Microbrewery - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A microbrewery or craft brewer is a brewery

Brewery

A brewery is a dedicated building for the making of beer, though beer can be made at home, and has been for much of beer's history. A company which makes beer is called either a brewery or a brewing company....

which produces a limited amount of beer, and is associated by consumers with innovation and uniqueness.

In the UK, the term has become synonymous with small scale breweries operating under the UK Progressive Beer Duty threshold of 5,000 hls. The most common products are traditional bitter ales, generally known as "Real Ale" or "Cask Ale". Breweries are often described by their production capacity or brew length, mostly ranging from 2 to 20 bbls (a brewer's barrel or bbl is 36 imperial gallons).

In the US the American Brewers Association

Brewers Association

The Brewers Association is an American trade group of over 1,000 brewers, particularly concerned with the promotion of craft beer and homebrewing....

defines a American "craft brewery" as "small, independent and traditional", and gives a production size of less than 6000000 beer barrels (704,086,590 l) a year, further grouping them as microbrewery: annual production less than 15000 beer barrels (1,760,216.5 l); A "brewpub" brews and sells beer on the premises. A brewpub may also be known as a microbrewery if production has a significant distribution beyond the premises - the American Brewers Association use a fixed 75% of production to determine if a company is a microbrewery.; regional craft brewery: at least 50% of its volume is all malt beers. A regional brewery has annual production between 15000 beer barrels (1,760,216.5 l) and 2000000 beer barrels (234,695,530 l) per year. In order to be classified as a "regional craft brewery" by the brewers association, a brewery must possess "either an all-malt flagship or [have] at least 50% of its volume in either all-malt beers or in beers which use adjuncts to enhance rather than lighten flavor." Of the 1,759 breweries in America, only 43 are not defined as craft brewers, and 100 not defined as either a micro or brewpub.

Origins and philosophy

The term originated in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

in the late 1970s to describe the new generation of small breweries which focused on producing traditional cask ale

Cask ale

Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...

. The first successful example of this approach was Litchborough

Litchborough

Litchborough is a village and civil parish in South Northamptonshire, England. At the time of the 2001 census, the parish's population was 300 people. It is about north-west of Towcester....

Brewery founded by Bill Urquhart in 1975 in the Northamptonshire village of the same name. Urquhart had been the final head brewer at the large Phipps

Phipps NBC

Phipps Northampton Brewery Company Ltd, formerly known as P.Phipps and Phipps Brewery is a brewing company with a long and varied history, currently specialising in historical real ales and stout, based in Northampton, England.-Early History:...

Northampton brewery when it was closed by owners Watney Mann 1974 to make way for Carlsberg Group's new UK lager brewery on the site. Alongside commercial beer brewing, training courses and apprenticeships were offered. Many of the movement's early pioneers passed through Litchborough's courses prior to setting up their own breweries.

Although originally "microbrewery" was used in relation to the size of breweries, it gradually came to reflect an alternative attitude and approach to brewing flexibility, adaptability, experimentation and customer service. The term and trend spread to the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

in the 1980s where it eventually was used as a designation of breweries that produce fewer than 15000 beer barrels (1,760,216.5 l) annually.

Micro or craft breweries have adopted a different marketing strategy

Marketing strategy

Marketing strategy is a process that can allow an organization to concentrate its limited resources on the greatest opportunities to increase sales and achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.-Developing a marketing strategy:...

than large, mass-market breweries, offering products that compete on the basis of quality and diversity, instead of low price and advertising

Advertising

Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...

. Their influence has been much greater than their market share

Market share

Market share is the percentage of a market accounted for by a specific entity. In a survey of nearly 200 senior marketing managers, 67 percent responded that they found the "dollar market share" metric very useful, while 61% found "unit market share" very useful.Marketers need to be able to...

(which amounts to only 2% in the UK), indicated by the fact that large commercial breweries have introduced new brand

Brand

The American Marketing Association defines a brand as a "Name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers."...

s intended to compete in the same market as microbrewery. When this strategy failed, they invested in microbreweries; or in many cases bought them outright.

Microbreweries in the United States

In the early twentieth century, Prohibition

Prohibition

Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...

drove many breweries in the US into bankruptcy

Bankruptcy

Bankruptcy is a legal status of an insolvent person or an organisation, that is, one that cannot repay the debts owed to creditors. In most jurisdictions bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor....

because they could not all rely on selling near beer, nor "sacramental wine" as wineries of that era did. After several decades of consolidation of breweries, most American commercial beer was produced by a few very large corporation

Corporation

A corporation is created under the laws of a state as a separate legal entity that has privileges and liabilities that are distinct from those of its members. There are many different forms of corporations, most of which are used to conduct business. Early corporations were established by charter...

s, resulting in a very uniform, mild-tasting lager

Lager

Lager is a type of beer made from malted barley that is brewed and stored at low temperatures. There are many types of lager; pale lager is the most widely-consumed and commercially available style of beer in the world; Pilsner, Bock, Dortmunder Export and Märzen are all styles of lager...

, of which Budweiser

Budweiser (Anheuser-Busch)

Budweiser is a 5.0% abv American-style lager introduced in 1876 by Adolphus Busch and one of the highest selling beers in the United States. It is made with up to 30% rice in addition to hops and barley malt. Budweiser is produced in various breweries located around the world...

and Miller

Miller Brewing Company

The Miller Brewing Company is an American beer brewing company owned by the United Kingdom-based SABMiller. Its regional headquarters are located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and the company has brewing facilities in Albany, Georgia; Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin; Eden, North Carolina; Fort Worth, Texas;...

are well-known examples. Consequently, some beer drinkers craving variety turned to homebrewing

Homebrewing

Homebrewing is the brewing of beer, wine, sake, mead, cider, perry and other beverages through fermentation on a small scale as a hobby for personal consumption, free distribution at social gatherings, amateur brewing competitions or other non-commercial reasons...

and eventually a few started doing so on a slightly larger scale. For inspiration, they turned to Britain

United Kingdom

, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, and Belgium

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

, where a centuries-old tradition of artisan beer and cask ale

Cask ale

Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...

production had never died out.

The popularity of these products was such that the trend quickly spread, and hundreds of small breweries sprang up, often attached to a bar

Bar (establishment)

A bar is a business establishment that serves alcoholic drinks — beer, wine, liquor, and cocktails — for consumption on the premises.Bars provide stools or chairs that are placed at tables or counters for their patrons. Some bars have entertainment on a stage, such as a live band, comedians, go-go...

(known as a "brewpub") where the product could be sold directly. As microbrews proliferated, some became more than microbrews, necessitating the definition of the broader category of craft beer - high quality beer. The largest American craft brewery is the Boston Beer Company, makers of Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams (beer)

Samuel Adams is an American brand of beer brewed by the Boston Beer Company and its associated contract brewers. The company was founded in 1984 by Jim Koch, Harry M. Rubin, and Lorenzo Lamadrid in Boston, Massachusetts, USA...

. Portland, Oregon is very well known for its microbrew proliferation. In 2008, Portland had 30 microbreweries located within the city limits, more than any city in the world and greater than one-third of the state total. Many of Portland's 46 microbrew outlets have won nationwide and international acclaim.

American microbreweries typically distribute through a wholesaler in a traditional three-tier system

Three-tier (alcohol distribution)

The three-tier system of alcohol distribution is the system for distributing alcoholic beverages set up in the United States after the repeal of Prohibition. The three tiers are producers, distributors, and retailers. The basic premise of the system is that producers must sell only to...

, others act as their own distributor

Distributor

A distributor is a device in the ignition system of an internal combustion engine that routes high voltage from the ignition coil to the spark plugs in the correct firing order. The first reliable battery operated ignition was developed by Dayton Engineering Laboratories Co. and introduced in the...

(wholesaler) and sell to retailers and/or directly to the consumer through a tap room, attached restaurant, or off-premise sales. Because alcohol control is left up to the states, there are many state-to-state differences in the laws.

The Association of Brewers reports that as of July 31, 2009 there were a total 1,482 craft breweries (962 Brewpubs, 456 Microbreweries, and 64 Regional Craft Breweries) in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

Microbreweries in other countries

Microbreweries are gradually appearing in other countries (such as New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

and Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

) where a similar market concentration exists. For example, microbreweries are flourishing in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, mostly on the West Coast

British Columbia

British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...

, in Québec

Quebec

Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....

and Ontario

Ontario

Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

, which has a large domestic market dominated by a few large companies. Many of Ontario's microbreweries have joined together to form the Ontario Craft Brewers

Ontario Craft Brewers

The Ontario Craft Brewers is a trade association representing 27 small, independent breweries in the Canadian province of Ontario.- Origins :...

association. Britain also has a large number of small commercial breweries making cask ale

Cask ale

Cask ale or cask-conditioned beer is the term for unfiltered and unpasteurised beer which is conditioned and served from a cask without additional nitrogen or carbon dioxide pressure...

, the smallest of which are known as microbreweries and can be found in spaces as restricted as a single domestic garage. There is less of a divide between these and the giant companies, however, as breweries of all sizes exist to fill the gap. In Japan, microbrews are known as Ji Bīru (地ビール), or "local beer." In 1994, Japan's strict tax laws were relaxed allowing smaller breweries producing 60000 litres (126,802.7 US pt) per year. Before this change, breweries could not get a license without producing at least 2000000 litres (4,226,757.1 US pt) per year. As a result, a number of smaller breweries have been established throughout the country.

In Germany

Germany

, there were 901 small breweries in 2010. The Federal Statistical Office

Federal Statistical Office of Germany

The Federal Statistical Office of Germany is a federal authority of Germany. It is a part of the Federal Ministry of the Interior of the Federal Republic of Germany....

defines a small brewery as a brewery with a production of less than 5.000 hectolitres beer p.a. Small breweries pay a reduced beer tax

Progressive Beer Duty

Progressive Beer Duty is a term used to describe a beer duty system that allows smaller breweries to pay less tax on their products. The idea originates from Bavaria where such a system has underpinned the brewing industry and helped support local production. This idea encourages competition in...

.
The total market share of the small breweries is less than 1% . 638 of them have a production even less than 1.000 hl p.a. and can be considered as microbreweries in a narrow sense. The figures apply to commercial breweries only and do not include hobby brewing.
About one third of the small breweries have tradition going back up to 500 years, most of them in Franconia

Franconia

Franconia is a region of Germany comprising the northern parts of the modern state of Bavaria, a small part of southern Thuringia, and a region in northeastern Baden-Württemberg called Tauberfranken...

. About two thirds were founded in the last 25 years. The vast majority of small breweries operate in combination with a brewpub.

Brewpub

A brewpub is a pub or restaurant

Restaurant

A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...

that brews beer

Beer

Beer is the world's most widely consumed andprobably oldest alcoholic beverage; it is the third most popular drink overall, after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of sugars, mainly derived from malted cereal grains, most commonly malted barley and malted wheat...

on the premises. Some brewpubs, such as those in Germany, have been brewing traditionally on the premises for hundreds of years. Others, such as the Les 3 Brasseurs chain in France, and the various chains in North America, are modern restaurants.

Britain

Before the development of large commercial breweries in Britain, beer would have been brewed on the premises from which it was sold. Alewives would put out a sign — a hop pole or ale-wand — to show when their beer was ready. The medieval authorities were more interested in ensuring adequate quality and strength of the beer than discouraging drinking. Gradually men became involved in brewing

Brewing

Brewing is the production of beer through steeping a starch source in water and then fermenting with yeast. Brewing has taken place since around the 6th millennium BCE, and archeological evidence suggests that this technique was used in ancient Egypt...

and organised themselves into guild

Guild

A guild is an association of craftsmen in a particular trade. The earliest types of guild were formed as confraternities of workers. They were organized in a manner something between a trade union, a cartel, and a secret society...

s such as the Brewers Guild in London of 1342 and the Edinburgh Society of Brewers in 1598; as brewing became more organised and reliable many inn

INN

InterNetNews is a Usenet news server package, originally released by Rich Salz in 1991, and presented at the Summer 1992 USENIX conference in San Antonio, Texas...

s and tavern

Tavern

A tavern is a place of business where people gather to drink alcoholic beverages and be served food, and in some cases, where travelers receive lodging....

s ceased brewing for themselves and bought beer from these early commercial breweries.

However, there were some brewpubs which continued to brew their own beer, such as the Blue Anchor in Helston

Helston

Helston is a town and civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is situated at the northern end of the Lizard Peninsula approximately 12 miles east of Penzance and nine miles southwest of Falmouth. Helston is the most southerly town in the UK and is around further south than...

, Cornwall

Cornwall

Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...

, England, which was established in 1400 and is regarded as the oldest brewpub in Britain

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

. In Britain during the 20th century, most of the traditional pubs which brewed their own beer in the brewhouse round the back of the pub, were bought out by larger breweries and ceased brewing on the premises. By the mid-1970s, only four remained: All Nations, The Old Swan

Old Swan

Old Swan is an inner-city area of Liverpool, Merseyside, England and a Liverpool City Council Ward. It is located fairly centrally in the city, bordered by Stoneycroft, Broadgreen, Fairfield and Wavertree...

, the Three Tuns and the Blue Anchor.

The trend toward larger brewing companies started to change during the 1970s when the popularity of the Campaign for Real Ale

Campaign for Real Ale

The Campaign for Real Ale is an independent voluntary consumer organisation based in St Albans, England, whose main aims are promoting real ale, real cider and the traditional British pub...

(CAMRA)'s campaign for traditional brewing methods, and the success of Michael Jackson's

Michael Jackson (writer)

Michael Jackson was an English writer and journalist. He was the author of several influential books about beer and whisky.-Life:...

World Guide to Beer, encouraged brewers in the UK such as Peter Austin

Ringwood Brewery

Ringwood Brewery is a small brewery situated on the edge of the New Forest in Hampshire, England near the Dorset border. It produces mainly cask ales and some bottled beers.The emblem for the brewery is a boar....

to form their own small breweries or brewpubs. In 1979, a chain of UK brewpubs, known as the "Firkin" pubs, started, running to over one hundred at peak. However, that chain was sold and eventually its pubs ceased brewing their own beer. The resulting decline in brewpubs was something of a boon to other forms of microbrewing, as it led to an availability of trained craft brewers and brewing equipment.

British brewpubs are not required to double up as restaurants, as is the case under some legislatures. Some specialise in ale, whilst others brew continental lagers and wheatbeers. Current examples small independent brewpubs such as The Ministry of Ale, Burnley, The Masons Arms in Headington, Oxford, The Brunswick Inn, Derby, The Watermill pub, Ings, Cumbria and The Old Cannon Brewery, Bury St Edmunds.

America

Interest spread to America, and in 1982, Grant's Brewery Pub

Grant's Brewery Pub

Yakima Brewing & Malting Co, also known as Grant's Brewery Pub, was a brewpub founded by Bert Grant in Yakima, Washington. With its opening in 1982, it was regarded as the first in the United States since Prohibition...

in Yakima, Washington

Yakima, Washington

Yakima is an American city southeast of Mount Rainier National Park and the county seat of Yakima County, Washington, United States, and the eighth largest city by population in the state itself. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 91,196 and a metropolitan population of...

was opened, reviving the American "brewery taverns" of well-known early Americans as William Penn

William Penn

William Penn was an English real estate entrepreneur, philosopher, and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, the English North American colony and the future Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He was an early champion of democracy and religious freedom, notable for his good relations and successful...

, Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams was an American statesman, political philosopher, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. As a politician in colonial Massachusetts, Adams was a leader of the movement that became the American Revolution, and was one of the architects of the principles of American...

and Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry was an orator and politician who led the movement for independence in Virginia in the 1770s. A Founding Father, he served as the first and sixth post-colonial Governor of Virginia from 1776 to 1779 and subsequently, from 1784 to 1786...

. Growth was initially slow – the fifth American brewpub opened in 1986, but the growth since then has been considerable: the Association of Brewers reports that in 2006 there were 1,389 regional craft breweries, microbreweries and brewpubs in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

France

In France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, a chain of American style brewpubs operate under the name Les 3 Brasseurs. There is also a chain of about 7 brewpubs called Frog and Rosbif, which blend British and French traditions. ('Frog' is the English nickname for the French, and 'Rosbif' or roast beef

Roast beef

Roast beef is a dish of beef which is roasted in an oven. Essentially prepared as a main meal, the leftovers can be and are often served within sandwiches and sometimes is used to make hash...

the French nickname for the English). The pubs are decorated in a broadly British style, and serve a selection of ales, stout

Stout

Stout is a dark beer made using roasted malt or barley, hops, water and yeast. Stouts were traditionally the generic term for the strongest or stoutest porters, typically 7% or 8%, produced by a brewery....

s and wheat beer

Wheat beer

Wheat beer is a beer that is brewed with a large proportion of wheat. Wheat beers often also contain a significant proportion of malted barley. Wheat beers are usually top-fermented...

Canada

In Canada

Canada

, changes in outdated liquor control laws finally allowed "Spinnakers" to open in Victoria

Victoria, British Columbia

Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, Canada and is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific coast. The city has a population of about 78,000 within the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria, which has a population of 360,063, the 15th most populous Canadian...

, British Columbia

British Columbia

British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...

in 1984. Legislative changes followed in other provinces and brewpubs quickly sprouted up across the country in the 1980s and 1990s.

Germany

Whereas in other countries, microbreweries and brewpubs have risen in reaction to the mass production and marketing of beer, in Germany

Germany

, the traditional brewpub or Brauhaus remains a major source of beer.

Craft brewer

Craft brewer is a term coined by the American Brewers Association

Brewers Association

The Brewers Association is an American trade group of over 1,000 brewers, particularly concerned with the promotion of craft beer and homebrewing....

; it gives a definition of "small, independent and traditional", with small defined as an "annual production of 6 million barrels of beer or less", and beer produced by a craft brewer being termed "craft beer". The Brewers Association further groups craft brewers as microbrewery: annual production less than 15000 beer barrels (1,760,216.5 l); brewpub: sells 25% or more of its beer on site; regional craft brewery: at least 50% of its volume is all malt beers. Of the 1,759 breweries in America, only 43 are not defined as craft brewers, and 100 not defined as either a micro or brewpub.

Nanobrewery

A nanobrewery is type of very small brewery operation, often culturally defined by a less than 4 beer barrels (469.4 l) brew system. They are acknowledged by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau

Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau

The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, statutorily named the Tax and Trade Bureau and frequently shortened to TTB, is a bureau of the United States Department of the Treasury....

(TTB), and are fully licensed and regulated breweries. Nanobreweries are often on task to grow into microbreweries or brewpubs. There are quite a few breweries and brewpubs that could have been described at one point in their history as nanobreweries, had the term been invented. One example is Dogfish Head, from Milton, Delaware

Delaware

Delaware is a U.S. state located on the Atlantic Coast in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered to the south and west by Maryland, and to the north by Pennsylvania...

. Sam Calagione started the company as a brewpub on a 10 gallons (37.9 l) Sabco brew system in 1995. As of 2010, it produced 75000 beer barrels (8,801,082.4 l) annually.

A list of nanobreweries is kept current by Hess Brewing Co., a nanobrewery from San Diego, California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

. As of September 2011, it lists 66 nano breweries operating in the United States and 49 in the planning stage.

Origins and philosophy

Microbreweries in the United States

Microbreweries in other countries

Brewpub

Britain

America

France

Canada

Germany

Craft brewer

Nanobrewery

See also