I always loved brewing, still do, but don't think running a brewery is about brewing. If you're reading this as an industry outsider you're probably wondering how that can be... after all, you make beer, it goes to pubs, then you make more, surely?
Well yes, that's about as broad brush as the process gets, but there's a bit more to it...
It's about - as many have said before - much more than the line above, and this needs broadcasting as a lot of people think running a brewery is easy!
- paperwork,
- more paperwork,
- fixing shit that breaks,
- spending money you don't have,
- chasing invoices,
- chasing wholesalers / pubs / every man and his dog for money,
- trying to sell beer in a marketplace increasingly slanted to cost and not quality,
- trying to think of beer names and branding (if you're not a rich boy who just pays for all this kind of thing),
- learning antiquated free graphics software to do said "artwork",
- begging people to pay an invoice early so you can buy malt to brew,
- lying in bed wondering how you're going to pay the beer duty / VAT / pumpclip people / electric / gas / water / anyone else who you owe money to,
- fixing more stuff that's inexplicably broken just when you need it,
- duty returns,
- more futile attempts at selling beer,
- trying to get yeast to attenuate properly,
- waiting in a queue at the bank for the privilege of paying them to pay in money which you've bust a gut to earn,
- changing your brewing schedule at the last minute as you got sent the wrong hops,
- racking beer,
- dry-hopping and sweeping up the resulting green foamy ooze,
- collecting empties,
- delivering beer whilst trying to find somewhere to park without getting a ticket,
- making a cup of tea and forgetting you've left the HLT filling and flooding the place (again),
- trying to get your empties back from Inverness or Penzance,
- dealing with cretins like kegwatch, HMRC, the bank, Glen Balls....
and so it goes on.
You get the idea? You want to brew, get a job at a brewery, if you want all this shit too then go for it but never say you weren't warned.
