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  • Small Town Brewery

    A license to print money they said, you will retire to an island in 5 years they said, any town with at least a population of 4,500 should have a brewery they said. Reality check. Small towns are islands and when everyone leaves the island we sell 10 beers, all day. Vacations, sporting events, concerts in the nearby big city, all draw down the beer drinking populous. These slow days can be unexpected and take us by surprise. Please don't respond with all the things that are obvious, like beer quality (check us out on Untapped) or customer service (high ratings there too). My questions are, have other breweries located in small (under 5,000 population) towns experienced these very slow days and, what have you come up with to fill those bar seats? Thanks!

  • #2
    Originally posted by Dailybrewz View Post
    A license to print money they said, you will retire to an island in 5 years they said, any town with at least a population of 4,500 should have a brewery they said. Reality check. Small towns are islands and when everyone leaves the island we sell 10 beers, all day. Vacations, sporting events, concerts in the nearby big city, all draw down the beer drinking populous. These slow days can be unexpected and take us by surprise. Please don't respond with all the things that are obvious, like beer quality (check us out on Untapped) or customer service (high ratings there too). My questions are, have other breweries located in small (under 5,000 population) towns experienced these very slow days and, what have you come up with to fill those bar seats? Thanks!
    Funny, I don't remember posting this....😀
    This sounds all too familiar. Some days, one or two customers period! Ouch!
    We have had work to get people into our tasting room in the cold months. Our town population drops significantly in the winter. Having said that, we have had good results with things like a weekly trivia night, promoting our space for business's holiday parties, weekly specials, financial businesses host once a week seminars in our space, painting classes. Basically, think outside the pint to create events using your local businesses and talented population. Nobody said it would be easy.
    Luck to you!
    Glacier Brewing Company
    406-883-2595
    info@glacierbrewing.com

    "who said what now?"

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    • #3
      As a small winery in a 3,000 population town the only thing that keeps our doors open is a decent wholesale trade in larger towns? I know of course marketing is completely different from a brewery, but maybe some bottled beers or kegs for wholesale?

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      • #4
        I am looking at opening in a small town too. I intend to open a restaurant with the brewery to help sales. We will see! Population 7,000

        Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

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        • #5
          I head up a small brewery in a town of 9,000, but we have a decent tourist season. One thing we see big draws for are ticketed events. If you can entice a band with a decent draw, give them 80% of the door, that way they do their own advertising, bring their own crowd, and you don't have to pay them up front. We also have talked with our town's marketing manager and gotten ourselves wrapped into area tours with motorcoach companies. We take crowds of 20-50, tours and beers are included. You can try doing some food pairings with local restaurants. Have them cater a custom menu to go with your beers. 4 course meals or small plates are a good way to go. In the mornings we will sponsor yoga classes, we have a running group who starts in the parking lot and dose a loop back to have a beer at the end. You can also buy a projector and show movies, cult classics always do well. It might not draw more people necessarily, but it will keep a few there longer, buying more beer.

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