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Thirty Years Of Pioneering Beers
410 Plays8 days ago
“We’re lucky to work in an industry that’s a lot about fun.”
This week’s guests need little, if any, introduction. Not only is BentSpoke – the brewery launched in a Braddon brewpub in 2014 and now a national brand – one of the country’s best-loved operations, but its founders have connections with Canberra’s beer scene stretching back three decades.
Richard Watkins and Tracy Margrain met while working in the kitchen at the Wig & Pen, a tiny Canberra brewpub that became a hotbed for experimentation and innovation. Once he’d swapped the stovetop for the mash tun, Richard started hunting down new ingredients and styles, while playing with barrels and funk long before the craft beer was even called “craft”, picking up major awards and influencing many that passed through its doors.
Since launching BentSpoke together, alongside the Meddings family who run Bintani, the couple have continued to innovate, helped bring IPA to a wider audience – their unexpected best-seller Crankshaft has topped the GABS Hottest 100 poll twice, and kept winning major awards, all the while adding their voice to discussions around the direction of the local beer industry.
As well as reflecting on an incredible three decades in beer, their affinity for the homebrewing world, the state of play for beer today, and future plans for the brewery, arguably the key takeaway from our chat is their ongoing, deep-rooted affection for beer and the community that surrounds it.
Prior to the main interview, Will and James discuss some exciting breaking news from Sydney, where a trio of brewing companies under the banner Misfits have taken over Wayward’s Camperdown taproom and are opening today.
Also in Sydney, we invited Bracket Brewing to reflect on their first five years via five key beers, while there was further positive news as the men’s mental health-supporting Convo Crates have been given new life via Nick’s Jerky, and Urban Alley announced plans to open a far bigger venue at Chadstone Shopping Centre.
We also highlight a trio of upcoming events for our beer club members in Freo, Brisbane and Melbourne, and, of course, issue a reminder to get in your nominations for the Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month and Have You Done A Rallings? campaigns.
Start of segments:
- 13:04 – BentSpoke Part 1
- 36:07 – Breaking Down Beer Styles with Mogwai Labs
- 42:47 – BentSpoke Part 2
To find out more about featuring on The Crafty Pint Podcast or otherwise partnering with The Crafty Pint, contact craig@craftypint.com.
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Transcript
Introductions and Locations
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Crafty Pint podcast. I'm Will. I'm James. How are you going there, Will? I'm great. As always, James, where are you coming to us from? Well, we're we're we're on the countdown now, but we are effectively in paradise. we're I'm at Osprey Campground, which is on the Ningaloo Reef. And that sort of if you're watching on the camera, about 100 metres back from the camera is the ocean.
00:00:28
Speaker
And there are turtles out there and stingrays. And last night, my son caught dinner for us, a spangled emperor, which Brad from a neighbouring campsite spotted us as he walked past. He went... I can't let you butcher that fish. I have to make sure you fillet it properly for dinner.
Life at Ningaloo Reef
00:00:42
Speaker
um So say I can actually work here, I reckon. You sort do a few hours' work. You go and swim with some turtles and rays. You come back. You do a bit more work. You go fish for a while. You come back. It's like it's pretty idyllic, to be honest. I probably miss the gigs and the footy.
00:00:53
Speaker
But, um you know, it's a it's I can't complain. There you go. Ningaloo Reef, a place that people from overseas spend their whole life wanting to go. You reckon it's pretty good, a pretty good place to work.
00:01:05
Speaker
Well, yeah I'd rather not be working, but, you know given I have to, you know, the work-life balance here is is very um very pleasurable. Let's just leave it at that.
00:01:16
Speaker
Excellent.
Sydney News: Brewery Changes
00:01:17
Speaker
um Well, we have some big news out of Sydney that's sort of just come in and ah several days after Wayward Taproom has closed, um yeah, and a new group has taken over the Camperdown space, which is which is fantastic.
00:01:31
Speaker
Yeah, i have to say I didn't really see this coming, but ah Jason, one of our writers based in Sydney, had sort of the inside line, I think, on that. So he's been chatting to the the team there and yeah, a trio of misfits involved in the operation.
00:01:43
Speaker
Yeah, the Social Brewers, Queens of Chaos Brewing and the Sundown are brewing. So the Social Brewers are based in Sydney South, ah in in Mortdale, that sort of area, and the other two have brewed all over the place. But um yeah, so they'll now sort of have a home. It is, you know, they're all still doing their own thing. They've they've come together to launch this joint venture, but will have their own you know, brands operating independently. So they run it between them. They said they're going to have some wayward beers on tap as well. And obviously because of the rapid turnaround, it's probably no surprise that they won't have done too much to the internal space at the moment and don't fully plan to either. that They, they,
00:02:23
Speaker
yeah it's It's a great venue. um we We've always talked highly of it. It's just a really wonderful building and great place to hang out. And the hospitality has always been great. They're even keeping some key staff on. So yeah, it's ah it's a really positive story, I think.
00:02:37
Speaker
Yeah, no, it was great to hear that that there was going to be a future for that place. So it sounds like maybe, you know, when you go in this week, there'll just be a bit of sort of spray paint through Wayward and Misfits scored over the top, which would kind of appropriate given the name.
00:02:49
Speaker
ah But no, yeah, best of luck to the new team there. I think, you know, it was always a great venue. ah You know, we understand there's been, you know, various challenges facing Wayward over the years. I'm sure they'll be happy to see it live on and to keep their beers pouring there as well.
00:03:01
Speaker
Yes, so that's how did this podcast going out on Thursday. So open from today. ah Real rush to get everything signed, but obviously with Father's Day this weekend as well. And um people love going to breweries and tap rooms for Father's Day. So they wanted to make that weekend.
Trevor Louder's Business Change
00:03:16
Speaker
And it was nice to have the brook but breaking news in time to be able to discuss it for the podcast rather than having it after after we've sent off to the editors. So thank you to Bo and the team for ah for getting back to us.
00:03:27
Speaker
There's still plenty of day left. Things can come in. um Aside from that, I guess, sticking the ear in the inner West, um we've got a feature on Bracket Brewing. They turned five this weekend with four day sort of birthday weekender.
00:03:40
Speaker
um I feel this like Jason's had a chat to to Mike about the five beers that I guess define Bracket so far. um Given he's released more than 300 new beers over that time, it's probably been pretty hard to pick them. But some really nice stories tied into into the beers he's picked. And it feels like it's sort of bit of a sort of complete the trilogy ah piece we've done on Bracket this year from news that they they'd found a new place in in the west putting their listing together and now sort of reflecting on five pretty chaotic, but pretty yeah fantastic years.
00:04:07
Speaker
Yeah, beyond the number of beers they've brewed, just the number of sort of events that have happened to them as a brewery that opened during COVID really and then having to move like are they they've done a lot more in five years for such a small brewery than than many others.
00:04:21
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. um And I guess to talking of a new life, for a business like we had with the Wayward Taproom and also still in Sydney. It's funny how these seem to go, but we seem to have clutches of news from different parts of the country each week.
00:04:35
Speaker
But um a sydney an operation that started in Sydney, the the Conversation Craigs that was started by Craft Beer Coopery, um Trevor Louder a few years ago, the the idea with there with those was that he'd send out mixed cases of beer and sort of nibbles to people and the whole idea, he was initially in support of it, are you okay?
00:04:51
Speaker
and sort of to get got get mates chatting, yeah checking in on each other. um and he And he decided to sort of stop the business um not too long ago, actually, after running it for a number of years. um And we got word a week or two ago that he's found new owners. So Nick's Jerky have stepped in to keep that going, um which I think is another positive story for, you know, it's it's good to see beer doing good. And this is, you know, something that, you know, is very close to Treasures, to Trevor's heart. And I think it's been, you know, close to the um the guys at Nick's Jerky's as well.
00:05:20
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. And it was developed basically to um to provide money to a range of mental health charities. So there's ah obviously a fair crossover there on what they both
Urban Alley's Expansion
00:05:31
Speaker
do. And um leaving Sydney behind to Melbourne, we just ran...
00:05:36
Speaker
at at the time of recording that Urban Alley have expanded into a new space in Chadston, which is interesting in the sense that they only opened space in Chadston couple of years ago, but they quickly found they've outgrown it um from a hospitality point of view.
00:05:52
Speaker
Chadston probably needs no introduction. It's the biggest so shopping centre in Australia. I was surprised to hear it's the fifth busiest in the world considering how small Australia's population is, but ah anyone in Melbourne will know that ah And Chadston, maybe this is a bit disrespectful, but it's a bit like La Sagrada Familia in the sense that it's constantly under construction.
00:06:14
Speaker
ah There's always new things going in, a lot of hotels there now and all that kind of thing. But they've found a lot of success. So Urban Alley will be the biggest venue within that shopping centre. ah They won't be brewing on site. They're still doing that in Docklands primarily. But um yeah, they've had a lot of success finding a market this way. Obviously, it's a different approach for breweries. Don't tend to find them in shopping centres. So wanted to just catch up with the team and sort of i hear about how it's going for them.
00:06:42
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, well, and I think, you know, you look on the on the West Coast, Whitford's part of the Beerland Brewing Group. They open a ah brew pub in a shopping centre in Perth a few years ago. And that's just that's kicking goals as well. So, you know, if you get the offer right, I guess, in the right space, it is ah it is a possibility. and I guess it's a great way to yeah make call contact and engage potential new audience for craft beer as well.
Craft Beer Events and Promotions
00:07:04
Speaker
i'm In terms of an audience for craft beer, Will, you were up in Bendigo last weekend for Bendigo on the hop and on the Friday night had a chat with a bit of a legend of the the beer industry, Willie Simpson, and one of his younger or former employees, Evan Hunter, who's now at Bendigo Brewing.
00:07:19
Speaker
Yeah, it was a delightful night. People were really captured by open fermentation primarily. So it's quite a sort of intense audience who really wanted to hear both the gritty of different fermentation ventor vessels, but also sort of the nuts and bolts of what Willing and Catherine did, which is run a small business in Smallbury for more than a decade and a half.
00:07:44
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. um and talking of ah Cabal events, we've got a few locked in as well. So I'll be down in Frio in a couple of weeks time for an event with Rhys Lopez from Evil Megacore Frio Social. We'll have a podcast chat with Rhys going live before that, hopefully as well.
00:08:01
Speaker
um October, we'll be sitting down with Scott and Vanessa, the founders of Red Duck, to celebrate 20 years of Red Duck at Audacious Monk Cellars. um And Mick Woost will be sitting down with the team at Helios later this month, towards the end of September, for an event with with them in Brisbane as well. So um if you're, um yeah, jump on jump online at craftycabal.com to check out the upcoming events and all the other um deals we've got coming up.
00:08:25
Speaker
And if you have a special father figure in your life and still trying to work out what to get them, obviously, The gift that keeps on giving a year's membership to the Crafty Cabal, $99 for all this value would be a wonderful gift.
00:08:36
Speaker
So if if you're still looking for that last minute gift, you know where to look. And I noticed you said sitting down quite a few times in there. so So continuing that theme, not too long ago when we were in Canberra, this is the last of our Canberra chats, we sat down with Rich and Tracy from Bentspoke Brewing.
00:08:53
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. So what did we notch up that week? Six or seven podcast interviews in the space of five days. um This is the the last of them to go live. um But yeah, I mean, it goes without saying that you know Rich is very well known in the beer industry. He's Prior to Bent Spoke, he was at Wigan Pen. And, you know, goes without saying, just the number of pioneering beers. He was always experimenting with new ingredients, new techniques, took that sort of concept of Bent Spoke. You know, they always plan to can, but whether they plan to become a national brand like they have, you know, it's
00:09:25
Speaker
Seems like that was maybe something that came over time, but it's just great to go right back to the start of Wig and Pen. what what you know What the industry was like then, what they were doing, their relationship with home brewers, how the business has evolved um and where they see things going. um you know The two of them would have you know as much of an idea of what's happening in you know in the craft beer world as anyone else. So really um great and involved chat.
00:09:47
Speaker
Yes, Ben Spoke, they're a wonderful brewery. And if you'd like to shout out a wonderful brewery, don't forget to submit your favorite brewery to our Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month, which can be done at craftypint.com slash bluestone. Maybe just submit Ben Spoke if you want, or one of your other favorite ah capital city breweries.
00:10:06
Speaker
And James, what if you love someone in the industry that's not a brewery? Oh yeah, well, so we, thankfully, in partnership with Rallings, we came with this wonderful idea to celebrate that Australia's good beer citizens through the Have You Done a Rallings campaign. So if you want to nominate someone who does wonderful things in the beer industry, please just head to craftypint.com forward slash Rallings, R-A-L-L-I-N-G-S. So yeah, we'll be back with Rich and Tracy after the break. In the meantime.
00:10:33
Speaker
If you enjoy it, make sure you like, subscribe and leave us a review. It really helps people find the show and discover us on listening platforms. So enjoy the chat. Cheers. Cheers.
00:10:46
Speaker
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00:10:58
Speaker
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00:11:19
Speaker
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00:11:31
Speaker
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00:11:44
Speaker
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00:12:08
Speaker
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00:12:21
Speaker
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00:12:38
Speaker
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00:12:51
Speaker
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Interview with Bentspoke Brewing
00:12:54
Speaker
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00:13:05
Speaker
Rich and Tracey, welcome to the show. thank you Thank you. Thanks for having us out to the cannery Mitchell, our first visit here. We've been to the brew for a few times. um i think we'll come to the Bent Spokes story a bit later and obviously your careers in beer go back a fair way before that. And certainly a couple of recent podcast guests we've had have named you as a knowledge of the Wig and Pen and and you as as a brewing mentor over the years. so can you tell us ah i guess see how far your careers in beer do go back?
00:13:35
Speaker
do i i don' know Do you want to go first? when you How you got involved in the wig? Sounds like a staff induction. we do do this in our staff induction every year. um Yeah, I guess when I left college, I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do. So I thought I'd get into hospitality, started working in the kitchen at the Wigan Pen actually.
00:13:59
Speaker
um So that was my first forte into craft beer. um And then obviously just loved what was happening there. um And the Wiccan Pen was launched as a brew pub, like he was making beer from the off.
00:14:13
Speaker
yeah Yeah, in a smaller capacity to what Rich ended up turning it into. But um yeah, there were Newcastle Brown Island BB still on tap. So um yeah, when Rich started, it really revolutionised the craft beer movement, I think.
00:14:28
Speaker
And Will tells me that you hired Rich for the Wig and Pen. Is this right? no no Not quite. I may have misremembered. but its Too many Imperial saisons beforehand or something.
00:14:42
Speaker
I could say that, but when he first moved to Canberra, um He was working in the kitchen and obviously I'd been there longer than him. sorry I couldn't say he worked under me. but So you were his boss then. Yeah. So you came in to work there and not and were you brewing at the time? Were you home brewing? Were you home brewing as well, Tracy, at the time?
00:15:02
Speaker
i I wasn't really into home brewing but um obviously loved beer before that. Yeah. um but I'd been homebrearing in Sydney, but I wasn't actually homebrearing in Canberra at the time. i was sort of just fighting my feet and finding a place to live was hard enough at the time. I just needed a job. And I've worked at a couple of kitchens around Canberra and then saw a job going um as a cook in the kitchen at the Wiggin Pen and took that on and Then got into an assistant brewing role pretty well straight away. and Was he assistant to Lockie? Was he brewing? No, Lockie wasn't brewing really when I was there. It was Richard Pass was the founding brewer with Lockie.
00:15:41
Speaker
And so I started as assistant brewer in 96 under under the Richard. yeah um And he was a you know he was an amazing brewer. he was some you know I guess back then it didn't allow him to be full time. So he was doing his um customs government customs job and then coming in at night and brewing three times a week. And then me and a couple of others did all the sort of cell work and stuff like that um during the day. and And then he decided to, he'd moved up into a few different roles and and decided to sort of um look after he's his well-being, I suppose, and and decided to give up brewing professionally. But he kept brewing as an amateur and he still brews today, actually, um making lagers. And so, yeah, took over, I think, from him at the end of 97. Mm-hmm.
00:16:34
Speaker
And what drew you in out of the kitchen and was the brewery? Like, was it just something you knew you wanted to do having homebrewed or was there something about? Tracy here is cooking with awful. Someone take him out. He's actually very good.
00:16:49
Speaker
and so um Look, I've been brewing in Sydney. So when I was going to uni in Sydney, I'd I'd been home brewing, selling beer back to my mates at uni. And then I got a job working at the home brewery. So worked at the home brewery for about 18 months, two years, mainly just doing planning duties working on the pack line.
00:17:09
Speaker
um You know, that was that was back in the... uh 90 91 92. well it have been early days when you know on peelsner was you know umperine was really taking the world by storm wasn't it i guess yeah well it was sydney bitter was the main view that they were making at that point and then it obviously got slid up by by line not that far after um and uh then just look literally decided to leave Sydney and come to Canberra. i'd never been to Canberra before. i had a mate down here, I'd come and have visit.
00:17:43
Speaker
Never left. was in mid-94. And to those who don't know the Wigan Pan, which I guess would be a ah lot of lot of people who got into craft beer, even in the last sort of 10 years might
Wig and Pen's Impact
00:17:54
Speaker
not have known.
00:17:54
Speaker
Like it's such a formative and sort of pivotal place within beer industry over here in terms of like, I guess it'd be one of those things where not many people would have been there, but those who did would have been,
00:18:06
Speaker
blown away by it. What was the story about that? that sort of Well, yeah, I mean, Lucky Wickhamish and Richard Pass set it up. I mean, Lucky was the main main person behind it. four you know Very revolutionary back at that time.
00:18:19
Speaker
There were only, think there were seven or eight small breweries around Australia at that time. You had Lord Nelson in Sydney. yeah You had George and Forth in Picton. You had the G-Bung Polo Club in Melbourne, St Ives down in Tassie.
00:18:36
Speaker
Marsstead up on the Gold Coast and Bootleg were the ones that were around. So Wiggin Pan being part of those. i pretty bold sort of move to do it.
00:18:47
Speaker
But I mean, they you know they had that heritage from the yeah UK and really wanted to bring those English style real ales people in Canberra initially. Canberra's lucky in it that it had a really transient but worldly population due to all the embassies in Canberra. So there was a market there.
00:19:08
Speaker
And beer was slowly starting to take off at that time in Australia. you know we were We were lucky, Tracy said earlier, get Newcastle Brown and some of those, you know, real iconic sort of beers that were being sort of hauled around Australia.
00:19:21
Speaker
And because the beer market in Australia is pretty, it's pretty well, yeah. and And aside from sort of the real eyes, because there was always that the hand pumps were still there right through to the the last days of Wigan Pen, but also the last time I visited, there lot more taps and a lot more different beer styles.
00:19:36
Speaker
Was the Wigan Pen kind of the first of the early breweries to really push into, you know, some of more New World stuff and certainly the barrels, all that kind of stuff? It feels to me like, you name all those other ones that were there. Yes, they were making beers, but you don't really associate them with the sort of stuff that was coming out of the Wigan Pen. Like you'd been pouring some pretty...
00:19:53
Speaker
crazy gears for the time. Yeah, I mean, the the main thing was, I think back then was that we had three hand pump beers on and we had three other taps, four in Cooper's Pale and Cascade Pale. And I just got sick of seeing, you know, having to deal with buying other kegs in. And we were selling stubbies of EB from the fridge and that was 20 to 25 cartons a week. and I'm going, we can make a beer here. So in the end, we just made a real easy drinking um well sorry Richard made ah a real easy drink in lager, put a Pilsner we had a red ale and then we had a strong beer and they sort of replaced those taps and we yeah we started being self-sufficient for beer early and then then you know after I took over, I sort of increased the number of taps from sort of three to six to nine, i think we had 16 beers on tap when I left. And you've moved from the kitchen to run kind of run the venue side of things, is that right?
00:20:50
Speaker
Um, I worked in the kitchen for probably three years. Um, and then I left to do a completely very different line of work. So I was working as a landscape gardener.
00:21:02
Speaker
Okay. Yeah. Um, but in between that, uh, Richard started making cider. Okay. So I used to help him out on the weekends. We'd go to a local orchard and, um, use apples and use the apple press and we'd go out there and crush apples and um Yeah, so I still kept involved. Okay. Yeah, and I thought you'd been involved in some way longer than that. Okay. Yeah.
00:21:24
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I reckon as well, I can't think it would be anything else, but when I was here as a backpacker in 2000, 2001, I was getting an overnight bus, or getting a bus down from Sydney to Melbourne, ended up getting off at Shepparton to go and pick apples and gills.
00:21:39
Speaker
And we stopped in Canberra and I got chatting to some Norwegian guy on the bus and we went out to try and find a beer and the 45 minutes stop we have. but I'm sure I had hand pumped beer. So we must have somehow ended up in the wig and And then the beer, it was so good.
00:21:52
Speaker
He was like, no, i think I don't think we have to be back on the bus another half an hour. So we got a second pint, missed the bus and then had to call the bus from the bus station and get them to stop at the side of the freeway and get someone to take us down. We pissed off everybody on the bus and it would have been your beers I reckon. Well, there's no one else in real ale, that's for sure. So we we had to chase the bus down the freeway and they had to wait for us and get on. Everyone was like, who the hell are these people that made up suicide? For two beers. For two beers. He was really big, tall, Norwegian. I reckon he'd have saved me. What about the styles and things that? So when you started pushing more into that, I guess, innovative, because people coming in and drinking barrel aged beers that had never had them before. And like, where were sort of pulling that inspiration from?
00:22:35
Speaker
Yeah, I think, well, Barrel Age beer was really unique time. That was sort of coming back from the US and seeing what was going going on over there. I think we started making more hoppy, hop driven beers at that point. I think, you know, we were we were using Galaxy. We were definitely one of the first groups to use Galaxy at the time. It was still not even named. It was a number.
00:22:54
Speaker
um And that's when we came up with the Rumpols Pale Ale and that became one of our biggest selling beers. And then i think from there was always just keep trying things and barrel aged beers was always one of those things that I sort of wanted to have a crack at. And we got a bit extra space down below the pub and get a few barrels from a local winery and started aging a bit of stout in them and then started to do some sort of mixed culture um ferments as well, using the leaves out of, you know, canteen bottles or whatever we get our hands on. but you couldn't You couldn't really buy mixed cultures, you know, in Australia. so
00:23:30
Speaker
It was sort of playing around. I think at the same time, Brad Rogers down at um so garage like that Tilda Bay, he was doing he just started looking at a barrel and same with Brendan at Ferrell.
00:23:45
Speaker
I think barrels were about 2005, 2006 when we started doing that. So they we were sort of all doing it at the same time. yeah and Unknown to ourselves, we're all doing it, I guess. Okay, so there wasn't any, you know, they hadn't been through the wig and pen or you hadn't been speaking to them? No, that's right. Yeah. and Did you know each other though? I id imagine was a fairly small community. Yeah. Yeah.
00:24:06
Speaker
Yeah. So we, I've been doing a fair bit of judging by then. I started judging at the Australian National Beer Awards in 2000, 2001. So, so that was sort of where I got to know Brad and Brendan.
00:24:21
Speaker
And then we sort of, you know, there weren't a lot of brewers around at that point. So, you know, you've always kept in touch with but your fellow brewers and people you like having a beer with as well. Yeah, yeah. It's very dangerous going downstairs to that barrel aging and open fermenter area. There was, you know, like the time machine where you go down there and sample a few beers and come up not quite the same. Yeah.
00:24:45
Speaker
we'll We might have been spoke now, but it's a time machine upstairs. and Yeah, yeah, yeah. Can you describe what it was like? I think I went downstairs into the underground to the old brewery.
Barrel-Aged Beer Trends
00:24:57
Speaker
From what understand it was a very small space that you to make the absolute most of.
00:25:03
Speaker
Yeah, look, we initially we had really no space anywhere. So we were literally um storing grain in the brewery and we finally got a storage room.
00:25:14
Speaker
The mill... The original mill and grain store off site are in a garage. um So we managed to get this extra space and we could bring that back on site. Oh, so you were milling off site then carrying the mill grain. And bring it in, And dust blowing off over your shoulders.
00:25:31
Speaker
But we because we took over the the taps, we were... um buying beer in suddenly had to make a bit more people so and it gradually started to take off and we were selling 40 kegs a week there you know when i left the pub um yeah so it was a pretty it was a pretty good little little um very far brilliant and so you know 40 kegs a week of 16 different beers you need you know you need 150 200 kegs full of beer to be able to keep up with that range and not run out and stuff. So we managed to get more cool room storage downstairs and a grain store. And then we had another bit of space that we sort of decked out with some barrel racking and yeah put in a sanitary floor and draining and all those drainage and all those things you need to do to make sure you can protect the quality of the beer. yeah
00:26:16
Speaker
And um yeah, we had we had some we made some real amazing barrel-aged views back then considering We only had about eight barrels. And not just those amazing beers, you had some pretty fun names as remember one of the first beer awards I went to, I think you won a trophy for the beer like, was it the judges are all?
00:26:35
Speaker
but it's much Oh, yeah. well i mean, that goes back to when when I did start judging. I mean, that was that was like, I ah um remember going to Ballarat and We'd be sitting in this lab in white lab you know with white lab coats on on and everyone in the room would be was well over 55, 60.
00:26:52
Speaker
And there was me and i I was the youngest by far. And then there was Brad. He was a bit older than me, but not much older. And you know they just didn't get... but this that It was very hard for them understand some deer styles.
00:27:07
Speaker
And so they used to judge these beers and they'd always give them 15 out of 20. It could be a bad beer and they'd give 15. It could be a beer they didn't really understand to be 15. stay Because they weren't they weren't i they weren't experienced tasting these types of beers in their breweries.
00:27:25
Speaker
mean, they're technically correct um brewers. and technically correct in identifying flavors, but relate relating those flavors to style was just a foreign, yeah, a foreign, um, you know, foreign thing. So coming out of doing a lot of homebrewing and, and getting into the,
00:27:46
Speaker
helping set up the Canberra Brewers Canberra and doing a lot of judging with different styles and was was the best thing I ever did because you get to learn about all these different beers and then try and emulate them at the Wig and Panning.
00:27:58
Speaker
but What was the old Codgers beer that won trophy? Well, that was an Imperial Stout. okay um And it was, yeah, it was ah we ended it as an Imperial Stout and it was just, it was literally called, I can't remember what it was called the first time around, but it won a gold medal and um One champion scout, I think I recall. And then the next year we yeah we renamed it and judges were a lot of cognizants. We wanted to try and see a bit of change in the judging and it was getting a little bit stale.
00:28:24
Speaker
And the judging today is amazing how i how they run it and how they rotate. Experienced people, they're bringing new people in. i think it's just got a great balance. I had someone put to me recently that the crowd at the Wigan Pen as well, the people coming in and buying beer were just incredibly well educated compared to most drinkers. Is that sort of your memory of it? And do you think that was because of the styles you were doing, something about Canberra, because it has people coming in from over the world? Look, you'll probably meet most of them bit later.
00:28:53
Speaker
I did make that call. 25 of them are still on the house. They're still drinking at the Madden. That's a great thing about the Wigan Pen. It was like a community and there was such a diverse... group of people that came in there there was uni students there was you know public servants there were lawyers like you name it that was back in the day where you know you could have a a good feed and a couple of pints at lunchtime and then still go back to work have a little snooze at the desk yeah and it's amazing that we still have the support from some of the people that were there like back in the day um at bentwick so
00:29:26
Speaker
And what it did directly was one of those places as well where people would have come in, tried the beers and gone off and either, you know, started their own brewery or maybe, you know, were involved in a brewery and came in and were inspired by the beers that were poured in there and went away and sort of took things to another level.
00:29:43
Speaker
Oh, that's a big call. We mentioned before, we you know, we started recording that Willie Simpson, you know, credits you with A, being a great mentor, but also, you know, seeing what you were doing with the gear you had there and then going off to do it in seven sheds. I'm sure Willie would be the only person that would have been through taken something away from it.
00:30:01
Speaker
Yeah, look, that's pretty humbling to hear um for sure. i mean, we definitely a lot of home brewers come through and i but we definitely had a lot of people come through that have gone on to be part of know, I'd be at breweries and that. i mean I couldn't remember how many brew days I did in ah in the Wigan Pen with people wanting to come and do a brew. I mean, it was nearly probably a couple of weeks, I think, for most of the time. yeah And I think the main thing was just to show people what you can actually do with a small space, a pretty straightforward brewery, um and a bit of outward thinking, you know, like a bit of, okay, how can I get around this problem making this beer style? I can do it like this, you know?
00:30:42
Speaker
It was also the introduction of fresh ingredients as well because Rich was very keen on getting fresh product into the country and that's when we kind of started getting different hops from the US which also led the IPA creation and pale ales and different styles.
00:31:02
Speaker
It was an exciting time and why wouldn't you? And yeast, you know, new yeast strains and everything. So it was an exciting time to kind of get into the industry. Yeah, because that pathway really built up, didn't it, in the time? You were brewing there like was very hard to get.
00:31:15
Speaker
i imagine you were getting a lot of stuff from home brew shops potentially early on. and Oh, that's right. It was hard to get ingredients to stop. You know, you had a couple of malt suppliers. You you were lucky to get your hands on any...
00:31:27
Speaker
any hops, it was all, you know, pride of ringwood and a bit of a Australian cascade and so super pride. And yeah, you occasionally get some fuggles in and some EKG out of the UK and maybe a bit of Chinook. There seemed to be a bit of Chinook floating around.
00:31:42
Speaker
um And you just had to make do with what you had, really. um i mean, yeast was another one. There was just really lack of of options for yeast.
00:31:53
Speaker
um So, yeah, I mean, trying, wanting to try different ingredients was... really, really important and trying to differentiate different beers by using different ingredients was as he grew the number of ingredients grew over the time, it was it was a lot easier to make different styles. It was pretty tricky back then.
00:32:13
Speaker
We were making our pilsner using an ale yeast, not an ale yeast. It made a good pilsner though. Isn't not an ale yeast the one they're using for hazy hazies these days as well, isn't it? Oh, that's London ale. A lot of people use the London ale for that.
00:32:28
Speaker
It was one of the only yeast back then. Yeah. and and And you seem to maintain pretty good, like close relationship with local homebrewing. We've heard number of times from people that Canberra has a pretty strong, vibrant homebrewing community and has spawned a few other commercial brewers as well. Is is that something mean you got out of your way to do to make sure you do involve them in Bent Spoke these days?
00:32:49
Speaker
Yeah, look, we do a fair bit. I mean, name they've got a judging on on Saturday over in our warehouse, so we give them space to do stuff. um I turn up and judge every now and then. um We do a heap of events with them, help them with fundraising activities. We brew the winner of their home brew comp in the brew pub every year, so um whatever style that is, it gets brewed in there. which you know It's great for them to um see how their beers can be scaled up and served on their commercial level.
00:33:17
Speaker
Have you had any that have been that good that you've gone, but just rename it, put it in a can?
Homebrewing's Role in Craft Beer
00:33:24
Speaker
all They've all been really good in their you know in their own way. I mean, there's been a range of styles. from Mostly been there's been a couple of IPAs, um strong a strong pale, a porter.
00:33:38
Speaker
We just did an American Lager this year. We've had a sour beer, barrel-aged sour beer. um I mean, you're probably right, we probably could just copy the recipe and and make them. But then some of them we were sort of already doing as well. So it was good to see the same style, the two interpretations sort of next to each other. So yeah that was really good as well.
00:34:01
Speaker
um And before we come back and after break and have a chat about all things, Ben spoke, um I guess, related to homebrewing. I mean, do you think it sounds like it's still vi but vibrant here, but how do you see the role of homebrewing now, give it and that compared to say 15, 20 years ago or 30s?
00:34:16
Speaker
You can just walk into so many places and get good quality beers of a diverse range. I'm assuming the the inspiration for lot of people homebrewing, other than those wanting something cheap, was they wanted a variety of beers and now you can get them. Do you still think there there's a the place for it or is it the reason for making it change because people just like making stuff A bit of both. i think um I think there's a lot of people that like doing things themselves. um And I think if you want to be a brewer, the best way to learn is obviously you can go and do course or whatever, but until you start actually brewing and learning and playing around with the different ingredients and putting them together, you're not going to really understand what flavour contribution a certain ingredient can make to a beer. So I think home brewing for that sort of reason, um it's a fun thing. Like we're sitting here today talking about beer.
00:35:03
Speaker
We're lucky to work in an industry that's a lot of about fun. yeah And home brewing is a fun thing to do on a weekend for someone. if They work through the week or a lot of the home brewers do it at night. Now through the week, they've got these beautiful little automated systems, you know, controlled by a computer.
00:35:18
Speaker
um So I think I think most people who like beer, it's a bit like bread, isn't it? If you really love bread, you end up making beer.
00:35:30
Speaker
end up giving it a crack. You know, I think beer is the same. If you really like beer, you know, and you've got the space to set up a little brewery, you just homebrew, you know, you just have a go. You might not You might only make 10% of the beer you drink, but yeah you know you you have a crack at it because it's just a fun thing to do. Take a bit of pride in it. We spoke to a Matt from Moffat Beach. He goes, oh, it's the first ever home where he goes, it's probably full of faults, but it was the best beer I'd ever drank because I'd made it. And there is that sense of satisfaction of drinking something or eating something that you make yourself.
00:36:02
Speaker
Yeah, nice. Well, um we'll take a short break now and then we'll come back to today and the wonderful story Ben spoke. Cheers. Cheers. And now we're breaking down beer styles with Mogwai Labs.
00:36:15
Speaker
Mogwai has one of the most diverse yeast collections available for brewers and other beverage makers in Australia. If you're looking for the perfect pitch, visit Mogwai Labs. That's M-O-G-W-A-I-L-A-B-S dot com dot au today.
00:36:31
Speaker
Hey guys, it's Craig here and we're back with another segment looking at breaking down beer styles with Mogwai Labs. I'm joined yet again by the founder of Mogwai, Josh Allen. Josh, how are going?
00:36:44
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, good. Thanks for having us. And we're thrilled today to have Mark Howes from Working Title Brewco. Mark, thank you for joining us, mate. Hey, thank you for for inviting me. It's great. Now, guys, we're talking this week about the Belgian Golden Ale beer style. A lot of brewers are having a lot of fun with this style. Josh, give me the give me the run of the the the tape first. What's this beer all about?
00:37:07
Speaker
Yeah, look, ah these Belgian-style ales I absolutely love. So I get excited when people like Mark get me on the the phone and want to, you know, brew up a special release for this stuff. It's definitely Desert Island beers for me. So, yeah, really, really enjoy it.
00:37:24
Speaker
um Famous examples. ah So this beer style originated from Duval in Belgium. um Other classic examples of it is Delirium Tremens.
00:37:36
Speaker
So that's the the the beer with the labeling with the little pink elephant. They had some pretty cool, amusing um Gabs merchandise at the festival this year. like did, yeah. Yeah, yeah. There like crazy hats and stuff.
00:37:49
Speaker
um Another famous example is Le Chouf. So that brewery... is based out in the Ardennes forest of Belgium. And they're labeled, they're famous for that little gnome man that's ah that's everywhere.
00:38:04
Speaker
Some pub trivia, his name is Marcel, if you wanted to know. I didn't know that until recently, actually. Yeah, but look, um Australian examples, look, beer drinkers need to look at craft breweries to get any Belgian-style beers to drink.
00:38:22
Speaker
um And there's a few ah breweries in Australia that are focusing on Belgian styles in their core range. um But I think the the Golden Ale style in particular, like it's just a great style for breweries to throw in for special releases at some point during the year, like Mark's done this month.
00:38:45
Speaker
Yeah, I'd probably give a shout out to Matic Brewing. I think they they're very specialised in in Belgians. Is that right, Mark? Yeah, yeah. They make some great Belgian beers. yeah You'd know the guys there, I'm sure.
00:38:57
Speaker
um now Now, Josh, the yeast for this, you mentioned Ardennes, and that's the name of the yeast you're you're recommending for this style? Yeah, so ah this ah this yeast strain that's marked that Mark has used in this beer, Webb branded it as Ardines because it comes from Le Chouf, or it's a variation of the Le Chouf Brewery yeast strain. and it's known um And it's known as the Belgian house strain for these styles of beers, generically speaking. And that's because it's so versatile for a lot of these beer styles.
00:39:33
Speaker
um It's very easy to use. ABV, it can handle these higher ABVs that are required for these Belgian styles. So sort of in that seven to or the style itself is in that 7% to 10% The yeast can handle up to around 12%.
00:39:52
Speaker
It drops out really well, meaning it can be used again and again in the brewery. um And it just offers like a really rounded profile, depending on how you want to drive the yeast. So it is Poth positive.
00:40:08
Speaker
um So it can create a really rounded profile for esters and phenolics. Yeah, nice. and And Mark, working title, you've recently, I think, brewed a Belgian Golden with that particular yeast. What what was your approach to that beer? What were you looking for in the and the product?
00:40:27
Speaker
Yeah, no, I think pretty much Josh summed it up nicely. This yeast creates a complement of phenolics and esters and we were really looking for that balance between the two.
00:40:39
Speaker
So, you know, we make big beers with big flavours but everything still has to be in balance. So we wanted the fruit, we wanted the the peppery spice from the phenolics and that was sort of the main reason for it.
00:40:55
Speaker
Yeah, nice. and And you mentioned the esters and so on, like what what are the kind of the key characteristics that you' you're wanting to achieve there? Yeah, I mean, we drove the fermentation temperature pretty high, like 24, 25 degrees.
00:41:08
Speaker
ah Looking for like banana and bubblegum, a little bit of apple and pear, that really fruity. And Ardines is particularly like tropical fruits. um So getting that really nice classic Belgian yeast character ah to be sort of the dominant aroma. So keeping the malt and hops very low so the yeast could really be the hero.
00:41:32
Speaker
Yeah, nice. and And tell me, with that, I guess maybe with those more tropical notes there as well, do you think that has translates well for an Australian drinker? I think so. the feedback The preliminary feedback we've had in the pub has been it's an easy drinker, which is the surprising...
00:41:48
Speaker
response for a 7% Belgian blonde. And we love to hear it because that's what we were trying to achieve. So something that is mashable that passes the pint test. And yeah, people seem to be enjoying even like non-classical Belgian beer drinkers, just guys at the pub seem to be gravitating towards it, which is great.
00:42:09
Speaker
Yeah, lovely. Fantastic. Well, there you go, guys. Let's make Belgian Golden a new house style for Australia, not just ah the Europeans. So thank you very much, guys. Really great to chat through that style. And and Josh, we'll see you next time with another Breaking Down Beer Styles with Mogwai Labs. Thanks, guys.
00:42:27
Speaker
Thanks for having us. Appreciate it. Mogwai Labs can help your brewery create custom yeast strains for your beers, with biobanking services to help keep your house culture safe and supply a fresh pitch whenever you need.
00:42:40
Speaker
Check them out at Mogwai Labs, that's M-O-G-W-A-I-L-A-B-S dot com dot au.
00:42:49
Speaker
Welcome back, ah Rich Tracy. We're sitting inside the cannery, which has a lot of fermentation tanks and ah pretty good capacity. Is this sort of where you thought Ben spoke would be? What are going into the 12th year at the moment?
BentSpoke's Expansion Journey
00:43:03
Speaker
Probably not originally. um When we started, we just had a small seven head filler canning line and the brewery. um And then we thought that we wanted to put a brew pub out here.
00:43:17
Speaker
So we did start some works to get that kind of happening. So the hydraulics and everything went in. And then we kind of realized pretty soon after that, that the brew was probably going to take more um Precident over the the hospitality side of things. So then things just expanded with extra fermenters and bright tanks. And a group up here on this location? yes okay Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00:43:44
Speaker
yeah And so the carrying the original canning line, was that sort of moved around behind the bar downstairs at Braddon? And is that why you used to take beer from... the tanks down the handrail. Is that right?
00:43:57
Speaker
You still got the pipe? No, we never candied Braddon. We never candied Braddon. But we had, I mean, we never, we didn't have, when we started, we we we literally had one pipe that went from the top of the Braddon, where the brew house is, down to the fermentation. So,
00:44:12
Speaker
It was just that when they installed the handrails, for they were installed as beautiful stainless steel piping, just like you have in your brewery. So yeah we turned them into transfer lines. We used them initially because we literally had to because we didn't have really any other way of getting the beer down there. But we did find after a while that It was a bit hard to have someone come up the stairs and there's hot water going down through a handrail.
00:44:35
Speaker
But you've still got their eyesight so you can see that it's a bit functional. yeah yeah yeah well they They are functional, they work 100%. We used them heaps and then we put in a few more pipes to be able to navigate getting liquid from up to the bottom and from down to up.
00:44:55
Speaker
but No, it was a fun thing to do at the time, but it was became didn't become all that safe um for punters trying to use the air. But it's a pretty intricately designed ah brew pub, you know, i guess, themed really closely around the idea bent spokes, cycling, that kind of stuff. Like there's amazing chandeliers or whatever you might call them. or have you drunk Where did that come from? is yeah Who's got the design eye or vision for that kind of stuff?
00:45:23
Speaker
Oh, well, we pretty much both came up with the, which was obviously into the brewery side of things. He knew what he wanted to achieve after working at the Wigan Pen and what could fit in small spaces. yeah um We were lucky when we started working on Bent Spoke that it was um a new building. So we got on there at Basefield, both got white cards, started working on there so we could fit all the tanks in.
00:45:47
Speaker
Um, and then, yeah, I guess I chose a lot of the fit out, the lights and the flooring and help weld the lights over the stairs.
00:45:59
Speaker
So it was pretty hands on from day one. And we was this starting and when you were still at Wigan Penn? You were still working as landscape gardener or was it like... Yeah, no, we quit our jobs in sort of July 2013 and we started building in September 2013. So it was, ah you know, we opened in June 14. So it was a was a big build, you know, like um it was, as Trace said, working on a building site, the building's getting built above us and we're trying to do our little works in here and, you know,
00:46:29
Speaker
We've had tradies running around everywhere, turning power off, you know, turning water off. And um it was, look, it was a great learning curve to be on a building site, for one. It was a great learning curve to install your own brewery. You know, you think you know how it's all going to go together, but it's always, you've always got to make changes as you go along.
00:46:46
Speaker
Yeah. Look, we tried we learned a lot of, we learned a lot of, we got a lot of good ideas from going to all the different breweries we went to all around the world and tried to put use a lot of those as well as our own ideas to try and put together a place that could be a functional brew pub. I think a lot of the times when I go to brew pubs, I sort of go, how are you actually going to brew in this pub? You know, like it's, I don't think sometimes people have thought through the logistics of how they're going to get rid of spent grain and keep it clean and tidy and looking really nice. Like we don't, Trace doesn't really go to a hell of a lot of effort.
00:47:24
Speaker
I mean, the brew looks really clean all the time, but she doesn't have to go to a hell of a lot of effort to keep it clean. Like it's sort of one of those breweries we've set up to sort of be minimalist in terms of what you actually need to do. Yeah.
00:47:37
Speaker
I guess that kind of reflected why some people, they come in and they don't realise that it's an actual functional. Yeah. Like, well, it's very expensive exercise for what these takes in if you're not going to use them. Yeah.
00:47:49
Speaker
And Tracy, you, um, so you, you focus on the brew cart, right? That's really your domain. Yeah, I think my um my tagline is Jill of all trades, so there's probably not a lot that I haven't done in this business since we started. I am used to work out here on the canning line when it was the little filler. um But, yeah, then I moved into the brewery in Braddon well, I've done a lot of jobs in the in know actual brew pub from the kitchen to standing on the door to helping rich out. That's what kind of inspired me to get into brewing full time. Yeah.
00:48:26
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's fun and it's changed and it's dynamic and, yeah, there's always something to do in there. I remember you um sold a phenomenal amount of beer over the opening weekend or maybe the opening a few weeks and so it sounds like you were still surprised it's got to this point. I mean, did you have sort like growth plans and that you've had exceeded or and I guess if it has sort of grown more, you thought what do you reckon has been but reason for that? Because you can have great beer doesn't necessarily mean you're going to become successful like you guys have.
00:48:55
Speaker
I think um there's a few things there. I mean, I feel like we've got a you know a pretty decent place to come and enjoy a beer in. You can find a spot somewhere if you want to be a bit private or you can you know being a be next to a noisy table of people enjoying some pints um um we've you know we've evolved our food over time and feel like we offer a pretty good um quality of restaurant style food as well so um that's an element that draw people in we cater for you know families and and dogs we do events we have a good local community that we run
00:49:28
Speaker
membership program called the drafters, which, um you know, I think we've got about eight and one hundred members of that. So, that yeah you know, pretty active with what we do. um I mean, obviously, Dana will come in for a beer every day, but um they you know, they're connected with us and come into the pub every now and then.
00:49:45
Speaker
So they putting all that together, I think that adds up to And there's nothing really like it in Canberra. I mean, Capital have got a great tap room, they've got a great beer garden. it's a different It's a different look and feel to what we've got sort of in Braddon, guess.
00:49:59
Speaker
And Braddon's grown around you as well, right? It used to be sort of yeah car yards and now there is a lot more going out and dining options, which it's sort of a very popular place to be now. Yeah, right. It's become a precinct. I mean, there was only two pubs there when we, or two bars there when we started and they're both, one them's still there, but of them's gone now and there's heap of restaurants now and it's, you're right, it's, you know, people draw people. So if you've got a, you know, if you've got a sort of critical mass of people wandering around, going to a restaurant, coming to a pub, then you likely always get more people. Plus the other thing is,
00:50:33
Speaker
With all the new buildings that have gone up around us, as the population of people living in Braddon has increased dramatically. ah think it was 9,000 we started. I think it's like over 25,000 now. So that's a lot of extra people to live within five-minute walks.
00:50:49
Speaker
Well, it's funny you say people draw people. i remember the first time I visited the brew pub. It probably opened maybe a year or so. he was... early in the week, I think I was staying the Novotel or something um in town and I walked out and I reckon every place I went past that was open had like one table of people in and then i was like, to turn the corner to where the brew pub was, all the tables outside were full, there were people inside, there was a few tables upstairs as well. it was like there was probably more people just in your brew pub venue than there had been in every other restaurant I'd walked past. It was like a Tuesday night or something.
00:51:19
Speaker
So I guess you know that happens, but you but you've maintained it as well, I guess, and that must be a challenge over as you know new places open and people's tastes change. Yeah. Yeah.
00:51:30
Speaker
We were really lucky when we started. We were kind of on that wave of craft beer and everything was exciting. We didn't realise what the speed of the uptake of people coming into the brew pub and how quickly we'd expand out here. um And then just keeping that momentum, I guess, is just being involved in the community and like we're pretty lucky in Canberra to have such good support. Yeah.
00:51:56
Speaker
And, yeah, I mean, we've had to pivot and change through COVID and now this period, but, yeah, we still get people through the door, and think that's... And aside from getting people through the door, like... mean, if the beer wasn't any good, people wouldn't be coming. Yeah, true. It still matters. But aside from getting people through the door, how do you, you know, you've become a national brand, you know, a successful national brand, very well known in most different, not all of the country.
00:52:21
Speaker
How did you, was was that sort of always part of the plan or did you sort of see an interest, maybe how the market was changing going, oh, we need to be a part of this. And yeah, how did you manage to do it so successfully? Because a lot of people have tried it and and not got to where Ben Spoke has.
00:52:36
Speaker
If you look up at the ceiling in the brew pub, you'll see can lids in there. We put them in there um when they poured the slab on the floor, which was always a sign that we were going to hopefully start canning. Yeah.
00:52:49
Speaker
But obviously we didn't realise what that would take um when we first started and how... Well, we thought we could can at the brew pub. And we had a three-year, we sort of had a three-year idea that we would can our beer and and set up another, you know, another brewing space.
00:53:08
Speaker
But yeah, after 12 months, it was pretty clear that we we should jump on now and people want our beer outside of the pub and... Maybe if we don't jump on and do it, then um something else might come along. So we jumped on. me We got this place. um um you know the The Meddings have been incredible through this time. I mean, they've been really supportive of what we want to do. And we've all made decisions together as well. So it's been like a really good partnership.
00:53:35
Speaker
And so when we were deciding on where to go, Phil and I wanted a much smaller little place across the road and Tracy wanted this place and she talked us into getting this big factory in. I know you wish you had a bigger one.
00:53:46
Speaker
Back in the day, we were like, oh, what do we need a boardroom for? What do we need all this office space for? What do we need this for? And now... like, oh, we've outgrown this place. We need another warehouse or we need extra storage. You had the vision, the belief. Yeah.
00:54:00
Speaker
I mean, we did have some amazing events back in the day when we didn't have so much um equipment and storage needs out here. but And that was a fun thing. Yeah. did BMX events and open days and it was really good chance to involve the rest of the community to see what we actually do out here.
00:54:20
Speaker
So I think originally when we started, people would wander in and just go, oh, hey, and what are you doing in here? Yeah, yeah. and when I guess initially you would have started putting cans into like's like Canberra venues. How soon did you decide to go beyond that with with the fact pack products? Yeah.
00:54:38
Speaker
Look, I mean, we, yeah, we we basically, we started off with Crankshaft and Bar. We picked our two biggest selling beers from the Brewpub. We said, well, we're going to put a beer in a can. We might as well choose our two biggest selling beers. We didn't even think, we didn't even know at the time that, well, sorry, when we set up the Brewpub, we never thought Crankshaft would be our biggest selling beer in the Brewpub.
00:54:55
Speaker
I mean, we always thought Palo would be. Maybe was bit too weird when the paleo was a bit too weird when we started. It was because it had a touch of oregano in it. And so that maybe be held it back from the start. We removed that pretty quickly. I think i don't think we ever had oregano going to go under the can. But... um we we Look, I've still got the the original sales plan on my office office door. I'd just drawn up a map of Canberra and gone, we're going to split it into regions. going to someone looking after this region, someone looking after this region. We're going to try and sell beer to everyone who's got a license and possibly can unsell beer. So that was our that was our start.
00:55:35
Speaker
I mean, we were lucky enough to get it into local VWS. You know, everyone has a bad thing to say about the major the majors, but I mean, they've they certainly, we found them good to deal with.
00:55:47
Speaker
generally don't have a lot of dramas with them at all. so But they helped us initially. So we I think we still hold the record for the biggest selling new product in a BWS store. I think we had to deliver 100 cartons in a day to this BWS up in Franklin, which is literally you know five kaves up the road.
00:56:03
Speaker
And I think them seeing how well it was going, they said to us, well, how about we put it in these stores in Sydney? And all of a sudden, we're selling beer in Sydney and Queensland and Victoria. And I think that was pretty well...
00:56:15
Speaker
you know, a year after we started selling Cairns. So by November 17, we were selling beer pretty well in every state um on the East Coast. and there would have been too many beers like that in Cairns. And did you have the full 360 lids from the off as well? That would have been a bit of a talking point. That's right. We had those as well. And it's a shame me about those. And it's a pity that the the um EPA in Sydney has banned them, but um we'll get on with that. We used to take them and the the colonial ones to Dalton Plains Music Festival. You guarantee, as soon as you crack one, everyone either side of you is going, what the hell have you for the festival.
00:56:54
Speaker
um Yeah, makes it it did. like It feels to me like it was sort of open as a brew pub. People come to visit. Yeah, they're making great beers like, you know, Rich and Tracy doing this. And then it seemed to almost be overnight from looking at the outside that suddenly you suddenly had stepped up to be this regional and then on the way to being a national brand pretty bloody quickly.
00:57:14
Speaker
Yeah, I mean... Probably felt a lot slower to you guys. yeah Maybe faster. Yeah, maybe it was a bit faster, but I mean, we it was simply it was simply because people people sort of were buying for beer, ultimately, you know? I mean, that's where it went. I mean, sure, we won a few awards ah along the way. Didn't you win, like, champion brewer titles?
00:57:32
Speaker
It was like Jimmy Connors-esque sort of distances between these Wimbledon titles or something, wasn't it? A little bit like that. Yeah, a little bit like that. Won at the Wigan, yeah. um But I think the main thing was that, you know, for us, Crankshaft sort of fitted into a place and in bottle shops where there really wasn't a lot of competition at that time as well. so um And then as we grew, we could maintain our price, so we kept it pretty competitive where new players obviously were finding it hard to make a beer like that that was...
00:58:01
Speaker
um selling for the same sort of price. We managed to keep that going for a fair while. yeah I mean, the market's changed a hell of a lot now. People really aren't as much into this style of beer, of an IPA as they were. So, you know, you were seeing a lot more of those um easy drinking styles like pale ales and
Challenges in the Brewing Market
00:58:18
Speaker
hazy pales. And do the markets change because their tastes are changing or it's just because there's a bit less money going around and I can get my four pack or my six pack. I think it's combination of what it comes. I think it's I think it's an evolution of a generation coming true because we're now talking 12 years ago for Ben Spake, 20 years ago, yeah nearly 30 years ago since I started of brewing. um
00:58:38
Speaker
So I think you've seen the drinker change over time. um whether that's through the food that people eat as well, because you know there's a lot of food options now where you can get hu you know whole meals delivered to you as ingredients at home, and you know you never had that back in the day. So people maybe are experimenting more with different foods. there I think generally, I wouldn't know this for sure, but if I had to take a stab, I think people are generally spending more time at home, um especially from Monday to Thursday or Sunday to Thursday, so shall we say.
00:59:13
Speaker
So I think that's affected you know what people are drinking as well. They're probably going for something a bit lighter. um And obviously all those other drinks categories have come in as well. Seltzer came in. you know It's maybe not much here anymore, but the RTD certainly become really big.
00:59:33
Speaker
And that wasn't really a big thing back in the day. and so have you Have you seen other beers rising in as percentage of your sales then compared Crankshaft or not? Crankshaft's still a flagship. Yeah, look, there's obviously enough people who um like it and buy it and we're still getting it in new people's hands as well, which is exciting. Like when you...
00:59:54
Speaker
you know, even after, you know, 10 years, it's you're still getting the can in people's hands who haven't had it before, which I think is really good. It means that we've still got opportunity and with opportunity comes, you know, it comes comes potential growth. And and that's exciting, really, because I think a lot of brands sometimes a pigeonhole too much and and then there is no opportunity. So I think if you have opportunity, yeah you're in a good spot. yeah I saw some 10 packs of it being packed downstairs as well. so obviously there's still a good number of people who like it in a bit of quantity. I know that's right. Yeah. 10 packs are a funny thing. We really only sell them in Canberra. it's I don't know why it is, but I think it's something to do with the fact that we can
01:00:35
Speaker
put our four packs on the shelf and then have a 10 pack as well. So you sort of get that that brand blocking effect of people going, oh, I might as well buy a 10 pack. I'm going to have a few mates over on the weekend. A four pack's not going to cut it. So yeah I think that's how that works. but yeah and yeah And you sort of talked about change in market and hinted at some of the challenges of the last couple of years. you know I guess having to you know work a lot harder to maintain the market, what have you.
01:00:57
Speaker
If you could wave a magic wand and, you know, would be what you'd like like to see change for, you know, for bent spoke or for beer sort of more widely in terms of the change that face now.
01:01:10
Speaker
It's tricky one. um Well, I mean, ultimately, I think there's too many breweries in Australia for the number of people. You know, it's like, it's nice to, it's well, maybe not maybe not there's too many breweries. There's too many breweries selling beer to bottle shops. Okay.
01:01:27
Speaker
And it's it's good if you're a bottle shop owner because you've got like so much choice and you're trying to get everyone to compete on price. But if it comes to a point where ah pricing becomes, makes breweries unsustainable. And we've seen that.
01:01:41
Speaker
I don't know how many breweries have closed in the last three years. you guys probably know more than more than me but um a significant number like it's if it peaked at 700 just before when i was you know as part of the iba it couldn't be much more than 500 now wouldn't have thought yeah you know and i think that's pretty damning really that or if there are more i reckon there's a lot more smaller ones that you wouldn't necessarily know about because they are just pretty much selling over the bar and yeah if they've got cans it's in their own fridge for something to take home yeah yeah yeah I don't know if we shot ourselves in the foot as a craft beer industry, kind of making it too fancy or too um out of reach from you know general hunters. I mean, beer at the end of the day is something that you share with mates.
01:02:26
Speaker
um So maybe it just got a little pretentious for some people. um And, yeah, I think we need to... The younger generation, obviously, their palates are changing, so we need to remind people how great beer is and how diverse it is. How nice it is to get down the pub and you know yeah catch up with people.
01:02:44
Speaker
We've got a really different beer landscape in Australia. i don't think you can think of another country in the world where, yeah you know, New Zealand's probably a little bit similar, but our beer landscape mainly dominated by...
01:02:55
Speaker
you know, two really big brewers and another one that's, you know, pretty big as well. You don't see that anywhere else. So when, you know, 80, 90% of the beer, 80% of the beer is consumed from those brands, it's,
01:03:10
Speaker
we're all playing in this really little small place. And so trying to be a regional brewery, I think is important. I think you need to make sure you you're you shore up your your own local market. and That's what we focused on when we started. We made sure we you know, we had our beer everywhere in Canberra and all then the Canberra and surrounds and down the coast and up Snow and at Goulburn and then Trickland Beer into Sydney and slowly building that and then obviously going to Queensland and Victoria. But keeping your own backyard is really important.
01:03:45
Speaker
I mean, Snowden and Wood did a good job of that, let's be honest. You know, they were ah were the the big sort of regional brewer that really sort of made that regional brewery type model work. And I think a lot of people should think back to that and sort of try and copy that because it's a sam sound way of doing it.
01:04:03
Speaker
Do you think then, you know, there is that chance for independent breweries to be really like genuinely national players or, you know, if those days ever existed, are they gone on now because people maybe don't want that? They they want to buy beer from the city they live in or from nearby or something like that. There's probably a lot more of that.
01:04:20
Speaker
bob COVID obviously brought that to the front where people didn't tend to venture out more than their little suburbs and the pop-up of you know more um regional and suburban venues and breweries.
01:04:38
Speaker
I think there's still room for people to be national. i think you've got to have money though because there's so many more beers in the bottle shops now. So in order to penetrate in and get and get penetration in a bottle shop that's, you know, the other side of the country, it's really hard. I mean,
01:04:53
Speaker
Bolter did it. They're reasonably young. um They'd managed to grow extremely quickly and become a national brand in a very short space time, not that long ago, be honest.
01:05:06
Speaker
So it shows if you have the right sort of model, you can actually make get there and and make it work. But ah don't if you said what brands currently out there in the market are going to become, that's the brands that aren't. yeah i you know I don't have the ins and outs of everyone's business, obviously, to know, but I wouldn't think that anything pops to mind at the moment.
01:05:25
Speaker
Suddenly you're going to say, oh, that brand has just started or that beer is going to suddenly be a national player. yeah um Maybe you guys probably have more idea. I mean, I might ask you guys that. What news out there at the moment do you see is going from a small regional play to ah becoming a national brand?
01:05:42
Speaker
Well, it's interesting because don't know how many actually want to. I think, you know, there's there's a whole bunch that would have got to this size either side of you that are probably aiming to stay there at least sort of hold on for now or maybe some probably have downsized, you know, and and remain profitable.
01:05:55
Speaker
and Interesting, we had a chat with them Reckless the other day and they they're very keen to... expand and become a national brand over time. But don't think there'd be too many of that sort of scale. There's ones that we sort look at doing well. It would be, you think like Love Shack in, in, um,
01:06:11
Speaker
in Victoria going great, but essentially they've nailed down the local market and they sell a bunch of stuff into Melbourne. And I don't think they have any great desire to go beyond that. i think i think that's probably what's almost limiting it is how many people really want to do that.
01:06:24
Speaker
Well, there's mountain culture, of course, I think. both for that But they're sort of what you're sort already there, I'd say. And they took over venue and decided not to keep it as well. So like, yeah even they ah seem to be um focusing more on the East Coast too. It is a big country though, Australia, which is a sparse population, which I think is part of the underlying issues with the market as well. You can't actually get your beer everywhere.
01:06:49
Speaker
It's crazy. Yeah, and Rocky Ridge having a play, but the same time, they were already pretty sizable in WA. So, yeah, in terms of the next ones coming through, ah don't know how many of the those getting into beer now are getting into it thinking, I want to do what Rich and Tracy did. Maybe they're getting in going, it's going to be a retail-based, venue-based kind of um operation, at least for the time being anyway.
01:07:11
Speaker
feel it is probably more of a passion thing now. You do it for the love of it. It's not... um Perhaps like some people who joined the industry where they saw Craft Bee rising and thought, well, I can make a little bit of money from this. I'll build a business and sell it and, you know, i I'll make some money out of it Now it's really, you've got to love what you do. You've got to work really hard at it.
01:07:33
Speaker
And, you know, being in your community is probably the best place to be. Well, both Ben at Bridge Road and Stu at Voyager, who's obviously got, you know, operating different parts of the business as part of podcast road trip this week. Like they have both said, you've got to have passion to do what they're doing. Like whether you want start brewery or they want to start craft malting. If you don't care about the product, you don't care about doing, you don't care about beer or spirits. In Stu's case, like, just don't bother.
01:08:01
Speaker
You know, just don't do it. It's not going to carry you through. No, that's right. No, you've got to, i mean, this is, This is a lucky thing. and I think he talk about longevity. i mean, I can get up every day and go to work because I love being in and around beer and I love the product.
Community and Business Growth
01:08:18
Speaker
And and I mean, ah you know generally all of the people we've got yeah in the industry, like you guys and so many other friends you've made through the industry over time. And then also you know our team.
01:08:31
Speaker
you know We rely heavily on our team. I think we built a really good team and turning up every day and coming to work and having all these great people around you, I think it's amazing. That's something that I think you should never take for granted.
01:08:43
Speaker
And so looking back, whether it's over the 11 years and counting of Bent Spoke or nearly 30 years since the start of the Wig and Pen, sorry, your involvement with the Wig and Pen for both of you, any, well, the moments you've enjoyed the most, whether it be beers or events or moments and maybe don't talk about crankshafts can we so yeah doesn't big exist for a ticket they never won one happened hey what are you It has been months. Yeah. i think it looked I think it's spending time with our mates in the industry. I think the other thing that's been good for us is we've had a lot of people start with us in different roles and go on to do bigger and better things, bigger roles within the company. yeah So we've had people that have started off cleaning beer lines in the pub and
01:09:29
Speaker
and now they're part of the brew team out here. We've had people who started working in accounts and and then gone into sales. We've seen them leave our business and go into bigger and better things outside as well. and I think that's been really great to see that we've maybe been a starting point for a lot of people's careers, whether they stay with us or not.
01:09:53
Speaker
It's just traveling around as well when Rich has been doing judging, just going to different countries and experience in different breweries over there and, um, they're always so welcoming. So you learn so much when you go over there, you give them so much beer and, um, it's just a great community.
01:10:10
Speaker
Like there's no, I wouldn't imagine there's many other industries in the world where you can travel and, um, get lot lifelong friends um through a love of beer.
01:10:22
Speaker
It's amazing how it opens the doors. Once someone anywhere in the world understands that you are involved in the beer industry somewhere, especially if overseas, it's like, oh, you come into into the inner sanctum. We used to travel a lot with Lachie McBean from Greenford. His line all the time was, hi, I'm lucky and we're rich and we're brewers from Australia over here judging the world big up and the doors would open and all of a sudden you'd be, you know, touring breweries stuff. So, no yeah, it's just a great, great thing to be involved in.
01:10:53
Speaker
And before we wrap up by asking what's next for Bent Spoke, who green-lighted the ah lamb's brains in cracked barley that used to be on the menu when I first came through? There we go. I just wanted to clarify that. We we didn't mean we shared it this year before.
01:11:07
Speaker
And then you became a vegetarian. I think that was about a year or so afterwards. It wasn't directly tied to allow the lamb's brains. He likes experimenting in beer and food. I might add a couple of things, though. I just want to go back and go,
01:11:21
Speaker
what did I learn from back at the Wigan Pen days and and really acknowledge Lockie for being a visionary. yeah But he also taught me a little bit about what it might be like to get into business as well. and And he'll know more than I'll ever know about beer and to this day.
01:11:37
Speaker
But just because you own a business doesn't mean you're a businessman. And I think I took that on. I learned that and I took that on. And so that's why we surrounded ourselves with good people. And it was, you know, it's been it's been absolutely fantastic to be have partners like the Mettings who have that business acumen that we've been able to lean on to build our business because we We know a little bit about making beer but and running hospitality, but we we probably never knew anything about business back in the day. So we've been able to really you know work together on that. So that's been it's been you know, it's been unreal working with Pete and Marg and Dale and Phil. So it was interesting when we chatted to them a couple of weeks ago, you got the impression that maybe Pete didn't know a great deal about business until Phil came back into the operation. So, you know, maybe all roads lead back to Phil Meddings. I mean, you got to think back. He was pretty revolutionary back in the
01:12:27
Speaker
in the late 90s because he was he just started his business and he was selling a lot of malt extract to to um food manufacturers and stuff but then he started selling brewing ingredients and brewing yeast you know he knocked on our door at the weekend pen and said you want to try this yeast we we tried it we won a few gold medals at the beer awards and sure enough we started using his yeast all the time in all of our beers and then lots of other breweries started using his yeast too um But that was like like we talked about. There were hardly any ingredients back then. To start a business selling ingredients back then, you would have thought that was a bit risky back then.
01:12:59
Speaker
yeah um Yeah, just chucking that in. Yeah,
BentSpoke's Future Outlook
01:13:02
Speaker
great. Well, yeah, I mean, what's next for Ben Spoke? What's the next decade? Talking of bigger and better, next decade. Bye. You'll both at least surely be on the brew deck still.
01:13:11
Speaker
um Absolutely. i don't know. back Can you keep like around 25 kilo grain bags and... Yeah, i mean, it's always exciting, isn't it? There's always new products and new innovations and new things you can get involved in.
01:13:28
Speaker
So, yeah, just... I think keeping it fresh. I mean, like, we don't we don't need to change the world or make radical changes to what we do. There's enough people out there who enjoy really good beer and that's why all the breweries around Australia are obviously see making making, that are making good beer or selling but selling beer because there is enough...
01:13:49
Speaker
good Australians that love, you know, trying craft beer, supporting their local brewery. And look, there's still so many events and so many things that we do that just when you think you've got a nice, quiet spot with nothing to do, we might sneak away for a couple of weeks, something comes up and you're at this event and you're seeing how passionate people are about listening to you talk about, you know, your story or or talk about, you know, your beer and And then they really go from not ever trying your beer to really liking it. And then you get a message, you know, through one of our social channels saying, oh, ah ah but I saw you, I met you at the, you know, this event you did. And then I saw your beer up there in Noosa on the Sunshine Coast and bought a carton. Just thought I'd let you know, you know, and you see that sort of stuff. And it I think it just keeps keeps motivating you to, you know, to to keep enjoying it. Because, mean...
01:14:42
Speaker
I think the next 10 years for me is is really about making sure that the enjoyment keeps flowing along. yeah um I think it's it's so easy to... spend a lot of time at work and A lot of people go to work and they don't like what they do. I go to work because like what I do. I love what I do. yeah And I think that's the thing I like want to get more people doing is is making sure they like going to work. you know if you if you go to if you If you like going to work or love going to work, your life's pretty good.
01:15:10
Speaker
Yeah. Now, we were chatting to Stuart Brown after after the some interview the other day over lunch. They were talking about you know what we'd most like to see for the industry. And I was kind of like, people to hold on to that and remember that side your hold on to the positivity and you know, yeah things are tough just like, yeah, keep keep holding on to what is good about what the and yeah beer is and what the industry is.
01:15:31
Speaker
We can't we can't worry about what the economy is going to do and how the world's going to play out at the moment and and all of that. what we All we can do is control how good our beer is. Yeah. And if we do that well, I reckon that will stand some pretty good stead. 100%. Fantastic words to end it on, Rich and Tracy. Thank you so much for joining us.
01:15:50
Speaker
Cheers. Cheers. Thanks, guys.
Crafty Pint's Pint of Origin Festival
01:15:53
Speaker
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01:16:07
Speaker
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01:16:19
Speaker
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01:16:32
Speaker
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01:16:47
Speaker
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01:17:06
Speaker
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01:17:22
Speaker
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