This is about the East End Brewing Company in Pittsburgh. The URL is www.eastendbrewing.com.

I went to a tasting yesterday and spoke to owner/brewer Scott Smith. Scott is brewing and selling his ales by keg only.
He does not bottle his ales and he doesn't have a retail outlet, like a brewpub, to sell them. Others might have heard
of a brewing business model like this, but it's new to me.

Scott told me that he is a one man operation. He got a warehouse to brew in for cheap rent and he bought his equipment
from the Foundry Brewpub, which had closed (I was told at the tasting that the Foundry bought it from Meander Brewing in
Morgan, OH when they closed), and he did the installation by himself, which took a year. Scott said that the margin is
highest on beer served draft in a brewpub and next highest in bottles. His model, selling kegs to bars, has the lowest
margin. I asked him why he didn't open a brewpub and he said that he didn't know the restaurant business and that's
where brewpubs succeed or fail. He said that he also didn't want to need to brew 5 beers including a lager which would
be a Bud knockoff and an amber which would be a little darker and still taste like Bud. He has gotten 20 or so bars in
Pittsburgh to carry his IPA and being a local brewery is a good selling point. It's too soon to see how many will
reorder, but I gather it has been moving well at beer geek bars. He said he fears running out of product which could
sink as surely as not selling would.

I tasted his second ale, the blackstrap stout. It was quite hoppy for a stout, to be compared to Victory's Storm King.
He isn't registered to sell it yet. What's interesting is that he said a new beer has to be registered with both the
state (Pennsylvania's notorious Liquor Control Board) and the federal government, and the state process is much easier
than the federal process.

Tom W

Tom Wolper wrote:

This is about the East End Brewing Company in Pittsburgh. The URL is
www.eastendbrewing.com.

I went to a tasting yesterday and spoke to owner/brewer Scott Smith.
Scott is brewing and selling his ales by keg only. He does not bottle
his ales and he doesn't have a retail outlet, like a brewpub, to sell
them. Others might have heard of a brewing business model like this, but
it's new to me.

It was quite common in the early days of microbrewing (and, for that
matter, wasn't UNKNOWN in the pre-micro days- wasn't Anchor a draft only
brewery at the time that Maytag got involved?), since bottling equipment
was expensive (and harder to "do-it-yourself" fabricate) and
labor-intensive. One of the first micros in the East, Newman's of
Albany, NY was draft-only but, like many others, he had at least one of
his beers contract-brewed/bottled (by Schmidt of Phila., in the
beginning, IIRC) but you could also stop in at the brewery and buy a
plastic "cube" gallon of beer (these also were carried in some area
grocery stores). Brooklyn, for that matter, still is set up like that,
isn't it- kegging beer in Brooklyn, contract bottling at Matts?

Obviously, such a "model" needs to be in a region where draft beer is
still popular and makes up a large part of the market.

On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 22:40:51 GMT, Tom Wolper
wrote:

This is about the East End Brewing Company in Pittsburgh. The URL is www.eastendbrewing.com.

I went to a tasting yesterday and spoke to owner/brewer Scott Smith. Scott is brewing and selling his ales by keg only.
He does not bottle his ales and he doesn't have a retail outlet, like a brewpub, to sell them. Others might have heard
of a brewing business model like this, but it's new to me.

Scott told me that he is a one man operation. He got a warehouse to brew in for cheap rent and he bought his equipment
from the Foundry Brewpub, which had closed (I was told at the tasting that the Foundry bought it from Meander Brewing in
Morgan, OH when they closed), and he did the installation by himself, which took a year.

This sort of setup is pretty typical for a small UK microbrewery, and
maybe that's where Scott got the inspiration. Many newly established
microbreweries are one man operations and brew tiny amounts, initially
at least. The American brewpub/restaurant setup is almost unknown
here.

We wouldn't talk about beers being 'keg only' though :-) Keg = bad,
cask = good :-)

Best regards, Paul
--
Paul Sherwin Consulting http://paulsherwin.co.uk

Paul Sherwin wrote:
This sort of setup is pretty typical for a small UK microbrewery, and
maybe that's where Scott got the inspiration. Many newly established
microbreweries are one man operations and brew tiny amounts, initially
at least. The American brewpub/restaurant setup is almost unknown
here.

It seems so capital intensive, buying and installing all the equipment, buying grain, yeast, and hops, and only then
seeing if anybody will buy your beer. Scott's only marketing is his website and beer tastings, with word-of-mouth from
bars carrying his products. He didn't talk about any plans to sell growlers (beer cubes) or contract brew. I hope he
succeeds but it just sems like a hell of a way to break into a fiercely competitive beer market.

By the way, I first read about the brewery at Lew's site. I figure he derserves the plug.

Tom W

"Tom Wolper" wrote in message news:QwgLd.3093
Paul Sherwin wrote:
This sort of setup is pretty typical for a small UK microbrewery, and
maybe that's where Scott got the inspiration. Many newly established
microbreweries are one man operations and brew tiny amounts, initially
at least. The American brewpub/restaurant setup is almost unknown
here.

It seems so capital intensive, buying and installing all the equipment,
buying grain, yeast, and hops, and only then seeing if anybody will buy
your beer. Scott's only marketing is his website and beer tastings, with
word-of-mouth from bars carrying his products. He didn't talk about any
plans to sell growlers (beer cubes) or contract brew. I hope he succeeds
but it just sems like a hell of a way to break into a fiercely competitive
beer market.

By the way, I first read about the brewery at Lew's site. I figure he
derserves the plug.

Thanks, Tom. I've got a more extensive piece on East End coming out in the
Feb/March issue of Ale Street News. I thought the IPA and stout were nice
beers indeed.

FWIW, I don't think Scott would do a lot of on-site growler business; that's
a somewhat scary little corner of town he's in.

--
Lew Bryson

"GOOD or SHITE?" -- Michael Jackson, "Thriller", 1982
www.lewbryson.com

Tom Wolper wrote:

This is about the East End Brewing Company in Pittsburgh. The URL is
www.eastendbrewing.com.

I went to a tasting yesterday and spoke to owner/brewer Scott Smith.
Scott is brewing and selling his ales by keg only. He does not bottle
his ales and he doesn't have a retail outlet, like a brewpub, to sell
them. Others might have heard of a brewing business model like this, but
it's new to me.

Scott told me that he is a one man operation. [...]

Nothing new or unusual about this business model. Draft-only packaging
is the way many small craft breweries have started, going all the way
back to the likes of Redhook and Grant's back in the early 1980s. There
are still draft-only breweries, especially brewpubs, in a lot of places.

The one-man-show thing isn't so unusual, either. Washington state's
newest microbrewery, Iron Horse in Ellensburg, is staffed and run by
its owner, founder, and only brewer, Jim Quilter. For the time being,
it's his baby, and that's the way he wants it.
--
dgs

Tom Wolper wrote:

This is about the East End Brewing Company in Pittsburgh. The URL is
www.eastendbrewing.com.

I went to a tasting yesterday and spoke to owner/brewer Scott Smith.
Scott is brewing and selling his ales by keg only. He does not bottle
his ales and he doesn't have a retail outlet, like a brewpub, to sell
them. Others might have heard of a brewing business model like this, but
it's new to me.

Scott told me that he is a one man operation. [...]

Nothing new or unusual about this business model. Draft-only packaging
is the way many small craft breweries have started, going all the way
back to the likes of Redhook and Grant's back in the early 1980s. There
are still draft-only breweries, especially brewpubs, in a lot of places.

The one-man-show thing isn't so unusual, either. Washington state's
newest microbrewery, Iron Horse in Ellensburg, is staffed and run by
its owner, founder, and only brewer, Jim Quilter. For the time being,
it's his baby, and that's the way he wants it.
--
dgs

dgs wrote:
Tom Wolper wrote:

Scott told me that he is a one man operation. [...]

Nothing new or unusual about this business model. Draft-only packaging
is the way many small craft breweries have started, going all the way
back to the likes of Redhook and Grant's back in the early 1980s.

The reason this model is strange to me is that we aren't in the early '80s, that is, he's trying to get set up this way
in a competitive craft brewing market. If Scott went around to the bars in 1982 with an IPA, the bar owners would have
looked at it as an untested style in the area. Today, if a six tap bar wants an IPA, it could take East End's IPA, or it
could take Victory Hop Devil or any other craft brewer's IPA.

There are still draft-only breweries, especially brewpubs, in a lot of places.

I didn't mean draft-only was unusual. I meant draft-only without a natural retail outlet - a tied house (if legal) or a
brewpub. By comparison: the Church Brew Works sends me an email telling me they're tapping a new porter. On the same day
East End sends me an email telling me he's got a new stout in distribution. If I want to try the porter, I can go to the
Church brewery and taste it. If I want to try the stout, I have to find out which bars are carrying it and if they have
it up yet. It seems a tougher way to build brand loyalty.

Tom W

"Tom Wolper" wrote in message
nk.net...

The reason this model is strange to me is that we aren't in the early
'80s, that is, he's trying to get set up this way in a competitive craft
brewing market.

Even in recent years, that's not that unusual. Three Floyds just outside of
Chicago sold for years as draught-only, with no pub of their own, and there
were a couple other Chicago-area breweries doing the same thing when I was
living there. Here in LA, Craftsman sells only kegs to other pubs, and I
believe Angel City Brewing Co. is also draught-only and has no pub of their
own.

I didn't mean draft-only was unusual. I meant draft-only without a natural
retail outlet - a tied house (if legal) or a brewpub. By comparison: the
Church Brew Works sends me an email telling me they're tapping a new
porter. On the same day East End sends me an email telling me he's got a
new stout in distribution. If I want to try the porter, I can go to the
Church brewery and taste it. If I want to try the stout, I have to find
out which bars are carrying it and if they have it up yet. It seems a
tougher way to build brand loyalty.

Yes and no. A lot of brewpubs have difficulty expanding out beyond their
pubs. A lot of successful breweries have gotten started by pretty much
concentrating on draught distribution (Victory comes to mind) without having
their own place for a while, or ever.

-Steve