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Community, Culture, Creativity – Inside The Cypher World
456 Plays27 days ago
"We've got big plans and big ideas, and want to have some fun with it along the way.”
Canberra’s beer scene has been dominated – in a nice way – by two breweries for the best part of a decade now, but since Cypher Brewing released their first beers in April 2023 the Gungahlin crew have been angling to join BentSpoke and Capital and turn the Big Two into a Big Three.
We joined co-owner Jeff Wilson-Shipley and head brewer Matt Thiele at their brewpub as part of our podcast road trip odyssey in June. The former is one of a group of soccer-playing mates from diverse backgrounds behind the brewery, the latter a brewer who joined Capital a month after they launched and moved across town for the chance to take more creative control of a brewhouse.
We talked about their ethos and brand, the building of what they refer to as “The Cypher World” – one that seems to involve plans to open a brewpub on Mars, their efforts to celebrate and engage their multicultural local community, balancing hardcore fans’ (and their own) desire for big beers with more approachable offerings for the wider market, and their work advocating for indie brewers with the pollies down the road.
It’s a pretty snappy intro this week, covering the week’s news – the founders of pioneering Red Duck Brewery putting the business on the market as they approach 20 years; the launch of an indie maltsters association in WA; tickets going on sale for the industry components of Grainstock – as well as Mick Wüst’s lovely tale featuring the founders of Brisbane Pub Chess.
We also reveal the latest winner in our Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month campaign; keep the nominations for that coming, as well as for our Have You Done A Rallings? celebration of good beer citizens.
Start of segments:
- 7:54 – Grainstock 2025 Preview
- 11:37 – Cypher Brewing Part 1
- 32:25 – Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month
- 37:41 – Cypher Brewing 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
Introduction and Initial Setups
00:00:05
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Crafty Pine podcast. I'm Will. I'm James. Good see you again, Will. How's has things in Melbourne? Great. As cold and as wet as it was last week. How how are you, James?
00:00:16
Speaker
Oh, well, I'm sat in the shadow of my car here because it's rather warm. um I had set up in a different part of El Questro. Then this plane started taking off to take people for a sunset flight. Then I moved somewhere else and ah helicopter took off. So I've had to sort of drive off site, but I thought I'd get a little bobe tree behind me just to um add a little bit of ah local colour before I head off and drive over the hills to go and take in Sunset myself.
00:00:41
Speaker
How wonderful.
Breweries and Associations: Red Duck and WA Malsters
00:00:43
Speaker
I guess potentially speaking of Sunset, that's quite a nice segue because one of the original ah Victorian craft breweries, the founders of that are looking for a sort of sunset of their own.
00:00:55
Speaker
Yeah, Red Duck, one ah one of the first breweries whose beers I would have tasted when I was starting the Crafty Pint. I sort of, I guess, follow their journey from when they were in a shed in Purimbeet through to having the the place in Camberdown. They're moving to Ballarat.
00:01:07
Speaker
Always one of the great pioneers and sort of adventurers in flavor and sort of stories and stuff in craft beer. um Scott was also, you know, one of the early distillers, you know um but someone, a brewer, sort of moving to distilling as well.
00:01:19
Speaker
um barrel-aged beers, groups, all sorts of stuff over the years, Egyptian bread beers. um So yeah, i think i think they got to the point where they just feel they've sort of taken it as far as they can and looking at the next phase in their life, which I guess a lot of people are doing um with it within craft beer these days who've been around since the early days.
00:01:35
Speaker
Yeah, it was great to talk to them. And, you know, Vanessa said that you want to do this now potentially rather than when you don't want to sell the business. Like they can run it, I'm sure, for some time. Like like they have a pretty solid business, and but it could be on the market for a while. Who knows where the sort of current landscape sort of gets things.
00:01:53
Speaker
It's one of a few number of breweries in Ballarat, though. So there could potentially be some interest as well with someone who wants to have that local offering in a reasonably large regional city. Yeah, for sure. um And I guess talking talking local offerings, a story that you've run this week, focusing on, we got a tip off from Rex at Malacup Malt a few weeks ago, that there's a few small WA malsters have formed an independent malt association for WA.
00:02:19
Speaker
Yeah, well, yeah, i was only aware of three Maltsters in Malacup, Mortlock and Loam Malt Studio, which is also very fresh and i think still in the process of getting their product out there.
00:02:30
Speaker
But there's also another one on the way from the team at Lucky Bay Brewing in Esperance. So obviously Western Australia is pretty big, but they do span a fair bit of the state. And um yeah, I spoke to Rex and Nigel from Lucky Bay about you know, how they have these similar challenges and they also want to really promote what they do and the difference to what they do from some of the larger companies and um to try and drive home the message that, you know, maybe brewers could be supporting small businesses more since they're asking their own consumers to to make sure they heat support small businesses as well.
00:03:04
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
Cypher Brewing's Community and Innovation Focus
00:03:05
Speaker
No, it's interesting. It's, you know, constantly changing landscape out there, not just for beer and brewers, but for suppliers, producers, the whole the whole works as well. um And I guess on an even smaller scale, Mick Wust had a really fun little article last week. It wasn't that little in terms of length, but it was a nice jaunty article to read read through ah Brisbane pub chests, which seems to be kicking off in britain in Brisbane's breweries.
00:03:29
Speaker
Yeah, I loved this story. I mean, anything to sort of ah get people out to venues, but I just love how, you you know, this couple behind it went to several sort of amateur and supposedly fun chess competitions and continually found that they weren't actually very fun. so we're like, okay, well, maybe we need to step back a little bit and create something fun and do it in a great beer venues as well. And and that all sort of naturally mean people have ah A good time and people who maybe aren't as experienced with chess would want to turn up. ah I'd love to go. um Maybe I'll need to start a chapter in Melbourne or something like that. I always find chess, ah it's it's terrifying. One of my old housemates used to play it and I used to watch him and ah just used to be too scared to ever verse him because he was ah he was a real monster.
00:04:12
Speaker
There you go Yeah, no, it was a fun read, so yeah'll we'll include that in the show notes as well. um I guess i talking to some ah fun guys, what one of the stops we made on our big podcast our trip, was it last month, month before, I forget now, probably last month, ah was to Cypher Brewing in Canberra, a previous winner of Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month campaign, which we'll get to again later in the show.
00:04:35
Speaker
ah One of the younger brewers in Canberra, but making great waves, making some great beer. um And we had a good chat to them about you know them trying to build a I guess, a community brew pub in ah in a newer part of Canberra, a very multicultural area.
00:04:47
Speaker
um But also Matt Teal, the head brewer um from the former capital, loves making big high ABV beers as well. And they seem to be getting a bit of a following for their sort of beers much wider around the country than you might expect for a small young brewery, a bit like maybe Shapeshifter did out of SA when they first started. you know They're making those sort of beers that a lot of smaller retailers and sort of, i guess, beer geeks around the country want to get their hands on.
00:05:12
Speaker
Um, it was really interesting to have out there, try to sort of balance building a locals community with beers that locals want to come in and drink over a session with those bigger high ABV eye catching beers that people are going to want to grab out of a fridge or off a shelf sort of interstate. Yeah, definitely. Regular listeners to podcasts will know that last year we did talk a lot about Canberra and you do wonder if, um, a few people posed that it may be, you know, it could be a bit of a two brewery town. it It is hard to stand out, I think, when you have two really good but really different substantial breweries in best spoken capital. And um Cypher have certainly shown a way to do that. So it was awesome to talk with Matt and also Jeff, who's one of the founders. They they all met playing soccer, apparently. Yeah, yeah. They met playing soccer and Jeff was a home brewer. A couple of his recipes made it through as well to the ah the official stakes as well.
00:05:59
Speaker
um So, yeah, that's it. Matt might have a different opinion about that. Who knows? Yeah. We did prod, didn't we? we't get he He gave some pretty polite answers when we asked about that yeah as as part of the chat. So that's up after the break. and As I mentioned, they were one of the early winners of the Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month campaign.
00:06:14
Speaker
and We'll have the latest winners and honourable mention coming up in the middle of the show um ah for for that um today as well. um So if you have any breweries that you love out there, please do get your nominations in craftypint.com slash bluestone. And it's not the only campaign we run, Will. What's the other one we're always looking for more nominations for?
00:06:31
Speaker
Have you done railings, which is where we shout out good beer citizens. They could be doing anything. They could be customers. They could be bottle shop owners. They could be you driving people between venues. Maybe it's just your friend who who hangs out with you at breweries, even though they don't really like hanging out at breweries or something like that.
00:06:48
Speaker
um So yeah, make sure you nominate someone for that, which is craftypint.com slash railings. Yes. And before we get to the main show, we're partnering with Voyager Craft Malt and a bunch of other people um in launching the first grain stock ah later in the year. Tickets went on sale this week for the two industry parts of the day, Fields and Ferment. We'll include show notes on that. It's taking place in October in the Riverina. Promises to be a really fantastic new industry event with a consumer festival um on the final on the third day as well.
00:07:13
Speaker
um So have a look in the show notes for that. um We'll all be there. um as i've I've never known any event, I think, where as many members of the Crafty Pint team go, are you and Will going? Can we go along to this one? even though it's in the middle of, you know, regional New South Wales. So that that should be a lot of fun.
00:07:28
Speaker
Yes, definitely. And um of course the Crafty Pint survey is still open. ah Entries keep sort of trickling in, but we'd love to see that become a flood. And if you also enjoy the show, other than completing the survey, you could also like, review, or leave a comment um on anywhere how you enjoy the podcast.
00:07:46
Speaker
So enjoy the chat. Cheers. Cheers.
00:07:55
Speaker
Hey guys, it's Craig here and we're talking grain stock. It is an all new industry conference and beer festival celebrating grain, brewing, distilling, baking, all the good things. And it's all happening from the 9th to the 11th of October at the stunning Witten Malthouse in the Riverina.
00:08:11
Speaker
ah In the lead up to the event, going checking in regularly with conference organizers, Stu Whitecross, who you may know from Voyager Malt. Stu joins us right now, mate. In a nutshell, what can brewers expect from grain stock?
00:08:26
Speaker
Yeah, Craig, grain stock is ah is a three-day celebration of all things grain that happens right here at the commencement of harvest in the Riverina. um We'll start off with ah the first two days being industry-focused days.
00:08:39
Speaker
The first one is called Fields, which are chartered bus tours. They'll be visiting growers, trial plots, barley breeding sites, grain receivable sites, malt houses. ah Some of these tours will be starting in Capital City, so it'll be a great pilgrimage out to the Riverina here along the way.
00:08:55
Speaker
um And then the next day day, two, is called Ferment, and it's an industry symposium with ah with a trade show held here at Witten Malthouse. We've got some amazing speakers, international speakers, industry veterans, and plenty of ah businesses that are putting their hand up to exhibit here as well.
00:09:12
Speaker
And then day three is the Grainstock Festival, a beer spirits music festival. um We've got more than 60 breweries, distilleries represented in a model where industry can really let their hair down and enjoy the event. So essentially these three days is a really great get together out in regional Australia where everyone can experience the harvest.
00:09:32
Speaker
Fantastic, Matt. And I think it's something the whole industry can probably is is in much need of and looking forward to. Now, do I understand there's there's sponsorship opportunities now available for the event? Yeah, there is. So we've we've got a newly launched prospectus out ah with plenty of of of attractive packages for all of industry to be involved.
00:09:52
Speaker
yeah And that includes hot producers, yeast manufacturers, equipment suppliers. What we've we've really tried to do, we understand it's a challenging time for industry and we really want to pull this together.
00:10:02
Speaker
or pull an event together that makes it easy for everyone to be involved and participate. So, um you know, and in terms of bringing industry together, I don't think there's any um bigger example than the commitment we've had already from some of the major sponsors such as Barrett Burstyn, Joe White Moultings and AMSAT Malt, who are sponsoring buses out of capital cities for brewers who are able to donate a keg to get free travel to and from the the festival.
00:10:26
Speaker
So the industry support we've had so far has been overwhelming and we're really asking everyone in the industry to kind of chip in and help us pull off an event, have one great big get together out here in the Riverina and celebrate, reconnect and celebrate all the great things in our industry.
00:10:43
Speaker
Love it, Stu. Thank you so much. Well, there you have it, guys. Check it all out at grainstock.com.au. Hit the the fields and ferment tab for all the details on the industry conference.
00:10:54
Speaker
Stu, we'll be back with more grainstock updates as we go along. Cheers, mate. Cheers.
Cryer Malt's Role in the Craft Beer Revolution
00:11:01
Speaker
For over 30 years Cryer Malt has supported the craft beer revolution, supplying top quality malt, hops and yeast to brewers across Australia and New Zealand.
00:11:11
Speaker
They offer world class ingredients, including premium malts by Barrett Burstyn, Best Malts and more. and top-tier hops from Yakima Chief Hops, as well as yeast from AB Biotech.
00:11:25
Speaker
With a passionate on-the-ground team, Cryer Malt is the trusted partner for brewers ready to break the mould. Discover how they can help elevate your brewing journey at cryermalt.com.
00:11:36
Speaker
Matt and Jeff, thank you so much for joining us. Yeah, worries, guys. Cheers, guys. So... so Canberra locals will already know Cypher, but for the uninitiated, what's what's your sort of story?
00:11:50
Speaker
Yeah, good question. So it's funny, we go up to Sydney for some events and we've got almost more recognition in some parts of Sydney, just in terms of like the big IPAs that have come out and some of the different unique beers that we're doing. Canberra is still picking up on we're out here in Gunk Island.
00:12:05
Speaker
um But there those that do know us adore us. We've got a like a little collective following that almost little mini ambassadors that preach pretty loudly for us, bring a lot of people back to our venue.
00:12:17
Speaker
um But yeah, outside, so we're unlocking the secrets to greatness, to great beer and to basically looking at a whole bunch of different cultural elements, artistic elements, and just generally having a bit of fun with it as well.
00:12:29
Speaker
Was the intention that you would hit sort of Sydney and other markets, and you know, in it in a serious manner or are you quite't kind of surprised that you're finding more of a following elsewhere but on yeah in your hometown?
00:12:42
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think it's just the type of beer drinkers um and the type of bottlers and things like that and distribution. yeah um So we're not too surprised because we know that there is a massive following in Sydney and Melbourne.
00:12:54
Speaker
And now I'm growing in Queensland as well around those kind of real crafty-style beers. Yeah, I don't think its Limited releases that just, I guess, people buy one of and then move on to the next. And and that's kind of what we sort of try and deliver here.
00:13:07
Speaker
And were those sort of beers always part of the plan? Or, mean, because you're releasing, is it two limited releases in big cans a month now or something? Like it's become a fairly rapid... I mean, obviously...
00:13:20
Speaker
my my direction was to do that because that's how i drink i guess like that's how i just big beers yeah i mean i've never been like oh well i guess i used to be a cool range kind of buy a six pack or buy a case kind of guy but then i kind of just evolved into just trying new things and and going to the limited fridge and getting a mix six and uh and it just kind of snowballed from there and that's i guess i'm just trying to deliver the way I drink, you know, and and that's what we try and do here. Just keep it new and and people are coming along for the ride with you, you know, yeah. and they go home school yeah For our collective membership, they get a new beer every week, part of it. Um, so pay a subscription fee, but every time they come up, they get the tribe, the new beer limited, um, runs on, on certain things. So, you know, we sell out almost each week at the moment. It's pretty exciting. So they get that kind of first dibs and,
00:14:12
Speaker
Um, some, so some don't even make the fridge, like they, they're the only ones that get the cans, even from ourselves, you know? So yeah, it's kind of special in that sense, but yeah. You'll have to get your own membership. Yeah, it's, it's been, yeah, it's good for us anyway. yeah And the people are loving it.
00:14:28
Speaker
Yeah, and in terms of where we are, so Gungahlin, so it's some of the Canberra, do you want to tell people little bit about it and ah why you chose to open where you are? Yeah, yeah. So we did a bit of a, um like, comparison and study across the number of places in Canberra.
00:14:41
Speaker
um So did Australian Bureau Statistics, got, you know, um how many people per square meter, so we could work out, like, you know, what brew house size we want. Um, and we just looked at, I guess the general demographic and area and the biggest selling point for us is the light rail.
00:14:55
Speaker
Um, so, you know, you don't have to worry about drink driving. Um, it's really good infrastructure and we've got a whole bunch of like outdoor space we can use as well. yeah Um, so that was kind of the kicker, the nice big windows were also on on there So we did have a place in Tuggerong as well, we looked at.
00:15:12
Speaker
um So we did a a really solid comparison study between the place here and place in Tuggerong and it was quite competitive. But I think the light rail have tipped that across the line. So we've got the cameras pointing this way because it's right on cue. It's basically at the end of the light Yeah, so the very last stop's just there at the moment. um So from the center of the city through here, it's like 15 to 20 minutes. And yeah, so it's the last stop and you can walk back the 100 meters and here we are. So, you know, we get a lot of people, um you know, kind of watch us as they cruise down the light rail, see what's happening.
00:15:44
Speaker
You know, you get the kids get out there and they um ask the train drivers to honk the horns and they usually do. They're really good like that. So yeah, it's it's good. It's good for everyone that. And a pretty new suburb or set or new development?
00:15:56
Speaker
but's out here as well. So is it sort of growing residential population? Yeah, we probably you probably can't set the cameras, but they' right around us, there's um sort of three developments on the go. um So I think there's around 3,000 or so dwellings on the build. So it's one of the fastest growing suburbs in Canberra.
00:16:13
Speaker
So it's Belcon and kind of here. And with the infrastructure of the light rail, you know, it's going to be built around. um So it's nice to be able to be here. kind of in the early days.
00:16:23
Speaker
It's not like the Dust Bowl it used to be when it first came here. It started to get a bit of infrastructure and people and and livelihood around it And we want to be a part of that, you know, bring that community spirit, know, put on the all the live events and draw people out of their homes and from the city up this way. Yeah.
00:16:37
Speaker
And it's very much, i even though you talked about having beers in Sydney and going into Queensland, it's very much a brew pub set up here. You know, that was, I guess guess, part of the plan for me off. Yeah. Yeah, I think um just having like a home base was important and then getting like the community involved in that. It wasn't until a little bit later that we kind of skewed and and started the whole limited release, like did some scheduling. and Yeah, i I was kind of surprised i saw how many and how sort of and big they were becoming. yeah yeah I think lot of the central to this cipher story has been that community, getting people into the venue. I mean, your brewery is actually tucked in a fairly
00:17:14
Speaker
small corner down there. yeah So you're doing well to utilize the space. getting a spot down there Whereas your 200 capacity venue here, which I'm assuming is, you know, doing doing good trade here.
00:17:25
Speaker
Yeah, it's like the bread and butter. And I think in the industry right now, it's kind of where everyone's falling back towards. You need to have ah a really solid brew pub. That was always the model. You've probably heard me talk before just a bit around the Australian Brew Statistics and getting the brew house size right yeah for the space. And then we also size to number of seats for the brew house and what we think foot traffic work on.
00:17:44
Speaker
Yeah. um Allowing, you know, at least 20% growth, et cetera. So yeah, I think getting this space up and running um before we do canning and launching things like that is very important. We did sort of move into canning a little bit.
00:17:59
Speaker
um a lot around just so people can physically see us and taste us and hear about us, um, as we're, as we're moving around. Cause it's yeah, you just locked into your own space, it's hard to share that love. yeah Um, so yeah, we've, we've got good reception, um, on what we're doing now. So we do that. Like, like I said, we sell out almost week on week to a certain amount of bottle shops. Um, and you know, it's kind of first come first serve.
00:18:22
Speaker
And there would be a lot of people, yeah, a lot of people coming here to, pick up takeaways maybe not even have any beer right like end of tram line yeah like at the start it was like um like i mean we've got a aussie pale house 4.2 percent and then we've got draft and we do have some that uh some beers that we've sort of kept around because they just they just pump through the tap room um like by far i think aussie pale is it's double everything else like in the tap room every week but then you see sales like go out of the fridge and it's just
00:18:55
Speaker
yeah big ah ipas big stouts and that kind of thing you know so yeah it's cool is that shoeys yeah shoeys yeah gold medal and what what were you doing before getting involved jeff was your what's your background pre cypher yeah i've had a bit of a funny journey so i'm a fit machinist still toolmaker by trades um started off in a jobbing shop I moved around a little bit, mines, and then into Royal Australian Mint. So fantastic place over there and, you know, a bit of a heart and hot culfer and heritage of, you know, Australia as well. It tells lots of great stories. So yeah, bent I really appreciate my time over there and then into defence. So yeah, spent a bit of time working my way in so certain different areas, trying to build, you know, work on the nation as best we can, bit of service as well as could, APS side.
00:19:48
Speaker
and then into
Personal Journeys in Brewing
00:19:49
Speaker
brewing. So yeah, it's the perfect launch pad to building this place. Yeah. yes So who else with the sort of, and the founding members that they'll see you come as the fan in bro, but there's a few, few. Yeah.
00:20:01
Speaker
So I got Leo over there corner. Um, so he's director of sales and distribution, which is brought on. Um, but yeah, so, one of founding owners, um, and we've got Ben. So Ben Masters, um, he's been with us since day one as well. And, you know, we're all three of us, we're here kind of building places, Mattie was saying, and Mattie got his hands dirty as well when he could. Yeah. So we got Jack hammering and plastering and,
00:20:23
Speaker
building and joining. Was this new build or was there something in here? No, new build. So we kind of did everything from scratch. it was three months turnaround. was pretty hectic, but yeah, yeah we're we only had one more flow out, but it was costly. So yeah.
00:20:36
Speaker
Let's not so talk about that and move on. That's right. Yeah, the people who know the story around that always have a laugh and think like, oh, have you not gone grey? But no, it's good fun with Leo and Ben being like good people to bounce off. We've got a couple of other directors. they all mates of yours? or Yeah, so we all played soccer together um probably several years ago now.
00:20:58
Speaker
Yeah, and we're kind of just talking online at one point in time and we're oh you should definitely do I'm really keen on this idea. I've been home brewing for a while and everyone thinks if you can do a good home brewery, you can start a brewery. So I looked into it enough to know that I'm not going to be the head brewer of everything. So we made sure we got some really good talent and knowledge behind us and Matty was absolutely crushing that. So yeah, we've had a really good network of friends.
00:21:24
Speaker
Yeah. And did any of your recipes make it across? Yeah, yeah. So got um Exhale and FireSprite, which were a couple early ones off the just to get us launched up up and running.
00:21:36
Speaker
Have you allow left left them as they were, Matt, coming in as the pro-brew? We brought back FireSprite. It was a little bit different. yeah yeah vice president no wouldn't say refined just a bit just different yeah it was what was the the the write-up was the it's the velvet couch or something yeah the velvet couch like just really nice smooth multi bit of hop kick on it um and that was with the xpa we actually released that at the multicultural festival before we opened here yeah yeah it really took off and then it kind of solidified like
00:22:11
Speaker
us being here as a brewery and, you know, people kind of caught on to that and that was the beginning, I guess. So yeah, that was Jeff's recipes and, and, uh, yeah. And Matt, what was the appeal to you? So you were at Capital Brewing before here? Yeah. Wade says hi. I was speaking with him today actually.
00:22:31
Speaker
Yeah, I just, I guess like as a career choice for me, this is, you know, this is what I want to do. And I'll continue, like I want to continue and move forward and progress and,
00:22:43
Speaker
ah so How long were you at Capital for? I was there five years, yeah, from the start, basically. I think I um ah was at Brewpack before that in Western Sydney. It's now Tribe in Goulburn. um But yeah, like I sort of jumped ship from there and went to Capital. They were open for a month and then I started.
00:23:00
Speaker
um And just, yeah, I sort of moved up as far as I could there, I guess. and um And then, you know, it was a sad day when I sort of told everyone that I was leaving.
00:23:11
Speaker
I just sort of, yeah, like want to continue with the career path that I'm on and and take the helm and and sort of just have my own, I guess, input into what we create.
00:23:22
Speaker
So were you guys advertising or did word get around you were coming and you were like, where is it? yeah I saw the advertisement and sort of just emailed Jeff and yeah the rest is history. I met him here and there was just an empty job. Yeah, exactly. one with the Yeah, with a table and some blueprints and all sorts of stuff on it.
00:23:45
Speaker
Yeah. you like, don't do that. Don't put that there. And you're still allowed to go to Capitol to beer and stuff? Yeah. They still let me in there. They didn't I'm surprised they didn't barred me when I worked there. Yeah.
00:23:58
Speaker
No, it was good. I was actually there on the weekend. They had their um dark beer festival. severe Yeah. So yeah, lots of fun to catch up with those guys. And there weren't as many big beers brewed at Capitol, but there was usually one or two, like the first track and then- yeah was a barley wine, I remember a few years ago did with when we went down with some around.
00:24:15
Speaker
um But I guess this will probably give you more opportunity to do more recipe development and more bigger beers here. but Yeah, for sure. type of set of it is Yeah, kind of um when I left there, I went down just a big rabbit hole of what I wanted to sort of do. i Obviously, wanted to keep things you know clean and traditional, but also look at like what innovative products were out there and i think i've like i started here jeff kind of just said you know like here's the keys yeah as long as it sells you know what you got yeah so it's just like it was great yeah i want to say what it comes to up with you know he's the skills and the ambition and drive and passion yeah why hold that back yeah that was great we we ordered yeast from the states that we just we imported it we didn't hold back here it was good um and just having that freedom like that creative autonomy was just priceless basically um
00:25:00
Speaker
I mean, doing core range and tweaking core range and trying to make that as best you can and and then entering awards and and things like
Cypher Brewing's Cultural and Creative Integration
00:25:07
Speaker
that. You learn a lot. yeah Like I've learned so much but in the five years that I was at Capital. yeah And then, you know, in the two years that I've been doing this, I've learned a whole lot more with whole bunch of other ingredients. yeah And and is there like an ethos so driving like Cypher as a whole and Cypher in terms of beers? This is what we're about. This is what Cypher is going to mean and fit the beers around that or, you know.
00:25:29
Speaker
I give a little bit of direction and stuff like that around like we've got community and culture. yeah You know, we're doing like the Peruvian event this weekend. So like let's look in a Peruvian style beer and it challenges Matty on a whole bunch of stuff he might not have otherwise tried, you know.
00:25:43
Speaker
So monthly rotations between that, but then it's like Matty's passion and it's up to that. Yeah. Yeah. but It's, it's always fun. Like, I mean, pretty stoked with the way this Peruvian lager has come out.
00:25:56
Speaker
the research I did, they're quite sort of Czech inspired. So that was, you know, what's, what's contribution that sort of added layer of dryness at the end? ah So there's pretty fair whack of SARS like ah late like in the whirlpool. So I feel like that kind of just dries it out a little bit.
00:26:12
Speaker
um like Like a nice bitterness too. So it's, I'm not sure, it i i find it like kind of sweet, malty and then yeah, just a big floral hit of the SARS. Yeah, floral herbaceous kind of thing. yeah pal Yeah, really nicely. and youve And you've done a few sort of beers for special events. like you know you You've got the, want to mispronounce it. You know, ginger beer, we've done a number of events that we've, you and know, she holding, celebrating like native ingredients and, you know, that kind of stuff. Has that always been put part of the essence of the business as well?
00:26:45
Speaker
I mean, from the from the business perspective, just starting off, it was never like the overarching goal, but, um you know, it's our people's heritage. and like We've got a massive multicultural team and we launched it, the Multicultural Event. And we've always, everyone here has a massive passion for that multicultural event here, like National Multicultural in Canberra.
00:27:05
Speaker
um Yeah, so man who's got, know, full creative freedom, we're talking about what we do at Multicult here. Yeah, you come up with some mad ideas, man. Yeah, nice. It's just, I've always wanted to kind of do it like a native inspired beer and I just thought like ginger beer would be, you know, the way to go with those kind of flavours. So that was just a just a moment of...
00:27:26
Speaker
realization and yeah, like things like that are always fun. Tweaking recipes. Like I wrote the recipe and I was like, well, I'll give it a go. I've never made a ginger beer before. and And it turned out to be quite popular at the event and we've kept it around ever since. Well, we've got gold medal award winning beers at the event and it's selling like two cakes to one. It was crazy. It was wearing such a hype. It was really good. Yeah. We just kind of left the tap running with. That's cool.
00:27:51
Speaker
What does inspire you for the InvenCenter? Is it just the throws ideas around and it's like, this is something we've never done before. Let's just run with it. yeah guess it's kind of two parts. So we do like like the multicultural side of things or something we really want to be passionate about because we have, you know, like Lebanese, French, Canadian, Chilean, indigenous, Australian, English, Bhutanese. Bhutanese, well there wouldn't be too many Bhutanese brewery owners or team members in Australia. Yeah, so it's like, yeah, we have just such a really cool collective of people. We're really going to play into that and everyone's passionate about their food and drink here. So we're just building on that.
00:28:28
Speaker
And the other one is just kind of like harebrained ideas and anyone can come up with them. I just seem have a few crazy ones that everyone's like, hey, Jeff's doing the
00:28:38
Speaker
yeah like this i know For me, it's like, I get a chance to like make something different. Obviously. I mean, we've had, like, we've got our dark beer festivals. Your dream, wasn't it? It comes up with like, you know, we get to come up with a big dark beer. um And then we're going to have some other events kind of like that. And then obviously multicultural festival, the Yuma was a good one. Yeah. just Just getting a chance to be creative is little bit different and learning from that process is yeah it's interesting. Yeah. Well, that chaos for Albem Darkbeer Festival we're talking about, that's like, that's one of the first
00:29:13
Speaker
like massive stouts you kind of pulled out it's just so important and yeah we were almost out of that out of that in keg before we even got the event we had to pull it off it was a fun one it was a was a long day we did an eight hour boil okay like big mash eight hour boil just standing around for eight hours just watching this thing like caramelize basically in the kettle um yeah just doing things like that like lots of fun Was that part of the moment where you were sort of like, I can actually just do what I want? Yeah. People aren't going to buy it. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. No, it's, um, I just keep my ear to the ground with like what other people are kind of doing as well and hearing about these big long boils and some people go overnight, um,
00:29:55
Speaker
which is insane. but yeah Oh yeah. The Rocky Ridge 24 hour byline. That's on the cards maybe next, but it's good fun to sort of tinker with those kinds of things. You sort of have like sort themes around the beers you've done there. Sort of the mystery beer thing that started recently as well. where and yeah theres like and your creative ideas i love this so So the idea of that is you put a different beer out, give people know yeah what was so what was the first one that's sort of the big, the 8% sort of hazy. yeah is it is Is it a case of sort of, you know, try to work out what the style is or try to guess the the recipe breakdown or whatever? Just taking that.
00:30:31
Speaker
kind of bias out of the equation. Like, so if you've got a beer in front of you and I tell you what it is, it's like, okay, so you've got a preconceived notion already before you even sniff it. yeah So I wanted to kind of do that. and like And it's really interesting watching people like go through the motion of like tasting it and and they kind of psych themselves out. Oh, is that lactose or is it citron? Was there a mysterys was supposed to be a mystery ingredient in that first one? so car and what what What was the brief? one I wanted to keep the first one easy. So I just did, it was just a double meat.
00:31:00
Speaker
Okay, it was a dark. I was like, was having good taste. It tastes like a double deeper, but surely he's put something else in there. like, so is there a funny yeast? Like, what's going on with this? No, it's pretty much like a double deeper. The second edition's out at the moment. I think it's, we we had that at Gab's, actually. when's It's kind of hard to sell a beer.
00:31:18
Speaker
at gabs when you can't tell someone who is what it is. lot of intrigue. But yeah, a lot of people were just standing around and some people got it right. yeah One person actually nailed it. You couldn't tell it. It was like, hey man, why don't you just put it on the socials. We'll tell you at some point maybe. I just find it really interesting um how people go through their emotions and what you get.
00:31:42
Speaker
Um, when you, especially cause I don't get much time to serve people behind the bar, but when I do it's yeah to engage them direct feedback and it's, it's just really interesting. yeah And when we're selling it to people and and people actually do try it, and they have more conversation with each other as well. So it's actually like, rather than just drinking beer and like, oh, walking off berries or whatever, like, oh, they really get into the passion of it. yeah So like it shows, Maddie's passion comes through in the beer and the conversation sparks around that. So that's what I love to see from it and really helps with some of the sensory stuff that we try to implement. So yeah, it's good.
00:32:14
Speaker
Right. we' We'll take a short break now and then come back and have a bit of a chat about the wider beer scene here and you know what you've done to get established fast as you have. So see after break. Cheers. Cheers.
00:32:25
Speaker
It's time now to announce the Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month. Bluestone is Australia's leading manufacturer of liquid yeasts, offering brewers a biobank of over 100 strains. find out more at bluestone yeast dot com dot a G'day guys, it's Craig here, I'm with Will and we are talking Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month, it's that time again. Will, I'm excited, are you?
00:32:50
Speaker
I am so excited to talk about these two breweries, we've got an honourable mention and and an overall winner and they are both from the great state of Queensland, where you live Craig. my My newly adopted home state, I have to admit I've completely lost my Melbourne weather tolerance. I now ah wear full jacket, hoodie and and sleeves in 23 degree weather because I've completely acclimatised, mate.
00:33:14
Speaker
ah Excellent. So this honourable mention ah comes from Phil and it's for Brisbane's Archer Brewing. What what does Phil reckon about Archer, Craig? Well, I've got to say Archer, they've been kicking goals for for a long time now and they make fantastic beers. And Phil really took efforts to point out in his nomination that you know every ingredient, every beer they make is Australian supplied and made.
00:33:38
Speaker
ah They've got an amazing head brewer, fantastic beers, and they're just wonderful at bringing... the young guys and girls through to learn from experience. So I definitely know there's been um quite a few great brewers that have kind of cut their teeth at Archer and um yeah, have gone on to bigger and better things. so great little honourable mention there to Archer Brewing.
00:33:58
Speaker
Excellent. And um one we couldn't go past, this nomination is from Pat James, and he wanted to nominate Carbon Six, which is a relatively new brewery. They actually won the Best New Brewery Award at the Royal Queensland Beer Awards earlier this year in April.
00:34:12
Speaker
And what Pat wanted to say is they were established last year and they're my newest local, only five minutes up the road from the city of Logan, which is a place, Pat says, these are my words, more synonymous with cheap cartons than the perfectly balanced combination of hops and malt. I love
Community Contributions and Industry Challenges
00:34:27
Speaker
that. Carbon Six, that's great. You can't go past that, can you?
00:34:31
Speaker
Carbon Six has given us locals something for which we ought to be grateful. While still only trading for a short period of time, they have racked up an impressive inventory with some perennial available core range beers and a tasty selection of limiteds.
00:34:43
Speaker
If all of that hasn't convinced you, try their award-winning Cardinal Red IPA while you still can. I guarantee you will understand. Well, you had me at at synonymous with cheap cartons, so i'm I'm on board. No, well done to Carbon Six. And I've met Reece, the head brewer there. He's a fantastic bloke. and And their whole team are really doing fantastic things. So what do they win? They get...
00:35:06
Speaker
ah From our ah wonderful partners at Bluestone Yeast, they will get a box of Bluestone's brand new Zinc Booster from their booster range. You should definitely check it out. um Yeast Booster is a cold side addition, sterile zinc. It replaces the zinc lost in the boil.
00:35:23
Speaker
um You've got to keep your yeast healthy, Will, and zinc's a key ingredient there. So jump on it. Without yeast, we wouldn't have beer. We'll just have wort. There you go. What a horrible world that would be. And also, Craig, so last week I actually i popped down to Devil Bend Brewery on the Mornington Peninsula, which are the head brewer there is Michael Stanzel, who many would know, particularly in Melbourne, from his um sort of ability to make German-style beers. And because we're very organised, listen out in September, we'll have that chat together.
00:35:52
Speaker
going for um uh to talk about octoberfest and those kind of things and um while we're a little bit organized no one i've ever met is more organized than michael stanzel he learned to brew in germany yeah he made me a coffee with the most elaborate setup i've ever seen it was like a sort of rube goldberg machine and he had the weights everywhere it was it was a wild time but uh michael because he's so ahead of the game he's already planned all his octoberfest beers and he um i mean several of them are already brewed and they're waiting away patiently for a October to come around. And, yeah you know, if you're a brewer, make sure that you're starting to think about your October fest beers now. If you haven't already, really, you got to get onto that.
00:36:30
Speaker
And if you want the very best yeast for your Hefeweizen, Martzen or fest beer, Bluestone yeast are the team to talk to. So, yeah, give Derek and the crew a call and have a chat about all things German yeast.
00:36:41
Speaker
Absolutely. Will, I feel like that was a ah pseudo nomination for Brewer of the Month. You know, we can't vote. We're on the team. So we've got to bow out here. It's a cool place to check out, but um maybe maybe wait until, I shouldn't say this, maybe wait until you've got the full story from the podcast. Maybe it maybe drive down listening to it so you go in really appreciating the full the full story story of Devil Bent.
00:37:03
Speaker
There you go. A very last shout. Now, guys, if you've ever thought of nominating a brewery for the Bluestone Yeast Brewer of the Month, now's the time. Jump on to craftypint.com forward slash Bluestone. it couldn't be easier. It takes five minutes.
00:37:18
Speaker
And you too can wax lyrical about your favorite brewery. And we may give it a shout out on the podcast. Get on to it. Cheers. Back to the show. Thanks to our Brewery of the Month partner, Bluestone Yeast.
00:37:30
Speaker
Bluestone provides the highest quality liquid yeasts to many of the best breweries in the country. If you'd like to find out more, visit bluestoneyeast.com.au today.
00:37:42
Speaker
Welcome back. And you know, from the outside looking at Canberra, we often, I think maybe see it as a bit of a two brewery town. I know there's other breweries operational, but there are the big two in Bent Smoke and Capital. And when we spoke to a few people last year, particularly in Breavittale and Canberra, they, they said to the effect of, you know, we're a bit skeptical that another brewery with a bit of production focus could exist in Canberra and have like really been pleasantly surprised by Cypher. Like, have you sort of found it as new, as the upstart, I guess? Yeah, well, I guess from our side of things, we're just excited to see that people are as passionate as we are. We did a lot of research around it.
00:38:20
Speaker
to get it up and get it running right. The big two that were there before now, hopefully the big three, everyone's there. Yeah, they kind of paved the way and we're still um really amicable. We work well together, set up up events together and talk shop. and Yeah, so we always knew there was room for more.
00:38:41
Speaker
um We started up kind of out of the blue compared to some other areas. We just, yeah, between the three of us, like we're either going to go and do it properly and try to take a good step and and back ourselves yeah and back the people that we bring around us.
00:38:55
Speaker
So yeah, back the right person here with Matty, that's for sure. Yeah. And I mean, obviously ah before Ben spoke, there was wig and pen for a long time. So like the crappy drinker in Canberra, imagine is pretty,
00:39:07
Speaker
educated or they've had local beer here for a very long time, right? Are you still finding, Matt, with your double IPAs that there's too many boundaries? There's a lot of polarizations. Some people love it and then other people just want to see classic styles.
00:39:23
Speaker
Really see it more so in the tap room, obviously. you want People come in, they just want to sort of have they want to have a couple you know and and not be on the light rail back to the city.
00:39:36
Speaker
And it's, yeah, it's just a juggling, kind of juggling act to to keep the limited release cans interesting enough so they they do fly and then keep people on um chairs in the tap room sort of thing. So it's, oh yeah. you crushed it with the shoeies and the high line. Yeah, I always get like a little like nudge from Jeff and he's like, yeah, they're getting a bit high 17, 8% reeling me back here kind of I'm all myself. So it's just well.
00:40:17
Speaker
Yeah, well, it's good though, because it's hard to keep up with that core range. So going back to that Wigan Penn kind of philosophy around people are attuned to craft beer and they do love it and they are passionate here in Canberra about it. So we're just glad we can be another chapter in that story of the evolution of craft beer in Canberra hopefully that we can help lift it as well.
00:40:34
Speaker
yeah And that was the scene, maybe outside of Broome, but more in terms of venues and retail. There's been a number of venues been around for a long long time supporting craft beer. i know a couple of ones further that have closed in the last few months as well. think we've published our two part, Crafty Crawl and then over the next few months I was like, oh, best to remove that entry, which is bit sad to see, but it doesn't does seem to be quite good established a number of venues that have been around a long time supporting stuff.
00:40:59
Speaker
Are there more sort of coming along and you know outside of the more well-known sort of bottle shops retailers, are there more coming along on that front as well? Yeah, I think it's a tricky time right now. yeah And yeah, we've seen some foundational institutions here in Canberra close down.
00:41:15
Speaker
And it's not just sort of drink establishments, it's like nightclubs and yeah like I said, kind of institutions that Canberra known. Yeah, it's definitely tough times. um It is kind of a little bit sheltered here in Canberra from time to time, but it's definitely not as sheltered as it used to be. And with, yeah, I think hospitality industry as a whole and the brewing industry is still in the pinch. So that's not uncommon or unknown news to anyone. yeah So I think...
00:41:40
Speaker
once things start to settle down little bit, we'll see some more growth and some more opportunity pop up There's definitely emerging breweries on the way that, you know, Maddy's helping guide as well and we always give feedback through and we want to see more because, you know, there's more passion, there's more diversity, more ways we can engage with everyone. So it's like,
00:41:58
Speaker
yeah we're excited by it but yeah at the moment it is definitely tough um with every you know pinch you got you know everything going up um come first july suppliers starting to feel a little bit of relief in some areas seeing mitani which is one of the first kind of pass on on that yeah um So yeah, we're hoping to see some of other suppliers do the same because it does make it a lot easier yeah um to move forward. And if we you start to slow excise down and things like that, everything just kind of stabilizes for you know us to continue to provide a community.
00:42:29
Speaker
Because here at Cypher, it's just four of us folks that just kind of banded together, started up. And then we've got a you whole range of influence and friends around us that help support us and bring us along the journey. but Yeah, we're pretty much just ah like almost a mom and dad type. It's yeah it's really community focused. though We don't really have any major desires to break the mold and go international.
00:42:56
Speaker
Maybe into space, the way things are going. um And in terms of like um support from the pubs, especially pubs or bars, we hear, for example, around often around Sydney, especially near the in inner west, that lot of the pubs and bi bars there can be reluctant to support local breweries because it's like, well, you've got your own cellar door, your own tap room. There's sort of a bit of competition. does it work with the it's the key craft venues here? Are they really keen to showcase their local brewers?
00:43:26
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think they they want to put the beers and when when you talk to them. and the Well, the punters definitely want to try the beers, which is amazing. But then you're just looking at a pricing point at the moment.
00:43:36
Speaker
Yeah, it's tough to keep that down. it's just with the industry at the moment. Like, you've got a lot of liquidated stock running through the system. we've got a lot of pressures coming through from big chain. companies, you know, Sahi Inc here and haven't let up and they know they've got a bit of a struggle hold some of the taps in the industry. Yeah. um So, yeah, to kind of go through for this contracting space is challenging. And so to put enough energy and effort and money into trying to go after and chase that you're probably gonna choke yourself as a small small brewery. so So how do you grow outside of that? It's challenging and difficult. You've got to chip away at one by one.
00:44:10
Speaker
Yeah. And I guess with the success of the um stick of this so the venue side of things, have have you considered you know other tap rooms or other venues around Canberra or elsewhere?
00:44:21
Speaker
i suppose you're already two years in. It's probably like, just just give us time, James. Oh, look, we've got it we've got ideas and ambitions. like So I'll let Matty talk a little bit more in a second, but like he's not just skilled in, you know, high end IPAs, you know, that's just like the specialty that people love and what, you know, gold medal award winning beers end up having, you know, your craft and style, but between the logos, profiles,
00:44:45
Speaker
um and the non-AUX that you're producing as well. like there's There's a whole range and different ideas around what we're going to do. So we've got ideas moving forward in the future. So yeah, i probably wouldn't say another venue is not off the table, but it all just depends on what works and what sells.
00:45:01
Speaker
It's almost cheaper to export internationally than it is to sell in your own country right now. So yeah maybe a few things need to fix up. from Try the policies. You're in the right city to do it. If anyone can do it. We're not quiet or we do have, try to create opportune times where we can respectfully, of course, because there is country to run. It's not just you can have a beer way running in the country, which is what we try to encourage.
00:45:27
Speaker
And what about the um membership club as well? That that seemed like so it was an idea from early on for the fans. Like, you know, you sort of had to get beer into people directly pretty quickly and that kind of thing.
00:45:38
Speaker
Well, yeah, so the members, it's just kind of like we know how passionate people can be and you want to kind of give back to them.
Membership, Feedback, and Branding at Cypher Brewing
00:45:43
Speaker
So, you know, you can do loyalty points and other bits and pieces. But when you've got true aficionados that come in and just and want to talk shop and almost start know trying to help out in brewery where they can kind of thing.
00:45:55
Speaker
yeah Yeah, you want to try and go, okay, well, what can we do for us moving forward? It's almost, it's not quite cost price. It's pretty much at that level, but, and it's like, yeah, let's just. does vary. I mean, one week you might get an 11% Imperial Stout and it's the same price as the week before, which was a, you know, like a Hellas Lager or something like that. So it's a good good middle ground and and then you get to have that variation week on week out and you you come in and you get deals with it as well we get a free schooner yeah so we get the sensory profile so we we collected a bit of data just on sheets of paper to start with we're going to move that digitally moving forward so it's a bit easier to correlate the data because that's otherwise yeah i don't only it's like when i do blind tasting events and you do like the paper thing you like
00:46:39
Speaker
Just give me 45 minutes to put all these scores into this spreadsheet. I mean, OCR good and helps. But anyway, when people fill it out differently. So yeah, I think a structured data would be great. So yeah, we're going to do bit more of that.
00:46:51
Speaker
um So because we can build flavor profiles around our customers there. and And we can help show what people learning. And you know, do you see more diacetol? Can you taste that a bit more than someone else? yeah Yeah. So we can try to build them on our collective members. and fair yeah It's a good to get into the point where I'd go through the different sheets and and like kind of... I know that is. Yeah, I was like, oh, yep got ye Maybe the next one I'll make it less bitter and he'll enjoy it a bit more. Do you like allow them to put forward ideas for beers that they'd like see brew?
00:47:25
Speaker
So the like online, basically, they'll get an email. yeah um that'll go out for the week and then they'll know what to do, when to come in and all that. And they're they're more than welcome to, you know, reply back and say, hey, have out one of these. or I mean, people come in and say it anyway, like we had a red IPA on not too long ago and they keep getting yelled at for to bring it back.
00:47:48
Speaker
I mean, there's still people asking for fire Sprite. ah Yeah, true. One of our big customers is pretty like loves it. Just gave us raw feedback and I was like, lots of IPAs, I'd love like a dunk or I love something like this. And we take that on board route seriously. and we're like, yeah, we've got one in tank now for you, Dave.
00:48:07
Speaker
So you're listening. You don't have to wait till October. Yeah, but we love that kind of feedback. That's how we built this place. I don't know if anyone remembers, if they listen to the cast, but like we had just white walls and plain taps and no decals, no plans. It was like, it was pretty, pretty stark in here when we first opened up because the intent was, well, we've got timelines from up behind, but we also want to grow and build the community. What do they want?
00:48:32
Speaker
You know, it's very, like we said, culturally diverse out here, which is amazing. It's also, what people want it and what feels comfortable? So, you know, brick wall, the TV placements, the different plant styles, the the lighting, the sound, the acoustic baffling, the kids play area. These are all right in the booths. These are all ideas from people as they're walking past while we we're building it yeah or here on an on opening. So.
00:48:53
Speaker
and you talk about it sort of being fairly plain and then sort of developing into what it is now you you've got pretty creative and colorful just with the ideas and the beers but also the the graphic design the labels the cans that kind of stuff where does that come from you know do you have like you know someone you work with who equally you give free reign to and go hey here's the idea because i'm thinking about know a four pack that was sent down to me recently with there was the red ipa that was bloody delicious you know and then obviously the the first blind faith and then the mid-strength pale and they're all very different it still kind of felt like the work together probably putting parts of all 500 mil cans but it was four pretty different designs so yeah how does how does that all work yeah so the process is uh i guess well it's um jeff's mate uh pat pat duffy uh patrick duffy yeah he's insane artist artist illustrator he's uh yeah i sort of um like i'll come up with a name or something or a concept and then just
00:49:49
Speaker
email him um and then we'll go back and forth maybe a little bit at the start it was kind of like here's the name here's the kind of idea and then we've kind of streamlined the process to me just saying here's the name and he just comes up with you know the crazy art but he's I feel like he's uniforming the cans a lot more now like he's had a lot more experience at at kind of getting you know the logo placement the write-up and all the legal stuff on it and then just having like a cool sort of art piece yeah that's every pretty there's generally like a fair bit of stuff to take in on children's books or anything in that sort of space like it has that sort of whimsical nature to it he does everything if you jump on to like um patrick do actually yeah on our instagram we'll tag him into it because yeah he does like um five point symmetric drawings concentric stuff he does
00:50:38
Speaker
um like death metal band art, where it's just like, it looks like it's like bleeding down the wall, but and you can read it both ways. He does a lot of different types of like, what do you call it? Like calligraphy.
00:50:51
Speaker
um Yeah. so he's been doing it ever since I've known his whole life. And he's he's the one man with the one stop shop for any design you could possibly want, whichever direction you go in. He's usually skillful and got a lot of love and respect to Patty. So,
00:51:05
Speaker
Yeah, you yeah you come up with an idea and a concept, you could give him a very loose brief some um sometimes and he just pulls out like this genius type of work. And we've kind of created a bit of an undertow thing coming through. You probably noticed some eventual or stuff running around, chaos realm and things like that. and you know if you've fallen us closely we've we've unleashed like the the cypher world it's kind of tying it all together so he's getting pieces of the puzzle that's coming through yeah cypher world on brand with the with the name with that there's little easter eggs here and there so yeah great and um i mean so we're what two and a half years in since you opened the door there abouts yeah what have been some of the biggest lessons you feel like you've learned
00:51:51
Speaker
since opening. Don't fuck up the floor. But Oh, definitely trust your people and your instincts on the people. Like, yeah, Matty is like, yeah, that passion and the freedom that he and the energy brings to the rest of our team. So it means like we've got all our staff that walk in and didn't really care or know much about beer. Suddenly like, what does that mean again? What's this? What's CDH? High density hop charge? What? So then they ask more questions. They start to become, you know, like,
00:52:21
Speaker
beer experts. So that's definitely one. and i messages I guess well the more they know, the more they can, yeah. Yeah. But they just care about it so much more, you know? So yeah. Yeah. What about you, Addy? You've brewed for a long time for you, but probably with a pick your crew around you and things like that. Yeah, it's definitely different coming in and... Are you still a one-man shop in there or have you got off-sider help? I've had a bit of help along the way. And I've got Jimmy on board now, so he comes in and helps a couple of days a week.
00:52:49
Speaker
He's picking it up. Yeah, and he's picking it up, which is great. He's super keen. I've given him all the info to sort of read and pick up and and we go through the brew days together. but um But yeah, it's definitely different. Like coming from...
00:53:04
Speaker
such a big crew of of brewers being surrounded by a lot of people to bounce ideas off and then going to just basically being by myself most days and then having some help. I've got to trust myself a little bit more and go through the process. I mean, I taste the beers every day, ah write the recipes all,
00:53:25
Speaker
um And just, I don't know, it's just, yeah, it's it's definitely a different experience having it. You could probably fit almost all the liquid in all your tanks into one of the bigger tanks at Capsule. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, having that, um just it's basically like, it's a double-edged sword. It's like a lot of freedom and a lot of fun, but it's kind of like, you know, i'm bouncing ideas off, not other brewers, but like owners like Jeff or Jimmy and front of house staff. it's It's kind of good to have some people who aren't as educated, so they don't have
00:53:57
Speaker
like just a preconceived notion of what like a Czech lager would be or you know things like that. But yeah, keeps it interesting. That's for sure. So it should be open-minded then. Take ideas from anywhere. Yeah, yeah. The amount of times I hear talking about the latest podcast and this, yeah. Ear to the ground for sure. That's just what I kind of love doing anyway, like podcasting, articles, books, all that sort of stuff. It's just... The sponge, the brewing sponge. Yeah, try to be. It sort of goes in and out.
00:54:29
Speaker
I retain some of it. with Some pH information or something like that to tweaks and tweak the next brew and try and refine it. Yeah. Well, there's like a CIT course coming up for brewing in Canberra at some point too. I know the groundwork is happening for that now. So, yeah, there's like... Show us the contact for that. We'll get the word out. Yeah, for sure. Because be great to create a little bit more of a network. Because, yeah, it is... I mean, you'll still catch up with all the... You know, Rich Wade and some of the other like jazz and jazz and things like that. It's still like ideas that bounce back. But it'd be good to have like that kind of...
00:55:03
Speaker
you as you grow in and teaching the next generation, like the experience heads of the team still talk and shop with everyone around. Yeah. It is good. Like, yeah, that's, I guess one, one benefit of being on a big team of brewers, like say when I started at, at brew pack, it was,
00:55:21
Speaker
that I had, you know, 10 other people there. Some of them were, you know, some of them had, you know, chemistry backgrounds. Some of them were engineers. Like, it was just a melting pot of these people who got sick of their jobs and wanted to chase their passion.
00:55:36
Speaker
um And then you learn, like, you pick things up from these people along the way. And it's been almost 10 years now. So it's just... um the last two years of being basically an expression of what I've learned along the way. It's just been, yeah, lots of fun.
00:55:51
Speaker
The medals and the awards will obviously work, man. You listen well. You listen well. Yeah, well done. I guess I'm coming back to where we are as well. you know, all the brewers around the country, the ones in Canberra, will be ones that potentially have the most chance to get the ear of the people who can make a difference for independent beer, whatever.
00:56:07
Speaker
know you've, Kylie's told me that you've had many conversations with her over time. Yeah. yeah's What's been the key things that you've tried to sort of and yeah put put to the IBA or outside that, maybe put direct Polly's or their staff in terms of what you're keen to see?
00:56:22
Speaker
Yeah, so advocacy is great. and We've had a lot of feedback between the IBA, couple other independent sources. And when we can see, you know like the Chief Minister will come through on the campaign and we'll have um you know like the Pro Clock and party and things like that.
00:56:39
Speaker
because we love and support what they're trying to do as a nation as a whole and for Canberra. um So what we can do is combine everything we're hearing across industry wide and take those one or two, three pages and highlight that and say, look, this is what we're feeling. Um, and this is why it's important.
00:56:57
Speaker
Um, just reiterate it. Um, so it's really impactful when they see it firsthand of, of, you can pour a glass and be like, you know, change colors and show them what the different types of excise versus tax versus labor and supply and all that sort of stuff works and be like, well, if I was to do this and then, you know, export or do something else, this what it looks like over here. Um, so you can do some really likes,
00:57:20
Speaker
start comparisons with them. And I mean, it's not like they don't know that. They're highly intelligent people and they got the right information and they're doing a great job. And so I think it's just to kind of make them push it up the priority priority list. Well, potentially, or sometimes it could make it worse because they go, oh, actually, you know what? These guys know what they're talking about.
00:57:36
Speaker
They can probably handle themselves. They've got the independent bodies, they've got the associations, whereas over here actually doesn't. And it's emerging um resource and infrastructure and sector that's actually going to help grow Australia and in so many other ways.
00:57:48
Speaker
So I think it's to look at it from both sides of the coin as well. So yeah, we do have the opportunity here to speak with them, but they also do have some very good points and valid points. So yeah, it's like, yeah, it's a double-edged sword again. and Like we can talk about it from our perspective. When do you hear it from the other side, you go, okay, yeah got it.
00:58:07
Speaker
damn Yeah, but yeah, you've got to have respect for it, understand what it is, right? So And at least conversations are continually happening as well. That's the starting point. They didn't recently. Yeah. A number of years ago, they just weren't, I think.
00:58:20
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think it gets a certain tipping point, as you're saying, you know, brewing industry struggling and they've started to listen and they started to make some changes. Um, cause you know, passionate, you know, it's a part of Australia and it's kind of culture and heritage of like, you know, their expressionism almost that we can go down and,
00:58:37
Speaker
You know, one of our favorite sayings, well, I'm sorry, my favorite sayings, you probably have a problem. My favorite sayings like solving the world's problems behind a closed door with a cold beer. And my old man coined the phrase, you know, used to go back into the workshop at the end of the day and you talk with all the boys and girls and talk about what can we fix and have a beer. And suddenly like, oh, they've...
00:58:58
Speaker
you know, come up with a new idea. It's like, great. It's laying six of me its finest, but it's, yeah, done creatively and they feel like they've done it themselves. Yeah. It's the best way. Matt, what's what's your favorite saying?
00:59:09
Speaker
oh my Oh, man. that's ah That's a tough question. Another double IPO, please. Yeah, well, that's probably what I say most. I do say that most. Beer's next. Well, thanks, guys. I mean, you know, two and a half years into the journey, what what are the sort of cipher in two years look like do you think?
00:59:30
Speaker
Yeah, hopefully we'll be in Mars by then. So we'll probably set up the first colony there with a brew. Maybe just one more fermenter. That's why people... you definitely Start with one more fermenter. You definitely have to bring the red IPA back at least. So those those consumers to be happy if you move into Mars.
00:59:47
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. exactly no We've got um got some ideas around yeah potential growth, potential strategies around what's going to be good for the community as a whole here, but also help us grow and, you know,
01:00:00
Speaker
share that ah kind of creative expression we have with the rest of the nation and maybe even international who knows. yeah We did talk before about know some of the competing priorities and price points and things like that and you know if it's more favorable elsewhere you've got to kind of keep this place going as community as a whole and that can help us then you know Gunkaiwan wins so. Yeah, because there's kind of risks to growth or you know big risks to growth within beer, especially if you yeah if you go above you know the excise cap at the minute, then you've got grow very fast, so a long way beyond it. you know to to kind of sit succeed and How do you factor that in into sort of future growth plans going? Just exercise about where yourself doesn't balance, doesn't weigh up. So yeah.
01:00:38
Speaker
um Yeah, and it's what's what people are willing to pay for as well. Common kind of things that people are aware of. But yeah, I think if you we back our brand, back ourselves, and know ah we obviously all back Matty and we all have faith behind him. you know we want to see him up there as Brewer of the Year and um frame it on the wall here somewhere. I remember when we first started, tried to get the first autograph. It's on the wall inside there in the storage room. yeah so Yeah, yeah. So that's, you know, you've got got big plans, big ideas, and want have some fun with along the way. So yeah, there'll be like a bunch of undertow of things that people won't really care about, or maybe they will.
01:01:16
Speaker
but Yeah. Matt, I feel like the next time I come in here, you're going be one of the murals on the wall. So some sort of thrown the yeah mural. The reason why the mural was there would be, you know, it would be a good one. I mean, passionate about brewing and and doing well, not just for myself, but for the company as well as, you know, it's important. So it's always good to get feedback that you're doing a good job and like to keep it that way.
01:01:42
Speaker
yeah. Maybe not a mural, but... payro It's not about the money. Just an extra... Bragging rights. Maybe that'd be it. but you you You get an extra fermenter. Maybe be the mural's on the fermenter.
01:02:01
Speaker
to say them yeah cool Great. Well, Matt and Jeff, thank you so much for joining us. Thanks, guys. Cheers. Cheers.
01:02:13
Speaker
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Speaker
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01:02:42
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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