sixpoint give back?

SW: We support events all the time!  We give back with a simple principle - we try to build strong relationships with individuals and the community at large - and be a fountainhead of positive karma.


DB: Many mirco-brewers have a bit of a green bent.  Sixpoint lists Mother Nature first on your list of allies.  What does Sixpoint do to protect her?

We have company meetings where we get together to discuss how we can be less wasteful as a company.  In the past several years, we have designed the brewhouse so that we can effectively curtail the waste from our manufacturing processes to their lowest levels possible.  One of the biggest waste streams is actually invisible - that of heat energy loss.  Breweries use a ton of energy, but most of this thermodynamic energy is lost.  The best thing about this though is the heat can be recovered, repurposed, and redirected back into the throughput cycle.  As a result, we have designed and implemented systems to recover the heat energy from different processes of the brewing stages to be redirected back into the system.  The result?  We cut our natural gas usage by over 30%!  Its just one of the things we've done on a small scale to make it more environmentally friendly.

Last Thoughts

DB: Brooklyn is Burning or No Sleep ‘Til Brooklyn?

SW: Let me put it to you this way:  Brooklyn is the new frontier; Manhattan is yesterday's news.

DB: Yankees or Mets?

I prefer the Brooklyn Cyclones.

SW: What else should we know about Sixpoint Craft Ales?

Our intention is to exceed your expectations.

DC Brau: Leading the Renaissance in the Nation's Capital

We Dumbarton's Beer strive to bring you cutting edge news and information from the brewing world.  Today, for the first time ever, we actually deliver.  Brandon Skall, co-founder of DC Brau, agreed to an e-sit down with us and we really didn't have to beg very much.

Mr. Skall took a few minutes from what is surely a busy schedule to share some insights about the brewery he is opening with partner Jeff Hancock in January 2011.

Background

DB:  How did Brandon Skall and Jeff Hancock Meet?

BS:  "We met as fans of the local music scene several years ago, when we were both just starting to get into the beverage industry.  After that we went our separate ways.  Jeff moved out west, brewing in Michigan and I stayed here working in beverage sales, distribution, import and marketing.  It wasn't until we were reintroduced at a party that the idea took off."

"Just to add a little more about my background.  I was a fine wine specialist for a local wine distributor for 4 years but most recently I was the Mid Atlantic Regional Manager for a wine and spirits importer based in NYC.  I was responsible for the sales and marketing of my brands in this region as well as designing sales incentives for my wholesalers."

DB:  When did the idea for the brewery come about?

BS:  "I had been contemplating a DC Brewery for quite some time when I re-met Jeff.  I discovered he had the same aspirations and we decided to go for it.  We got to working on a business plan and hired a lawyer and the rest is history."

The Brewery

DB:  Where will the brewery be located?

BS:  "The brewery will be located off of Bladensburg Rd, in NE DC."

DB:  Can you tell us about the brewery system (number of barrels, who designed and manufactured it, etc)?

BS:  "We are ordering a 15 BBL turnkey system from Premier Stainless in San Diego California.  Both Jeff and I were very impressed with the quality of design and construction behind this manufacturer."

The Brew

DB:  When open, will product and merchandise be available for purchase at the brewery?

BS:  "Merchandise yes, in fact we already  have T Shirts for sale on our website.  As for product, not at first.  But we hope to have an on-site and off-site tasting room eventually."

DB:  When will the first of the limited release beers be available?  How will they be named?

BS:  "We will most likely do a limited release sometime next fall.  The goal is to get all three flagships launched in the market before we start any "crazy stuff."  Our seasonal offerings will be named for different neighborhoods throughout the city.  The limited release specialty ales will have no rhyme or reason behind their names...just whatever we come up with at the time, but I assure you they will be fun and witty."

DB:  Do you have a preliminary list of stores, restaurants, and pubs that will carry DC Brau?

BS:  "Yes we do.  I don't want to name them publicly right now but you will be able to find DC Brau across the entire city.  Last summer/fall we collected letters of support from ABRA licensed establishments.  We used these letters in our investor presentations to show the current support for a hometown brewery."

Activism

DB:  We are in the nation's capital and a prominent link on your site is DC Statehood.  Do you expect DC Brau to be active on political and social issues?

BS:  "One thing that makes DC special is that it is the political hub of the nation.  This is the most unique and powerful aspect of DC.  No other city in the country can claim that.  While we don't want to be too political or choose sides, we can't imagine ignoring politics all together.  DC Statehood is one issue we'd like to shed light upon.  We plan on incorporating this into our packaging and our identity.  We are not trying to say something is right or wrong.  We believe this issue is just as much a part of DC as anything.  It is something that everyone who resides here not only identifies with, but is also affected by."

DB:  DC Brau is featuring aluminum cans and will recycle brewery waste.  In what other ways are you hoping the brewery will be "green"?

BS:  "We are hoping to re-capture evaporated water vapor from the kettle boil for initial fermenter rinsing.  We are also giving all of our brewery waste to a local organic practice farm called Burnside Farms located in Haymarket, VA., where they will use the waste for composting and soil conditioning purposes."

Last Thoughts

DB:  What else should we know about you two or about DC Brau?

BS:  "DC Brau will be the first package microbrewery in DC since 1956"

DB:  Want to share any breaking news?

BS:  "Just put down our deposit on our automated canning line."