One of the things I love about craft beer is how many brewers value things like organic ingredients, sustainable energy use and fair employee practices. Of course, they also care a lot about very practical matters like cost and space. As I roamed the massive exhibit hall at the Craft Brewers Conference and BrewExpo America, I found several producers trying to negotiate these diverse needs for craft brewers.
The increasing proliferation of such products only further testifies to the growing strength of the craft sector and the fact that manufacturers and producers see lots of opportunity (read: If you’re not sure they have what you need, you may as well ask. They’ll probably go to great lengths to serve you.).
Here are some examples of innovations you may want to look into or keep an eye on.
Amoretti Craft Purée
I have to admit, when I saw the booth with a couple rows of bottles with those big white pumps on them, I thought this was a consumer product akin to the syrups they use at coffee shops. I imagined a bartender taking my beer and turning around to pump a shot of black cherry into my IPA, and I wasn’t exactly excited about it.
Amoretti even put a small bottle of the stuff into our conference swag bags. I’m not sure I would have tried it, myself, except that I knew I couldn’t sneak it on the plane (well, that turned out to not be true), so I thought I’d give it a shot. I liked it more than I expected. I tried a bit in a pale, an IPA and even the conference collab saison, and it worked pretty nicely in each.
But according to Marketing President Maral Barsoumian, this is definitely a product for breweries. It is designed to be added to the batch like any other extract or tincture such as you might get from Lebermuth or Oregon Specialty Fruit (also CBC exhibitors).
The big difference, to my eyes, was the pumps, then. The concept of the pumps, Barsoumian explained, is that these purées are calibrated for precise taste testing. By adding one pump to a 12-ounce pour you get a reasonable preview of what the finished brew will taste like.
There’s certainly a convenience factor there, but I did notice on the website that they are in fact marketing the pump-bottles to consumers as a way to “customize your favorite beer, wine, champagne or alcoholic beverage.”
Fair enough. If you can sell something to both producers and consumers for similar but distinct purposes, it makes sense that you might do that.
The future of barrels is not what you think
You might think it’s never been a better time to be a cooper. Alcohol beverage is doing pretty well overall, and with the rise of craft distilling, barrel-aging beers and sour beers, barrels are in demand. There’s only one problem: We’re running low on oak trees. We have been for a while, in fact, and we may be in for some time until the next crop of trees comes of age.
The solution: Stainless steel. Sort of.
The Squarrel Barrel (just go with the name) is a square, stainless-steel frame that fits 12 slotted, charred, oak staves. Squarel Barrels market it as a barrel that pulls more flavor more quickly while using less actual wood.
But wait, it gets better: Most oak trees only yield two to five barrels, and much of the tree goes to waste. The Squarrel staves can be made from this leftover wood. It’s just as good because it’s from the same tree. And because they slot the staves (picture a reverse guitar fretboard), more wood is exposed and extraction happens more quickly.
So, it’s more efficient for the environment, and it reduces waste for barrel makers — they can literally make more barrels from each tree.
It really does sound too good to be true, but according to Tom Ohlin of Minnetonka, who had a display model at his booth, the TTB has already approved it for whiskey, so it has some official recognition.
The gamble, of course, is that there’s still enough connection to the traditional supply chain (tree > cooperage > distillery > brewery) that producers will buy into a new aesthetic. Then again, if an oak shortage keeps shooting traditional barrel prices higher, a cheaper oak solution will start to look pretty good.
The incredible transforming filler
On the next page! (along with a printer and “drop and brew” pilot system)
Bottles or cans? It used to be a question with several hundred thousand dollars attached to it. Well, it still is, sort of, but you can now answer: Why not both?
The IC Filling Systems Compactblock is a semi-automatic bottler/capper and canner/seamer. The rinser can accommodate either bottles or cans, while the counter-pressure filler and capper/seamer can be swapped between the two in under 30 minutes. That means you can, say, can your production beers, then put some specialty beers in bombers — all with the same system.
The Compactblock comes in a range of sizes with up to six fillers and is advertised to reach an output of up to 500 bottles per hour. Not too shabby for a machine that, with a labeling and coding add-on, comes in around $65,000.
Throw the best parties with a digital materials printer
The Helix Rotary Digital Printer from InkCups Now is not going to be for every brewery, but those who spring for one will be able to do some really cool labels. That’s because the Helix prints right onto most cylindrical materials — like your bottles and cans — in bold colors and high detail and with an available varnish to give the label a pretty sheen.
At around $200,000 and an output of about 20 seconds per container, you’re going to have to really want it. But think about how cool it would be to do short runs of snazzy labels for parties or customized bottles for weddings and gifts.
“Drop and brew” does turnkey one better
Chris Mulford of Fronhofer Design is a young man with an old soul. “They don’t make equipment to last anymore,” he said. “I want to over design our products so they are truly consistent and reliable.”
Fronhofer’s canning line, for instance, he calls an “idiot-proof, rock-solid” machine that is still very compact. It starts around $85,000, and they can take you from depal to labels for around $168,000.
Their mobile pilot system was getting a lot of attention at CBC. Mulford called it a “drop and brew” system: a skid-mounted, complete 3-bbl brewhouse. It hooks up to your pipes and hoses in minutes, and it’s on rollers, so you can literally roll it out to brew, and then push it aside to store it.
“It’s a better option than cheaper solutions,” Mulford explained, “because it’s the same as your bigger system, just scaled down.” Thus your test batches more accurately reflect what the final product would taste like in your main system.
Fronhofer also offers a cellar skid with the same features. The two together run around $115,000 and have been sold to large and small breweries alike for test and small-batch brewing.
