Do you want to make a career out of brewing?

[Bubbles]

I've been homebrewing since 2010, and like many of you, I'm pretty obsessed with it. Whenever people enquire about my hobby, the conversation frequently leads to the same question: "I suppose you want to own your own (commercial) brewery one day?". My answer is always an emphatic "no".

I love homebrewing because of the endless variety and fun I get out of it. I love the BREWING part of it and I can't see much fun in nearly always brewing the same thing and always striving to produce a consistent product. I don't think I've ever done the same recipe twice! And I can't see myself wanting to deal with suppliers, organising deliveries, dealing with customer complaints etc.

In short, I love "homebrewing", but I don't ever see it as a career. How do you feel about it? Answer the poll and put your comments below. Would love to hear your own thoughts on it.

Conor.

[DEMPSEY]

I would say,maybe for me. Being around the block a few times regarding running your own business and so running a brewery as opposed to running any other kind of business has all the same issues. Home brewing allows you to enjoy the art of making beer. Most home brewers end up better trained than commercial brewers simply because they get to try out different ingredient's and brew different styles of beer. The one question I never hear mentioned and answered when someone say's they are going to set up a brewery is, BECAUSE I WANT TO MAKE MONEY.  

[Tom]

I'm well going for it. Turns out 'the arts' wasn't a great career choice for me!

[Taf]

On the one hand, I would love to own and operate a brewery, and I have some ideas in relation to how I would go about it, re location, types of products, sales/exports etc, but my more sensible side tells me that if I had the money to do this, that there would be easier ways to make money from the same value of investment. You never know though, so it's maybe one day for me.

[Tom]

An historically significant brewpub would be amazing to own or run. I think you'd have more luck with that if your family owned the pub first. I mean, starting a micro OR taking over a pub are Goliath tasks, never mind the two together.

[Bubbles]

The brewpub is a business model that works well for microbrewers in the US. I heard this on a Basic Brewing interview. I can't remember the name of the brewer/owner, but he was basically saying that by having a pub you can reach your customers more easily. The pub advertises your brewery because it's right there on the street. You can also use the pub to support (or even subsidise, the worst case scenario) the brewing arm of your business by selling good food and entertainment/events. You are also cutting out the middleman in getting your product directly to the customer. Saves on transport costs too.

[Padraic]

The brewpub is a business model that works well for microbrewers in the US. I heard this on a Basic Brewing interview. I can't remember the name of the brewer/owner, but he was basically saying that by having a pub you can reach your customers more easily. The pub advertises your brewery because it's right there on the street. You can also use the pub to support (or even subsidise, the worst case scenario) the brewing arm of your business by selling good food and entertainment/events. You are also cutting out the middleman in getting your product directly to the customer. Saves on transport costs too.

Don't even look across the pond, look at our three biggest micro's, two of them are brewpubs and the other is just about to open their first bar.

[Shane Phelan]

My ideal would be a brewpub.

I would only go the brewpub route. The reason I enjoy homebrewing is for the creative element in terms of coming up with recepies, making improvements, tinkering with equipment etc...

The minute that the creativity stops, so would my interest and that is what I see with commercial breweries. Same beer day in day out with maybe seasonals thrown in, I would be sick of that pretty quickly. By running a brewpub I could have a set of taps dedicated to seasonal/prototype brews which would change on a monthly basis in addition to the house brews.

I have loads of other (non commercially viable) ideas of what format I would like the brew pub to be but unfortunately that is probably as far as it will ever go.  :

[Eoin]

I still have a dream of owning and running a gastro pub some day, to add a brewery onto it, you'd coin it.

You could clean up doing it if you knew what you were doing. The main issue is that having worked in catering for so long I'm not sure I'd want to go back now that I have a wife and kids, cos it's a full-time job with no rest and I'm not sure I want that anymore.

[Weiss]

Wouldn't know enough about brewing atm, but yeah, maybe one day in the future.  8-)

Couldn't rule it out....

[newToBrew]

ah in reality - I don't think its for me - I do think when I'm brewing - wouldn't it be great if could do this for a living - but I do enjoy  the non committal nature of this hobby - you know - no real deadlines as such - I don't think I have a business head on me either

[Blackbrew]

I'm going for it as well  Would love a brewpub too or better still a loosening of the rules so I could sell direct to the public from my tap room (without the cost of a pub licence)

[Eoin]

Personally I see a lot of breweries open, and like in other countries I see that they are working on a local level, I think that's the way to go. If a bubble is to be avoided then I think the idea of "growth" needs to be supplanted by "sustainable" otherwise you're talking a lot of places going out of business.

Whatever happened to the idea of simply making a living at something rather than it growing and growing...?

[AdeFlesk]

The brewpub sounds like a good way to go but, so many other areas to attend to. You need to keep the quality of food, bar not alone brewing the beer.
Although when it turns out well it can be great not sure if any one has seen the discovery series the http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/other-shows/videos/other-shows-brew-masters-videos.htm. I believe one of their main sponsor requested it to be stopped and the full series were never shown.
I downloaded it from the internet.
The show was based on the http://www.dogfish.com/  brewery in delaware

[Hop Bomb]

the discovery series the http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/other-shows/videos/other-shows-brew-masters-videos.htm. I believe one of their main sponsor requested it to be stopped and the full series were never shown.
I downloaded it from the internet.
The show was based on the http://www.dogfish.com/  brewery in delaware

Great find! Just downloading some episodes now. (ps. dont let the preview clip linked above put you off)