Nanobrewery - The Lessons I've Learned

[nateo]

What the longevity on the plastic fermentors? I've heard/read you need to replace them after a year or so, but I guess for how cheap they are you can just eat the cost. After a few rounds of replacing them, it probably would've been cheaper to buy SS though.

[populuxebrewing]

Not sure on the longevity yet, although I have also heard that they will eventually start to show wear. Makes sense since I can dig into the plastic pretty easily with my fingernail. Our set-up cost us $120 for the tank, $180 for the stand and around $200 for the terminal gear. The casters I use are industrial strength, we drill out the holes that the stands come with in order to fit the heftier shafts on them.

No, they do not roll all that easily. I spent more time grinding the floor in the tasting room and not much in back where we brew. The caster wheels are hard and with the added weight of a full fermenter, it stops and chugs on every little divit. It's fine for now, since all of this is temporary. Being a nano isn't the end-game for us, so when we replace these tanks they will be replaced with SS.

Another thing to consider is that SS has resale value, where as plastic does not. There's no secondary market for used plastic tanks...

[nateo]

So ~$500 for a plastic conical, vs $1100 for a Stout SS conical? I would've thought the plastic fermentors would be a lot cheaper. IMO that seems like a silly place to cut corners, especially since, like Pete said, there is no salvage value on the plastic conicals.

[ChesterBrew]

Actually, nateo, the price for plastic vs. SS dramatically changes as you scale up, even at the 3bbl level. A 110gal plastic fermenter runs about $500 ($210 conical, $145 stand, assume $150 for fittings) and a Stout 3bbl, unjacketed fermenter runs about $2100.

Point very well taken on the resale issue, though.

[nateo]

Actually, nateo, the price for plastic vs. SS dramatically changes as you scale up, even at the 3bbl level. A 110gal plastic fermenter runs about $500 ($210 conical, $145 stand, assume $150 for fittings) and a Stout 3bbl, unjacketed fermenter runs about $2100.

Point very well taken on the resale issue, though.

Interesting, I was just looking at the 60 gal size.

[mongo]

Lots of good advice, Nanobreweries Ho!

Hi, great to read everyone's stories. I wrote the nanobrewery bill for my state, (NH). According to the Brewer's Association, we were the first to make nanobreweries an official category. Our bill lowered the license fee and de-regulated how much we could sell to the public and during the first year under the new legislation, of the 9 brewery licenses issued 8 of them were nanos. That is more breweries than have ever started in a year here! We had to fight the distributors, the Liquor Commission, and Budweiser. They managed to restrict us to 4 ounces per label in over the counter sales. This year we have another bill pending which would remove that limit. I helped build four of the eight nanos in business now, they have gotten pretty busy and some have already expanded.

I started brewing at a brewpub and have worked in three 7 barrel houses, very traditional. The second brewery I designed on my own was a 4 barrel, we were brewing 4 times a week into 7 barrel fermenters. We went out of business, due to distribution problems. Our distributor committed to buying 210 cases a week, and claimed they'd double that in the summer. They never bought that much and in a couple of months told me that they had enough beer. They only ever added a few outlets to the places I'd already sold, and often told stores that sold a lot of our beer that they were all out, even when they weren't. They didn't rotate the stock, so eventually they were selling unfiltered beer that was two years old. We started with a B+ average on Beer Advocate, with two A- beers, but after a year the beer on the shelf just got bad and the ratings plummeted. We scrambled to add other states but couldn't move fast enough. Our state required that you win a lawsuit to end a distribution contract. If you've seen Beer Wars you'll get an idea of how things can turn out---go ahead, it's free online!

Anyway, the brewery closing led me to the lobbying gig and helping other people to build their own breweries. It's hard work, no doubt. If you want to build a brewery, every dollar you can save during the build out stays in your pocket. You'll probably have to spend money on electrical and plumbing work, get recommendations on who does a good job inexpensively. The lowest bidder isn't always the best, but neither is the top bid. I know people who've used the plastic fermenters to save money. They are somewhat difficult to sanitize, imo, and tend to be gotten rid of quickly. You can sell them to preppers for water or grain storage, incidentally, so they CAN be re-purposed! A good alternative is modified wine tanks.

The key to making a living is throughput, as another post suggested. If you can't sell the 400 barrels you make with a nano, you can't sell more with a bigger system. You have to sell your beer as you make it. I wouldn't recommend a 1 barrel system. I'd like to second the idea that you should sell every pint you make over the counter. Bottling takes a lot of time and labor, and you'll need caps and labels, boxing and stacking, moving pallets around and bringing in a new order of glass every week, plus moving out every pallet you have on the floor. We had a crew of six going on bottling days. We spent far more than we expected on labor. Going into kegs might be an option---the numbers are better overall, I know a couple of brewers who are ready to try it.

Looking back, the only decision I regretted was not continuing to self distribute. I thought the cost of a truck and someone to drive it would be the same as what I'd pay the distributor. How really wrong that was. I am going with a two barrel system on my next personal brewery, and planning to sell it all in pints. I understand that Dogfish Head started with a 15 gallon brewtree. In summary, get your numbers straight from the beginning. Find all the costs you can, and include them. Don't forget taxes. You CAN start small and get bigger, so don't give up!

Cheers.

[OurMutualBrewer]

^^This guy up here. I like this guy. Id like to have a beer with this guy.

[mongo]

Going to Georgia for a beer

^^This guy up here. I like this guy. Id like to have a beer with this guy.

I'll be down real quick...

[OurMutualBrewer]

Denver, dude!

Next time you're in Denver, hit me up! Drinks are on me.

[mongo]

Beer in Denver

Thanks! Even better!

[jcwilde1]

While you're touring the country and getting free beer, stop by in Missouri too

Perhaps next time I am in NH we talk too. That's where I am from, I only get home once a year though.

[ChasIPA]

great thread! I'm designing a small batch brewery myself and am now looking to start in a larger format after reading this thread

[johnnymax]

We (my wife and I) are Nano. We just turned two years old. We brew two, four barrel (124 gal.) batches and ferment them in 10 barrel conical poly tanks. We have one 8 barrel bright tank and a homemade bottling machine. I must admit, this is by far the hardest thing we have ever done.
We brew, bottle, market and distribute our beer. We are now in our third year and in the process of turning over distribution to distributors, because we can not keep up with demand unless we are at the brewery more.
I say IT IS possible to go nano, remain debt free and turn a profit, if you are willing to work harder than most people are willing to work. It takes drive and you can't quit when it gets tough! Just saying...

[SB Brewer]

What are you people calling a Nano? LOL but serious neebie question...

I already work 60 to 80 hour weeks for someone else. I have not seen a raise in over 5 years. I am tired of busting my ass, when my boss owns his own Jet and his kids drive a car worth more than my house. I was barely able to afford plastic buckets to make homebrew. But I have a way to raise enough money from family, for a system.

Anyhow, I ran math on this Nano idea but want help shooting holes in it so I dont have to tell my family I was dead wrong. I am probably wrong somehow, but dead wrong? 60 seats in a high traffic area. Selling only pints. Growlers sometimes, but on only my beer. Pints on guest beers. 2 batches a week, 4 bbls each. 4 different 4 bbl fermenters. 4x 4-bbl brights to match. All SS. Full glycol system. Brew 2 batches every week, offering 4 different beers. Buy guest kegs from all the great breweries here in Colorado, where it is legal to have a brewery and tap room. And serve some food so people can stay for more than just one beer.

Here are some questions: assuming I can sell 3 bbls a week of my own beer. Pints for 5 bucks each on 2 bbls and $10 for a growler which has 4 pints in it.

1. What are you considering a nano? I thought it depends on bbl production per year. Not brew house size. For example: I can have an 8 bbl fermenter and only brew one batch a week of 8 bbls. But with 4x 4 bbl fermenters, and 4 more brights and 4 more secondaries, I can brew more than the 8 bbl system, using a 4 bbl system. 4 bbl at a time, but able to ferment 16 bbls of 4 different beers.

2. With the above in mind, would it be better to use the money in getting a 7 bbl brew system and only 2 fermenters and 2 brights? Or a 4 bbl system with 4 fermenters and 4 brights. I like the 4 bbl because it seems like I can offer a better variety of beer this way and still brew the same amount. Maybe a little more work.

3. Is my math off? I show I can make a salary while paying another person to run the bar for me 25 hours a week. I of course will continue to work 60 to 80 hour weeks. This also includes me paying back family at around 700 dollars a month for years.

4. Are most of the posts on this thread on some super nano system of 1 or 1.5 bbl production? The reason I ask, is cause I am not sure how you are defining Nano. Based on my numbers, that would be slavery instead of entrepreneurship. Even only selling pints, you end of having to brew at least 3 times a week. Transfer beer, carbonate beer. Work the bar etc... and then you make some money to live on. I don't need a lot to live on. But remember, you have other things to do beside brewing beer when you own a business. And the gov't takes money from you too.

I am not a business owner yet, so please shoot holes in my logic or tell me what you think. Be blunt, rude or anything you like. I don't need a lot to live on, but I do require some food and beer for fuel. And my wife likes when I buy her stuff on Christmas.

Kind Regards and Thanks,

[Bainbridge]

I already work 60 to 80 hour weeks for someone else. I have not seen a raise in over 5 years. I am tired of busting my ass, when my boss owns his own Jet and his kids drive a car worth more than my house. I was barely able to afford plastic buckets to make homebrew. But I have a way to raise enough money from family, for a system.

Anyhow, I ran math on this Nano idea but want help shooting holes in it so I dont have to tell my family I was dead wrong. I am probably wrong somehow, but dead wrong? 60 seats in a high traffic area. Selling only pints. Growlers sometimes, but on only my beer. Pints on guest beers. 2 batches a week, 4 bbls each. 4 different 4 bbl fermenters. 4x 4-bbl brights to match. All SS. Full glycol system. Brew 2 batches every week, offering 4 different beers. Buy guest kegs from all the great breweries here in Colorado, where it is legal to have a brewery and tap room. And serve some food so people can stay for more than just one beer.

Ok, going to be blunt. (But supportive!) You risk setting yourself up for being nearly out of beer, all the time. We do at least 30bbls a month in our taproom even when it's slow, and we have 49 seats, aren't in a super high-traffic area and don't do much in the way of food. I don't know any local nanos that aren't struggling to brew enough beer. (Fortunately we aren't a nano. We have a 10bbl, and currently 4x10's and 1x20 with another 20 on the way. We are by no means big though.) If you get some decent traffic, in a beer town in Colorado, your problem won't be selling the beer, it will be making enough of it. Oh and that will be 'Growlers Always'...

Here's the problem. Four 4bbls fermenters on an average 2-week brewlength means you get at most 32bbls if you don't have large trub or dryhop losses. (And you will.) So that'd be 8bbls of each of four beers. But let's say one of your beers is twice as popular as the rest, because it will be. For us it is our IPA, and probably will be for you too. Any given week it outsells our next two closest beers 2/1 and the rest 4/1. So now you are having to brew twice as much of it. That's 16bbls of your monthly 32. Now, one fermenter is always making IPA. 24/7. Each week, a tank gets emptied, IPA goes in, repeat. So really you have, at any given week, one remaining free fermenter to brew one of the remaining three beers. The next week, same deal. One of three. But you have four beers on tap. Which means you get to pick which beer you run out of, because you can't brew it this week, can't brew it next week, can finally brew it the week after, then two weeks fermenting, meaning you can brew that beer once a month. And while it's going, you need to pick which of the other two is the new 'see you next month' beer, because the problem then shifts since that fermenter is full.

Also, what is your plan for half-empty brites? Going to blend the old beer with the new one? Which absolutely had to get out of the fermenter, like, yesterday, because you need to brew IPA into it? So remember to set aside some $ for kegs.

Here are some questions: assuming I can sell 3 bbls a week of my own beer. Pints for 5 bucks each on 2 bbls and $10 for a growler which has 4 pints in it.

1. What are you considering a nano? I thought it depends on bbl production per year. Not brew house size. For example: I can have an 8 bbl fermenter and only brew one batch a week of 8 bbls.

You will sell 3bbls a week. That's six kegs. We tapped six kegs last Saturday. For me, "nano" is a 5bbl or smaller brewhouse, that is NOT a full brewpub restaurant. But also annual production below 250bbls I've heard bandied about. To me 'nano' means replacing proper financing with sweat and headaches.

But with 4x 4 bbl fermenters, and 4 more brights and 4 more secondaries, I can brew more than the 8 bbl system, using a 4 bbl system. 4 bbl at a time, but able to ferment 16 bbls of 4 different beers.

There are no 'secondaries'. That's homebrewer talk. And yes you make more beer with 4x4bbls than 1x8bbls, 16 vs 8, that's just math. But you also make more beer with 4x8bbls. That's a potential 64bbls a month, albeit requiring eight double brewdays a month.

2. With the above in mind, would it be better to use the money in getting a 7 bbl brew system and only 2 fermenters and 2 brights? Or a 4 bbl system with 4 fermenters and 4 brights. I like the 4 bbl because it seems like I can offer a better variety of beer this way and still brew the same amount. Maybe a little more work.

Yes and no. 7bbl system? Yes. 2 fermenters and two brites? No. Four fermenters and ideally even more brites. But you could get the 4bbl, put 8bbl fermenters and brites in, and with a little more work make twice as much beer for only a little more tank cost. There are some breweries around me that have nano-sized 3-5bbl systems but more fermenters than we have and double batch in them. They can produce about the same amount of beer as we do. But they have to brew say, thirty-two times, to do it. While we have to brew twelve times.

3. Is my math off? I show I can make a salary while paying another person to run the bar for me 25 hours a week. I of course will continue to work 60 to 80 hour weeks. This also includes me paying back family at around 700 dollars a month for years.

You can probably make a salary. You will work those hours at a minimum. And you will find that running a business and a brewhouse at the same time will cause inevitable conflicts.

4. Are most of the posts on this thread on some super nano system of 1 or 1.5 bbl production? The reason I ask, is cause I am not sure how you are defining Nano. Based on my numbers, that would be slavery instead of entrepreneurship. Even only selling pints, you end of having to brew at least 3 times a week. Transfer beer, carbonate beer. Work the bar etc... and then you make some money to live on. I don't need a lot to live on. But remember, you have other things to do beside brewing beer when you own a business. And the gov't takes money from you too.

There are a lot of folks brewing on this scale. I don't know how they do it. From my experience it seems to have a lot to do with free labor supplied by friends. Which apart from being dubiously legal and an insurance nightmare, is not a long term strategy...

I am not a business owner yet, so please shoot holes in my logic or tell me what you think. Be blunt, rude or anything you like. I don't need a lot to live on, but I do require some food and beer for fuel. And my wife likes when I buy her stuff on Christmas.

I guess my advice (to anyone thinking about this) is plan it out really, really well. One thing I did that I found helpful was our pro forma/business plan was more of a spreadsheet that we could mess with, tweak costs, production estimates, best/worst case scenarios, etc.. Then I made a "Sanity Box" that translated those numbers into things like "Pints per guest." "Pints per hour." "Kegs wholesale per week." "Brews per week". "Tanks required". If I made a change and suddenly saw that we'd have to deliver 50 wholesale kegs a week ourselves (amidst everything else) or sell a pint every 5 seconds, than something was out of whack. Set up best, likely and conservative scenarios. Make sure you can find a conservative scenario that sets you up for a realistic chance of success. Then, and only then, pull the trigger. After that all bets are off, so toss that business plan out the window. If you planned well, you'll match your conservative estimate. If you're lucky, you'll exceed it.

There are mistakes we made, sure, but none were critical. Get yourself at least one fermenter that is at least twice your brewhouse size. On a brewhouse that small, personally I'd double batch everything. Think about what your goals are, what is the end game? If you grow, when you grow, do you want to be brewing double batches four days a week, while running the business and the taproom? In my mind, and yes this is a thread on nanobrewery lessons, disasters and successes, nanos exist to get you in the door without a huge investment, so that hopefully you can attract outside investment and get bigger, so that you can stop working like a dog and start working like a brewer. (Which is to say, slightly less!) Again, having brewed on a 5bbl I saw that it wasn't enough and we planned on a 7bbl at a minimum, analyzed it and went with a 10, and now I wish we had a 15. And more space. And more kegs. And more... I'm sure there are actual nanobrewers out there who agree with some of these points, and others who have advice I haven't thought of.

Good lord I spent too long typing this; must be the coffee. Now back to the salt mines!