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Another Round: Everything Indie, All The Time
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Something a little different from The Crafty Pint Podcast this week – and for the rest of July too.
As flagged in recent episodes, we’re taking a short break from running new full-length interviews. All three key players in the production of the show are on back-to-back overseas trips and a major new project is coming to fruition soon.
The beer news keeps coming, however, so we’re still recording fresh reviews of the week in beer. And, given we’ve got so many great chats to dip into from the past couple of years, we’re taking the opportunity to go another round with some of our favourites.
First up is Jade Flavell from The Wheaty in Adelaide. Few will need any introduction to Jade, given the pioneering role she has played in defining high-end, craft beer-focused hospitality at the Thebarton pub, then more latterly turning it into an award-winning, ever-innovative brewpub.
Jade is as passionate about supporting independent arts and live music as she is about indie beer – and whisky for that matter – and has plenty of insight to offer on those topics and many more.
Before we revisit the chat recorded at The Wheaty, James joins Will from Oban on the West Coast of Scotland, where he’s combining visits to small breweries and historic distilleries with a family adventure.
They look back over seven days in which Will has spoken to two people working sober in beer and hospitality, and we preview the opening of an ambitious new brewery in WA as well as the latest evolution of Prancing Pony in the Adelaide Hill.
Beer travel of two kinds – a new Crafty Crawl in South Sydney and a champion brewer’s exploits in South Korea – also hit the site, while hop fiends can also look forward to the inaugural Aussie version of the NZIPA Challenge coming to Melbourne later this month.
Start of segments:
- 0:00 – The Week On Crafty
- 13:57 – Industry Insights with American Canning Machines
- 15:06 – Jade Part 1
- 41:34 – The NZIPA Challenge
- 42:18 – Jade 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 Travel Experiences
00:00:05
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Crafty Pint Podcast. I'm Will. I'm James, coming to you this week from the beautiful port town of Oban on the west coast of Scotland, um which sort of It occurred to me this is only two weeks after I recorded the intro with you remotely from Adelaide. And in between times, I've done one for London. And even in between London and this one, have made calls to the East Midlands and Edinburgh along the way. So apologies if I'm little bit croaky and bleary-eyed. It's proven quite tiring couple of weeks managing both work and travel. Oh, that's no problem.
Scenic Beauty and Personal Anecdotes
00:00:42
Speaker
Is this near where humble fishermen, James Watt of Brewdog fame, used catch lobsters or anything like that or are we a fair way from their sort of area? Well, we're on the opposite coast to where Brewdog launched, but it is definitely very beautiful and quaint in typical, I guess, West Coast Scottish fashion. soon as we left Edinburgh this morning to head, well, initially up through Stirling and Bridge of Allen,
00:01:11
Speaker
The rain started and got heavier and heavier and heavier and the forecast isn't too good for the coming days, but it had and dried up by this evening. So we've been for a walk along the front and it's, you know, you've got the passenger ferries coming in, lots of fishing boats. my My wife's already been along the front and worked out which looks like the most local sort of of the fish hawking stalls along the the seafront. um So yeah, it should be a lovely few days. I think the weather's looking pretty brutal tomorrow. So we're going to try and get up to Glencoe for a bit of hiking. early doors and then fingers crossed we get a bit of sun on thursday when i want to take the kids out on a couple of the ferries go and visit distillery in tobermory um and yeah just a bit of harry potter action you know as you do when you're in this part of the world of course and uh any car scales that have caught your attention
00:01:55
Speaker
There hasn't been, i have to say, haven't made it to well too many places. or I did um get myself get myself along to, it can be accidentally earlier today, it was in Bridge of Allen, called in there because it's where my dad was born. So we tried to find the the house he'd first lived in and the the place he was, actual the building he was born in, show the kids.
00:02:15
Speaker
um stopped for some lunch there and I was i saw a sign for ah a brewery and I was like, oh, is there really a brewery there? And it wasn't the original building I thought, so i went down, you go through this car park out the back, it's like Allen Water Brew & Co.
00:02:27
Speaker
And it's been there 30 years, um very, very sort of quaint, they've sort of It was all Scottish folk music playing, lots of old furniture from old pubs. Cascales, the founder, was doing a brewery tour for for four guys. um And when I say brewery tour, it's it's like it's like in a large cupboard, really, the brewery. um So I tried couple of years ago. picked up a... and a beer using thistle root instead of hops that he made for the 900th anniversary of the Stirling Shire Council last year. um And yeah a gin featuring thistle, um that kind of thing as well. But um it turns out he actually was exporting beer to Australia at the time
00:03:07
Speaker
decade or so ago um after winning some, I think was a competition in one of the major supermarket chains, one over here, and got ranged in every single supermarket across the country, had to upgrade to a much larger brewery, had a contact in Townsville, I think he said, who who started bringing his beers over to to Australia. um He's now back much more as he used to be, winding things down. But it was just one of those sort of, you know, gorgeous little spots that you had. I guess the prime reason for going to Bridge of Allen was Stirling Castle, Wallace Monument, find Dad's old place.
00:03:40
Speaker
um And then to find this beautiful, cosy little ah brewery, it was quite a shame to have to leave after one half and picking up a few samples ah for the West Coast. But Open Distillery is about...
00:03:52
Speaker
three, four minutes walk from where we're staying at the minute. So it be that that looks just beautiful from the outside as well. in fact, Oben as a whole just looks like an absolutely stunning stuning the little port town. So yeah, it should be a fun fun few days out there.
00:04:03
Speaker
Excellent.
Sober Choices in the Beer Industry
00:04:04
Speaker
Well, enjoy. And while you've been away, the news has kept coming this week, including a story I wrote about not drinking, well, I guess running breweries or working in the beer industry and around hospitality and not drinking. This sort of came about because i i saw Devon Island from Buddy Brewing post about how he was sober for more than a year. And I reached out to him and wondered if you wanted to chat to a story. i I think he replied to my email faster than anyone has ever replied to one of my emails. He was he was pretty eager to chat about it. And I just kind of felt that dry July being a time when people sort of often temporary stop drinking for both Devon and also Leon Kennedy, who I spoke to for the article, they sort of stopped drinking for a short amount of time and then never went back to it and also found that it
00:04:57
Speaker
despite their sort of early maybe thoughts it never had an impact on on their work at all um i think well and it is something that i guess a number of people you know can have an issue with managing uh drinking especially in the sort of you know the drinks and the hospitality industry know it's not exclusive to that at all and i think it was interesting with you know the the two case studies here that they came came to this decision for different reasons and i guess people who are out there looking for, you know, whether they think they might have an issue or whether whether they are looking to take a break to sort of hear just very, I guess, open and honest reasons for why they've they've done this and and how they manage it is is pretty yeah pretty useful, I think.
00:05:35
Speaker
Yeah. And, you know, two quite different people working in different parts of the industry as well. Different country, different cities, rather. You're in a different country, James. And they've, but they sort of both found that they could just stop and and kind of keep going without any, you know, external support or therapy. Leon
New Brewing Ventures and Community Trends
00:05:56
Speaker
doesn't even label himself as sober. He's just sort of decided to not drink so it just kind of i hope to sort of show the nuance in that and that um people go about this all different ways and i think it's good to sort of normalize to a degree those people who work in beer but don't feel the need to drink beer at all and i guess uh another story we've run this week from guys southern in wa there'll be a business that is hoping people will drink um at least enough when it opens this friday longpoint brewing co we first mentioned it a couple of years back so it's been a you know a bit of a period time in coming It's new brewery opening, or i guess brew pub operation opening right on the coast, about an hour south of Perth. So yet another like significant addition to that that corridor south of Perth. It's a joint venture between Shane and Sally Wormall, who are part of the Wormall Group. It's a family-operated, pretty significant construction business in WA and a local sort of beach and golf resort um around Kennedy Point. They brought in um Jackson Purser, who... A lot of people will know from around the WA beer scenes. We've brewing a number of brewers around WA for number years. Really lovely, very thoughtful guy, great brewer.
00:07:06
Speaker
So he's been a part of the project for a long time. They brought another brewer who was a chef at Dutch Trading Co. back in the day, as well as a venue manager who was at Dutch Trading Co. and Rocky Ridge. So a bit of a dream team on that front.
00:07:18
Speaker
um And yeah, they look at they've opened this pretty flash-looking, or about to open, I should say, this pretty flash-looking two-story brew pub. um which is going to be one of the first sort of foundational pieces of this new community um on the coast south of Perth. So, um you know, sort of in keeping with the that a topic that comes up pretty regularly for us, that it's it's still tough out there for a lot of people um and will be for some time, I'm sure. But the new openings keep coming. People can see, you know, opportunities out there to to bring craft beer and and brewing the sort of lead experiences to people across the country.
00:07:50
Speaker
And it also, I think shows that, you know, they're kind of putting the brewery in and then this development's happening around that. I think this is a longer term trend where breweries used to become a part of communities or kind of maybe on the outskirts of them through industrial places, but now you have new developments and whether it's apartments in inner cities or. Uh, thinking like hop city, which the team at happy valley are doing in Brisbane or bridge road in Brunswick East. Like it's kind of like people realizing, well, if we're going to get people to live here, one thing we absolutely need is a craft brewery yeah and whether it's like less trendy than it has been, it's still 100% seen as like a bit of a bedrock of the community.
00:08:28
Speaker
Better than having a sort of faceless pub with a TAB, you'd think, hopefully. Anyway, definitely more family friendly. um That's the sort of clientele they're hoping to get into the development. um And I guess someone mentioned their family in part of his chat with you this week was Kenny Doyle, um who I guess we technically we spoke to because he was the guy behind this year's Australian International Beer Awards Champion Australian Beer. Brack to the Brewer from Mountain Goat. um But I feel like the talk wasn't overly focused on beer because Kenny, if anyone hasn't met him, is not only one of the, I guess, more sort of colourful and boisterous characters in the beer industry. He has a very, very fascinating backstory and approach to life.
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah, he's just ah he's just a fun guy to chat to. um i've I've only gotten to know him more recently, but ah he's Mountain Goat's head of innovation and procurement, so he works with all the ingredients and brings them in.
00:09:23
Speaker
yeah We spent a bit of time with him during the hop harvest. He became a bit of a celebrity there, I think, because he brought along that that very beer that won Champion Beer, and a lot of the international brewers from other countries drank it and saw that his name was on the can and and couldn't stop peppering him with questions on How he was using this NZ106 hop from NZ Hops and um also just his approach to brewing and life. But yeah, very fun guy. I spoke to him as he'd just gotten back from a holiday in South Korea where he'd cycled from Seoul to Busan. Apparently, it's actually a well-known trek. It's called the Four Rivers Trail. And he described it to me and instantly I was like,
00:10:02
Speaker
I got to do this at some point in my life. It's he's said, all you do is cycle along, look at beautiful wildflowers, beautiful scenery. Then you stop every so often and eat delicious food and drink delicious beer. So it's great holiday. He's always been a big traveler as we get into in his story, but yeah, it was, um, wonderful and also fascinating to sort of peel back a little bit of a layer that is Kenny.
00:10:24
Speaker
Exactly. um I guess a slightly less ambitious crawl, but no less fun if you're into beer. um Jason Truen, one of our Sydney writers, rebooted our South Sydney brewery crawl, um which we published the end last week, sort of refreshing some of the yeah the brewery entries there and adding a few new ones as well.
00:10:44
Speaker
ah So we'll include a link to that in the show notes. And also fresh on the site is we are caught up with the team at Prancing Pony because they've had added a bistro to their offering a Prancing Pony sort of elder states people of ah South Australia independent beer and continue to sort of find new ways to welcome people inside their Totnes taproom.
00:11:06
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. And I'm sure calling Karina and Frank elder statesman will go down really well well. So I'm glad you said that, not me. um but um and Look, if you have ah if you have a mustache like that, but as Frank does, then you're 100% an elder statesperson, even if you launched the brewery last year.
00:11:25
Speaker
Okay, fair enough, fair enough. um And looking ahead, there's a pretty exciting event that we're partnering with in just ah just a few weeks time now. And in fact, i think I'll be hosting blind tasting about 30 hours after landing back from the UK, which should be fun for me and all involved. The NZ IPA challenge, which is coming to Australia for the first time. Yes. And um if you want to get excited for it, I just spoke, as I found out, Mountain Goat and Kenny have brewed a beer for it too. So if that wasn't reason enough to go for all the other beers, you'll know that the guy behind the Champion Australian Beer has been dialing in something special for it too.
00:12:04
Speaker
And if you're not aware of the NZ IPA Challenge, it's something that's been taking place for a number of years in New Zealand at Smith's Craft Beer Bar in Queenstown. um It's become a very very significant event in the New Zealand beer calendar. It takes place over a number of days. um a lot of the NZ brewers, I think,
00:12:19
Speaker
They're really keen to not take part in but to win. It's become like a real prestigious win to make the best NZ hopped IPA. So the guys at Smith's and at Clayton Hops were keen to bring it over to Australia. We had a chat to them, suggested
Podcast Highlights and Canning Challenges
00:12:33
Speaker
they speak to Rocky Ridge in Brunswick about a good place to host it. And they've done that. So there'll be 20 different NZ IPAs from 20 different Australian breweries being showcased over a few days. Will, you're hosting industry panel on the Friday. I'll be hosting Blind Tasting the Saturday. There's a public vote element. And I guess this should just be some wonderful, delicious beer. So again, we'll include a link to that in the show notes.
00:12:55
Speaker
Yes, definitely. And because you're in another country, James, and we've got a lot going on at the moment, we haven't got a new episode for this week as we've been singling for the last few weeks. So even though you could listen to this episode, technically at any point you wanted to, we wanted to sort of shout out about some of our, I don't know, highlights from from the couple of years that we've now been doing this and no better place to start than with ah Jade from the Weedy.
00:13:24
Speaker
Yep. So, Jade, most people in the beer industry will be awarere well aware of Jade Flavill. We caught up with her at the Wheatie in it in in the flesh in the in the the red shed out the back. um And yeah, we had broad-ranging chat, not just about beer and her her sort of story in beer and the story of the Wheatie, but also independence, not just in the beer world, but in the in the music world. a lot of the stuff we talked about is obviously you know eternally relevant. um So yeah, that's coming up after the break and then over the next two or three weeks we'll have more of our favourite episodes from the past couple of years.
00:13:58
Speaker
Time for another industry insight from the team at American Canning Machines, providers of the very best can packaging solutions for brewers around the world. When it comes to acquiring a canning line, buyers are tending to fall into two categories, give me the cheapest thing possible or give me quality for the long run.
00:14:15
Speaker
The feedback from Group 1 is never great. While that initial price tag might be low, the ongoing costs are massive, including downtime, spare parts, product waste and the worst one, negative impressions of the beer due to poor quality.
00:14:30
Speaker
Packaging is the easiest place to ruin beer. There are some genuinely good deals right now on used equipment and if you know your stuff you can score a financial win. But buying a used line at auction is not for the faint of heart.
00:14:42
Speaker
In a tight margin environment, costly equipment repair bills and wasted product will eat your profit quickly. Before you go
The Wheatie Pub's Transformation
00:14:49
Speaker
down the rabbit hole of trying to buy on price alone, talk to Scotty at American Canning Machines about the total cost of ownership, new or used.
00:14:57
Speaker
Give Scotty a call on 0431 755 602 today.
00:15:02
Speaker
six zero two today
00:15:07
Speaker
Jade, welcome to the podcast. Jade Dewey- Thank you very much. Lovely to be here. So, um, we're we're going to cover a lot of ground with this. we we can tell you've obviously had a very long career in the beer industry, but we wanted to start with going back to the early days of the Weedy and and when you took it over and and kind of what you, what you saw in the place.
00:15:25
Speaker
Sure. So it's almost 22 years to the day, actually, that we got the keys to the Wheatie. So it was January 2003 that we picked up the keys. And at that point, probably best described as you know affectionately regarded shambles. So it was very run down. Non-Pokey Pub, which in Adelaide at the time was rare, sadly still is quite rare. So non-Pokey Pub was a live music venue, but it existed in a parallel universe. It was not subject to any kind of regulation inspection or you know in many punters coming through the doors either um so it was very run down the only phone on the premises was a blue phone so it was literally a pay phone uh and the publican at the time our predecessor uh conducted all his business such as it was through that pay phone it was uh bolted fairly securely onto the wall i think it was the most securely uh fastened thing in our premises because it was ripped off the wall uh about once or twice a week and someone would hot foot it up albert street with the 30 cents that was in there from the pay fine. um
00:16:24
Speaker
So very, very run down. First day went down into the cellar. um It was a fairly mild day like today, sort of you know, low 20s thinking, I'll just see what, you know, what we've got here. There were two taps, pouring West End Draft and Cooper's Pale. And you could pick the locals because they'd never, they'd never drink anything off tap. because it was literally un-pourable you'd pour three or four jugs to get a schooner there was ah a glass-fronted fridge with stubbies and you know regulars would always would always uh you know often help themselves to those because the public and couldn't necessarily be found so they'd help themselves to ah a stubby uh have a couple leave the money on the bar and walk out without seeing him um as i said quite a character uh went down the cellar first day and mild day and it was 45 degrees down there so there was a, you know, great big compressor driving refrigeration. um they
00:17:11
Speaker
our ah Our predecessor had thought about putting a ah you refrigerated cold room downstairs. So I actually put the refrigeration panels up and then ah lost interest. And that was it. So it was actually worse than not having the insulation panels up because it retained its heat. So it was basically sitting there, you know, the beer was broiling in the lines. It was pretty much unporable. So one of the first things obviously we had to do before we opened, you know, and we closed for, um you know, three and a half months just to to renovate. So myself, ah Trotty and and Liz, three of us, who'd met working at the Exeter Hotel in Rondell Street, which is another non-Pokey pub, owned by Pokey pub people, but a non-Pokey pub. We cut our kind of hospital teeth there, pub teeth there, um and you know worked there during the 90s when it was you know pretty rough and ready and you know good live music scene. Still quite famous pub.
00:17:58
Speaker
ah It is, yeah. I mean, it's it's it's a classic pub. it's it Again, kind of... You know, it's one of those pubs that, you know, I don't want to call it indie washing, but it's kind of pokey, you know, no pokey washing in a sense. So a lot of, not a lot, but there are several, know, non-pokey pubs that are owned by pokey groups, um which, you know, for me kind of cancels out, which is a bit of a shame. um And, ah you know, the the public and I worked under Binz, you know, he owned another pub with his brother with pokies. Now it's part of a group, you know, with pokey pubs. which which is sad because as a pub, it's, it's you know, it's a great pub. It's close close to the uni, behind the, you know, behind the the hospital, et cetera, et cetera. And East Ender on the Street, you know, has has had a lot of stuff happen to it the last last couple of decades, three decades that I've sort of been involved. But, um yeah, still a classic pub. um
00:18:47
Speaker
But, you know, not and it was Cooper's, you know, basically that was was only Cooper's on tap at the time. I think they've got a few other things now. Always a very good wine list. So, you know, we're spoilt for choice when it comes to wineries and SA. So, yeah. Always a very good wine list there. um I taught myself how to you know appreciate or at least you know enjoy malt whiskey working at at the X. I liked the idea of a malt whiskey, but I didn't like it. And then it's like, no, a knockoff. And I trained, it was training, like it was a conscious thing. it's like right I'm going to get a Talisker. Talisker 10 was a very, you know, very, very straightforward. like Four malts, all very good ones. Talisker 10, every night knock off, have it with the dash of dry. was like then less dry, then soda, then less soda, then neat.
00:19:25
Speaker
And then got to the point where could I drink it? And it was like, good, I've developed an addiction. um But we met there and then ah Nick was was selling. and We weren't, you know, I wasn't going to work for anyone else. Was that your first role in HOSPO as well at the ah Second pub. First pub was um the Director's Hotel in ah in Guja Street.
00:19:44
Speaker
And that was yeah that was kind of like everyone's first HOSPO job. you know It was pretty dodge. um And actually... it was i actually ended up ended up going there after I was actually training next door, just doing some Wing Chun there was a pub next door. We'd go to knockoffs and it's like, actually, I could, you know, I was 18, 18, I was about turning 19, I need a job, I can pour some beers and there was a good bar bartender there, the bar manager there um was great. ah He was about the only great thing about that place. The odour was super dodge. Still chasing super from that one. We'd get reports. you know It was like, yeah, this is I'm going to be taking out of it. And it disappeared. it was an ex-Olympian, ex-water polo okay player, which is fairly obscure. Hadn't made millions off it, I'd imagine. yeah No, but you know there's something about sports people who just automatically think they can run a pub. And was very much one of those. Had a handful of pokies, um which i you know i i mean I never liked them. And after that, I just like, i can't be near these things ever again. that would have helped colour what you wanted from your so speak. I pretty much you I mean, you know this fellow, was you know is as I said, you know did did pretty much nothing by the book and It was the day that he asked me to ah to work upstairs. and i said, what do you mean by that? He said, oh, we've got some some japanese you know some Japanese businessmen who are, I'm like, cool, well I can work the bar up there. He's like, no, no, no, I just want you to talk to them.
00:21:15
Speaker
I said, no, no, I can work the bar, but I'm not talking to anyone. What are you talking about? And he wouldn't say it. And I'm like, no, you can't say it. It's not going to happen, you know. See you later. So, you know, we it didn't last. um And it was in anyone everyone's interest, I think, that I didn't go upstairs because it would not have ended well for them. um So I left there, went to the X um and was there for most of the 90s and then met Liz and Trotting.
00:21:38
Speaker
And then we're like, would i we the the non-pokey thing is essential for us. um Live music venue was also essential, original live music. um and beer was was my thing. So you know I was at uni and joined the homebrew club, you know grew up drinking sort of Cooper's Stout and you know Grandpa's West End Draft and Southwark Bitter. So that had been there right from the start. like You were instantly drawn to to be whatever beer you could get that wasn't what everyone else is drinking. Yeah, I mean, you know, grandpa's, you know, Celtic bitter always, you know, really kind of intrigued me, you know, it was a bit too much at the time, but then I thought, no, this is something in this, you know, I'm going persevere. And my folks love stout, so they were, you know, stout drinkers. They weren't big beer drinkers, but they loved stout. And were Liz and Trotty into beer as much as you were or were you one driving that side of things? Liz, definitely more wine. I mean, Trotty came from wine family and so she very much grew up with wine. Trotty drank widely, so there wasn't too much quality booze that she didn't like. And a crisp lager was Trotty's beer of choice. The key word there is quality. At least it was quality booze. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, only one way to find out. But no, very much crisp lager and beer was my thing.
00:22:52
Speaker
homebrew club at you know flinders uni um ended up spending a lot more time as many people do in the tavern flinders tavern and um and homebrewing than you know my law degree um and then worked at the exeter to pay my way through um uni and then ended up you know enjoying hospital a lot more than my law degree yeah um so law school drop out um but when uh ah Nick was selling the Exeter. We didn't want to work for anyone else there because we were pretty much running it at the time anyway. And then basically made a pitch for the Exeter, which we were thankfully unsuccessful for. I mean, we were pretty young in the whole scheme of things. That pretty ambitious. Pretty ambitious. I mean, she's 29 years old, I reckon. Yeah. Yeah. it was very busy. it I mean, we've got run it without doubt. Yeah. um But it was pretty serious um risk and, you know, financial risk. And we were seen as a financial risk because we were, you know, effectively green around the ears. And there were obviously no match for Pokimoney. So, and again, I think we dodged a bullet. We would have retired by now. You know, the place is goldmine, but there were already, there were forces down that street that wasn't really that interested in. So when I started there, you know, we'd have security Friday, Saturday nights, and occasionally have something to do. By the time I finished, you know, sort of nine years later, we had security every night. They were busy every night. Just yeah a lot more agro, a lot more violence, a lot more, ah sent you know, just meaningless violence. Like there were a lot of people would come to the city, to the east end to, you know, cause a bit of trouble. And early days it was, you know, a couple of man babies, a bit of bifo, but there was some kind of honor in it. um And then towards the end, it was like two or three people onto one. And then it was two or three people onto one and actually hurting them, not just, you know, it was like stomping and knives. And I'm like, I'm too old for this shit. You know, i don't I don't want this. And you and you could resist that to a degree, but there were, you know, just I didn't want to be in the city anymore. so it was so So much for the city of churches, honestly. Well, yeah.
00:24:51
Speaker
I think very perfectly the city of churches, you know, that' that's what it's about, isn't it? um So ah it's it's just it's just all under the surface. um but So that that was an ah element to it, you know, and it's like, no, actually, we want something that we can mould lot more, you know, it so better to have an affectionately regarded shambles. um than something that already had a quite a you know personality and you know we could have guided it but there's only so much we could have done yeah um and certainly you know could have introduced um you know some good beer and something other than cooper's into that environment um and i note that they kind of have now a bit um but it different different kind of you know different kind of setup different kind of vibe and it would only ever have been a leasehold for example so yeah um and
00:25:39
Speaker
Yeah, a tricky landlord by all accounts. ah So, Weedy affectionately regarded jambles but suited us perfectly in in that regard. um When it came to, you talking to banks about borrowing money to buy the leasehold, it was regarded as having negative goodwill. So, it was... It was worse than a startup. It was like, no, no, no, you're actually, you're worse than zero, negative goodwill. No one's ever going inside there. Correct. Like it's driving people, it's actively driving people away. Um, and so we couldn't, we couldn't get money. The conventional wisdom was very much at the time. So this is, you know, early 2000s that, um, that Adelaide can't support another non-Pokepup. Like it already had half a dozen. That's all it can support. um we knew that wasn't the case but uh obviously couldn't convince the bank of that so negative goodwill we had to effectively pretend you know we were going on holidays and buying cars and take out personal loans to buy the leasehold for a pub because i'd lend us you know lend us money to go on holiday but not to buy the leasehold of a pub um so did that i got the keys uh beginning of 2003 closed for months three four months and just renovated it was old school kind of working parties and you know every day 16. and aside from the stay to the cellar like what was the recipe like i guess what was debits and like was it ready for what you had in mind well you know was it was going to have to be i suppose you know it's kind of you know very much a build and they will come i mean to be fair the weedy was always always had a good heart like it was always a community pub and it would have been the easiest thing in the world um our predecessor brownie because he was in financial strife to just put pokies in. Rip out the banner and put pokies in and he would have been sorted. And particularly because Theverton was a lot more working class then quite frankly. Light industrial, we're zoned light industrial. So lot of light industry. There used lot heavy industry here, smelters and so on. We can't grow, we can't eat veggies. We grow in our own garden for example. It's a contaminated site. So they had to replace the soil in our neighbours, you know, three or four times over. So, yeah, pretty rough and ready sort of, you know, industrial slash working class neighbourhood and a lot of post-war migrants here. So, fantastic. I love Thabertown. A great place to live, but a bit, you know, a bit rough around the edges, certainly, know, 20 years ago.
00:27:56
Speaker
um and ah But it would have been the easiest thing for Brownie to put poker machines in. And he didn't because he hated them and he saw them as antisocial and you know the opposite of what a pub should be about, which is is exactly what I think about them. um And it would have been the easiest thing for his parents who own the freehold. to have just sold it to the site to developers because it was worth nothing as a pub or less than nothing as a pub. They'd pay you to take it. um But they loved the place and wanted it to make it to remain a pub. So it was very much, it was known as a country pub in the city and it was you know we bought it on a handshake.
00:28:31
Speaker
which was, you know, not advisable at all and not, you know, not something I'd recommend, but but it was literally, you know, Brownies financials were on the back of a napkin, literally. oh I think it was about this and I think it was about that. And I gave that to our accountant. So that that that doesn't really meet the minimum criteria. I'm like, that's all we're going to get. You know, it's all we're going to get. um And same with with you know Bob and Joy, it was very much a handshake, which was amazing. you know So they they trusted us. We moved in and then spent three, four months you know ripping the place apart and kind of putting it back together as as as best we could, effectively on a handshake. And then you know it's obviously a lifetime's worth of work and there's another 20, 30, 40 years to go.
00:29:12
Speaker
But always had you know good heart and good good bones. But out in the back here, for example, in the band room ah was... Absolute shambles. It was covered in brush fencing. So homemade brush fencing on the walls and the ceiling. there was home There were homemade bar heaters on the ceiling. When we pulled it down, there were desiccated rats and and birds in there. Like so much dust, it was about to go up any second. It's amazing that it hadn't. um there were yeah it was it There was a bar, like you can see the outline of the bar here. It was ah just a little dry bar set up. And it was one of my jobs for for one of the days that we're here was to dismantle the bar. And I just hammer, one, two, kicked it, and the whole thing apart. And they were using that up until they closed. And just fell into dust as well. Pretty much. And it was like, oh, that's it. But underneath that yeah was some original stained glass. so they knocked out um you know the 80s had a lot to answer for in terms of you know picking up a beautiful old pub and so a lot of the original stained glass was ripped out and they put those ineffective extraction fans in the stained glass and we found two piles of um of stained glass had been taken out and the bar and the lounge windows in the front bar effectively those put back together so that you know be some pretty amazing finds like that you know a bit of bit of treasure which was which was magic how many skips
00:30:35
Speaker
Oh, I lost count. How many skips, how many trips, funnies? You know, luckily there's one just around the corner because it was like three or four times a day. um The beautiful old fridge behind the bar, so it's Tassie Oak, South Australian made. We used to make fridges just around the corner um in SA. And I've always been obsessed with those beautiful old wooden bar fridges. And there was, what we got here was just glass and stainless. it's like, no, we need ah an old fridge. So I bought that at auction um and brought it, I'd measured it up. it's like, yeah, it's going to fit there. No worries. We, we bought it in. It's about 400 kilos. Uh,
00:31:09
Speaker
Tried to get it through the door wouldn't fit, it took the door surrounds off, wouldn't fit. well time Only like 10 mil out, like so small. It's like, I'm sure we can make it fit. Like we just couldn't get it through that door. So like, okay, we'll just move it into the front bar and we'll wait till we run, it you know, pull the rest of it apart and then we'll we'll move it in. And as we're moving it through the front door, um,
00:31:27
Speaker
ah next to the pool table, the whole thing nearly went straight into the cellar. Because it turns out there was lino and pig bristle squares all over the floor. that That was the only thing holding the floor up in the front bar over the highest traffic area. And we could literally see the cellar you know underneath. So thankfully, it didn't fall down there. We wheeled it into the corner of the pub. It sat there for three months. And then we were a few weeks weeks away from opening. And like, how? Are we going to get this in? So we had take the end of the bar off and then move it over the floorboards, which I had flipped and stripped by hand and put back.
00:31:59
Speaker
Hope they held. And then old school, we just got a couple of metal pipes, put it because we've got the cellar trap door behind the bar as well. So it could have you know, various opportunities to fall into the cellar. um And then put the, you know, metal pipes, rolled it over and it fit within 20 mil. It is never leaving. It is never leaving. And in fact, this morning we had an old fella come and ah replace all the seals on it. So it's now part of our refrigeration system. We've done quite a bit of work on It's the most expensive old bar fridge in the world. um But a fella who came to work on it, he's close to retirement, he used to build them.
00:32:34
Speaker
for his apprenticeship. So it's it's kind of cool. like And that's a dying skill and a dying art. And he loves those things as well. So yes, very run down, um sort of parallel universe that it that it existed in. um And you know i kind of we we liked that, you know, blank slate. So the first thing we did was you know obviously replace all of the beer dispensing equipment, put a refrigerated cold room downstairs. I think we so we ended up when we opened running with maybe six taps. I think so we went from two to six. What was the opening day tap lineup? yeah
00:33:04
Speaker
That's just stretching the memory. But there definitely would there would have been a bit of Coopers on taps. There would have been, I think, Coopers sparkling, stout and pale and draft. Mm-hmm. We got James Squire Porter. as i was That was my mission to get that beer. you know it was ah It was a lovely beer and I think it was one of the the more interesting darks. So James Squire Porter and i I reckon we may have had the Amber as well. And then followed shortly by Little Creatures. So again, were one of the first venues outside Fremantle to have Little Creatures on tap. And when we were cranking for quite a few years years with Creatures, we'd have the Pale Rogers and Little Creatures Pilsner was our house.
00:33:42
Speaker
lager. And that was pretty controversial. Preacher's Pale was pretty controversial. But we were app pallilet a week a pallet of kegs a week across the Nullarbor. And that was the Rogers was the you know the midi house lager and then the Pale. I think the Pale by far was the most controversial being South Australian. So it was kind of seen as un-South Australian to drink anything other than Cooper's Pale. And you know people would come in say, yeah what would do you like? I'd like a Pale. I was like, which one? Yeah.
00:34:08
Speaker
there is only one, you know, that one was always Cooper's. It's well, no, actually there's this. And then, you know, ah quite a few people would be like, no, no, no, no. But you know, like I want to drink local. I want to drink local. on at that point there weren't any yeah really local craft breweries. So it's like, all right, you got us on that one for the time being, like you keep, you know, we'll get you later. Um,
00:34:27
Speaker
And then other people obviously would try it and we knew if the beer was good enough, we just coax people to try it and then if they were genuinely interested in flavour and character then they'd fall in love with beer as well. So was matching people, even though they didn't necessarily know what they wanted, we'd match with flavours. And so on. And we could see that, you know, see the light bulb moments, all these customers coming through. And often we were the only place to get a lot of these beers. Moo Brew was another one that we got really early days. I, you know, just pursued Moo and said, look, we want your beer on tap. You want your beer on tap. And they're like, you know, Australia, you know, where's that in Adelaide? Where's that Thibberton? um and i you know i say you know i was fairly insistent i think oj says was sort of stalking him perhaps he's like just tell us sell us a pallet of beer let's just see how it goes exactly right and if it goes well then keep selling us a beer if it doesn't then that's cool too but i knew you was really obviously really really good beer and our punters you know uh by and large were up for it There was a bit of dragging people kicking and screaming into, you know, flavorful beer for a while. And it took a little bit longer than I thought. It was probably two or three years really before the momentum started to build, before customers started bringing their friends in saying, hey, look, this is what they do. This is what they've got. We had a fairly extensive bottled beer list as well, mostly imports but other interstate products. Crafties, Mountain Goat was another beer that we had on really early.
00:35:49
Speaker
And that was, you know, you could see people just going, blame out wow, there's this all this amazing beer world out there. um And we were, you know, getting some some imported stuff on tap. So with you you know some amazing Kiwis as they became available, you know, 8 Wide and, you know, the Garage Project. And then we the American breweries, Rogue was exciting at the time. um and a lot of stuff one one off tap. So local stuff and then in interstate gear and then just getting more and more of the imports. We'd have showcases, often we'd have the only kegs of that beer in the country and it more and more of a following and then people, it just sort of picked up a life of its own. And then people other people started you know catching on that this this whole craft beer thing might have something in it. um But yeah, the pail was interesting. you know That was probably the hardest fight here. people it's Double-edged sword you know in South Australia with Coopers. Because on the one hand, people are used to drinking beer you can't see through. They're used to drinking ale and and they're used to drinking, you know, dark ale, stout, sparkling, unlike the, you know, the Eastern States where it's Lagerland.
00:36:52
Speaker
um However, there is so much devotion to Coopers that it's kind of seen that the decision is made, you know, that's it, we're done. So to, you know, coax people into drinking other ales, other darts, other stouts, other pales, that was, you know, it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. um Then when other local breweries started to come online, so I love with the Beer House, Brew Boys and so on, and we could pour their hoppy beers and their pails and we could say, actually, you know there is another local pail. So just saying, I want to drink something South Australian, not good enough. you know we We kind of force people to try these things in it. um And obviously not everyone likes them, but the the people who did really did. And then they sort of started their beer journey. And we started – it took took a while to get local brewers to really jump into the hoppy beers and brew some big IPAs. I think there was – a reluctance there and I didn't think there was demand. Yeah. So more sort of Euro styles, British styles, things like that. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Porters and oatmeal souts and English style pails and a few pails, but trying to get like just a a good West coast, for example, uh, was, was difficult. You know, it's like really there's demand for it. And then we'd get, um, you know, Mickela or, um, or 8-Wide even when, when started releasing these beautifully hopped beers, And they'd sell out in a night. Like we'd have lineups out the door. Like there were there was huge demand for these beers, but it took a while to convince local brewers to kind of really jump in. over But when they did, they were really well received. um And then, you know, the plan was
Wheatie Brewing Corps and Indie Music Support
00:38:20
Speaker
always to build our own brewery.
00:38:21
Speaker
And that took a bit longer than we we'd thought as well. But, you know, we kind of, we got there. Just as a step back from now Independence has obviously been important from day one in terms of, you know, Coopers, Little Creatures, Moo Brew, like chasing these people to get their beers when they might have won send them here.
00:38:38
Speaker
you would have formed some pretty good friendships with independent brewers who are no longer independent. Yes. And then it it would have been a case of that's it, you're done. Have you managed to maintain, know, had you maintained relationships, friendships, you know, with those people who, I guess, formed such an important part of the early days of the Wheatie? Yeah, it was an interesting one. You know, it was always, you know, always a bit saddened, like, you know, certainly professionally. It's like, oh, damn, you know, there goes another one. ah But also personally as well, you know, you just kind of you know, that there there is another model, you know. And I think the the in the in the U.S. there are examples of this. And in Australia for a long time, and and I think Stone and Wood, the obvious example is they were kind of too independent to to sell, you know, too independent to fail. Like that's surely not then. The poster boys for independence.
00:39:26
Speaker
And it's kind of the narrative that you get to a certain point where that you don't have any option. Like you you need to sell if you want to get to a certain size, if you need to keep your you know shareholders happy, if you overcapitalise, yada, yada, yada. But it's seen as almost inevitable that that happens here. And that's false. It's it's not the case. Like you you can grow sustainably. You can decide to not grow as much as you know as as you might need to if you then need to sell. Like it's not an inevitability. It's a choice. Mm-hmm. I think a lot of people making choices that and if that's the choice you make and you own it, that's what it is. you know it's like kind of Fair enough. i It's not my way of doing things and I i disagree with that as ah as a model, but I get it. It's when there's you know you pretend to be you know one thing or have principles about why you're not doing something in a certain way and you know you're not going to sell out. Your independence is important. This is why it's important. And you bring people along with you and then you get offered enough money to tap on the shoulder and all of a sudden your principals go out the window and it's like, actually, no, don't worry about that. you know where you know we We can be bought. That's what I take issue with. And and every time it happens, it does devalue um the industry. And I think it just chips away. at that trust. you know and And ultimately, a lot of you know what what we do in hospitality but in beer as well is like people trust you you know you, showing them different flavors and that you've made something to the best of your ability and you're you know you're doing it because you you're interested in it and you believe in it and there's a different way of doing things and then if it turns out there's not actually a different way of doing things and we're going to sell it's like, oh, really? That's ah that's a bit of a shame. you know Does it always all just come down to money? you know and i Yeah. And I, you know, so, you know, and I get, and obviously in one sense, it's all the same decision and the result is the same. In another sense, obviously there are individual circumstances and there are things that we'll never know what that influence people's decisions to do these things. And yeah, I mean, so, I mean, I'd still have a beer with all these people, yeah but I bloody will tell them on a think. Talking about making things the best of your ability. We'll take a break now and come back to talk about that and the growth of a Wheat Tea Brewing Core.
00:41:31
Speaker
Yes, very good.
00:41:35
Speaker
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00:41:56
Speaker
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00:42:10
Speaker
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00:42:19
Speaker
Jade, obviously we've got a brewery behind us. Do you want to talk us through a bit about how you went from being the Wheatie to also Wheatie Brewing Corps? Yeah, sure. So it was it was always the plan um to to build our own brewery. So, you know, loved sourcing beer from other breweries around the world, around the country, around the state.
00:42:36
Speaker
But it was always the plan to kind of build our own brewery, make our own beer and walk the talk effectively. Because you had the opportunity to try literally thousands of beers, various showcases and so on. And brew with some of the best breweries around the world. on a 50 litre home brew kit as well. Indeed, indeed. Let's not forget that. That was kind of cool. Even if most of them had anchovies. The Brewers Six Points, Pira del Borgo, these amazing brewers. Yeah, that was the great advantage of having been beer specialist pub for a decade previous is just had all these amazing friendships with brewers from around the world. And I'd always pick their brains whenever they were here. What do you think about this? How you do that? What's this about? And, you know, the beer industry still is, I think, very generous. Most people are very generous with their time and their knowledge, you know, and any kind of issues, you know, questions you've had, you just hit someone up they're like, yeah, yeah, this is what we, you know, did or do and try this and, you know, call this person. So lots of beer questions. I had plenty of dubious, you know, beer theories that I wanted to test out on a kit and having, you know, pretty, you know, potted homebrew history. I just thought, no, what could possibly go wrong? You know, we need to build our own brewery. And after I'd spent about a year in the States in between leaving the Exeter and finding the Weedy, working at the Grace and then finding the Weedy, that the best, the venues that most sort of, you know, resonated with me were ones that would brew their own beer, one beer, two beers, a handful of beers, just, you know, sharp, tight, technical,
00:44:13
Speaker
loved what they did served it on, you know, on site. And, you know, always thought that the, you know, beer is best, uh, enjoyed in the shadow of the brewing, which it's, it's brewed. Like that's, it's going to be best at its source. Um, like so many people have been to Uflakou in Prague and I was 19. So that just, you know, that, that experience blew my mind. So a couple of, you know, beer experiences like that, Berlin of Issa in Berlin, in a Schuss, which got almost got me into a fight because, you know, you're meant to have it Mitch's, but, uh, So many people had those beer experiences, Alaskan smoked porter in the US. It's like, this is what I want to do. This is what I want to do with my life.
00:44:51
Speaker
So then came, that was after the Exeter sold, year plus overseas, came back here. It's like, this is what we want to do. Sourced other people's beers. but still wanted to scratch that itch essentially. It took a lot longer than we planned. So it got to the point where, yeah, either put in a kitchen or a brewery and i was more committed, more organized ah than than Liz and Trotty were. So the the brewery was the one that got the jump. um And initially, again, you know, we were quite modest. There was a little little area just behind me, this side, like 36 square metres. There was an old shed there. We're like, we'll just put it in a little pilot kit. We had the 50-litre pilot that we'd done some good beer, weedy brews on. Let's just, you know, effectively go a slightly larger version of that in an existing woodshed, you know, fine. And then we're like, nah, we're going to do it. let's Let's do it properly, over-engineer it. So actually made a time-lapse film of it, which is which is a lot of fun. um
00:45:44
Speaker
and a little GoPro on the on the ceiling, knocked knock down um the woodshed and built a very small, like it literally only 36 square metres, that's all council would allow us um to to do initially. We couldn't go out, we could go up. So it's you know it's a giraffe of a building, which makes it seem a lot bigger than it is. And it's quite a pleasant space to be in, very small. So we got a Premier Stainless 600 litre kit, three single batch fermenters. um and a separate little mill room. So tiny little set up, keg washer. So, you know, it was self-sufficient. I spoke to a lot of local brewers about brewery design and and and interstate brewers as well. And and again, a lot of people very you know generous with their time and um And, and ideas and, and we poured our first beers in 2014. So that was, you know, again, just wanted to, wanted to walk the walk.
00:46:34
Speaker
Plenty of dubious beer theories that I wanted to test out. um A lot of ah friends in breweries around the country and around the world. um And again, after having collaborated on the 50 liter kit, perfect example. You know, we get a guest brewer coming over, not too many brewers will say no to a collaboration, particularly, you know, 10 years ago and they're brewing at, you know, much bigger breweries and often are not on the tools anymore. And they miss it. You know, ah we brewed with Tobias Zollo from Vine Stefano. It's like, it's just insane. that we you know he He had a bowl. I was terrified. Yeah. And he had a bowl because he just doesn't get to do that anymore. And to get, you know, do on someone else's kit where you can, you know, blame them for anything. It doesn't go right. it' It's a win-win situation. And did you go straight in and with taking over all the taps or at the start, was it like, we'll have a bank of wheatie and we'll still keep, you know, supporting our friends in the beer industry elsewhere?
00:47:29
Speaker
Uh, we were so small, like with the three single batch fermenters and 600 liters that we, you know, even if we wanted to supply all our taps, we couldn't. So initially it was only like three or four taps, I think. And then eventually a font after about a year or two, we we had a font. Um, and then it wasn't until we expanded. So we, you know, pushed into the car park fermentation alley where we more than doubled capacity and, um, and floor space that we could sustain all of our taps. So the the first ever brews on our original brewery um were for Good Beer Weedy. Again, like you know everyone's experience, there were council holdups, there were SA Power Networks holdups. So everything happened a lot later than it should have. So instead of having a couple of months to get to learn the kit, learn you know what the buttons do essentially, the very first day we brewed, it was a collaboration with Yeasty Boys, Yeasty Boys Stew.
00:48:17
Speaker
ah and Spooning. spoon it Spooning, yes. so It was a collaboration at that point. The following years it was Spooning, but yes, essentially Spooning. um And ah leah Leo DiVincenzo from Biro del Borgo and Magic Rock Stew. So it was kind of like a rock star collaboration. We'd never brewed on the kit ah beyond the first commissioning brew, which was a bit of a disaster. ah We didn't have our excise licence.
00:48:42
Speaker
So it was still, you know, going back and forth and literally got to the end of the first day and I'm checking emails and I called the ATO obviously saying, listen, this is what we're going to Am I safe to do it? And they're like yeah, just don't pitch yeast till you get your license. I'm like, okay, so excellent. So we've got these, you know, these, these international brewers are collaborating with, but that's fine. Like we'll just go through the motions and, um And it literally came through an hour and a half before we pitched the yeast. So I didn't have to make that decision, thankfully. I know what I would have done, but I didn't have to make that decision. So um so it was right down you know right down to the wire. And then once we expanded fermentationally, we could then sustain all of our all of our own taps. so And we still pour other breweries beers, but as a showcase. And how have you managed and that, I guess, from a brewery and also consumer consumer's perspective? The Wheatie had this reputation as could go there any time of the year and it would have the most fantastic, well-curated, diverse lineup of beers from breweries all over the place. And then...
00:49:42
Speaker
at some point it was like just your beers which are great obviously you've got the trophies to prove it but you know that would have been a bit of a change of experience for both brewers who you were long-standing friends with but also I guess for consumers as well going well this is the place we go to in Adelaide with you know the biggest diversity of beers was that Did that matter to people or was it something you had to work through? Oh, definitely mattered. Yeah. And it was, you know, certainly a risk, you know, because we were very, very successful venue pouring other people's beers. I knew other people would catch on eventually. It took a lot longer than I thought it would. And there were, you know, it was a good decade really before other other venues in Adelaide started taking craft seriously and having a decent range. And even in, I mean, we predate most, if not all of the Melbourne venues as well in terms of being craft beer specialist bars. I think we even...
00:50:29
Speaker
even pip the the Royston by a few months. So it was ah definitely a risk. you know We could have just continued doing what we're doing and it would have it would have been fine. there would have been Early days the challenge was sort of dragging people kicking and screaming to be with flavour but increasingly it was competition. So instead of us you know getting the only keg of a canty on You know, we couldn't sell Cantillon to begin with. No one wanted it. You know, there were Canty Tanties because people thought we were trying to sell them beer that was off. And we'd drink it and we'd have one or two customers who loved it and that was it. And then, you know, over it took a while again, but then in a few years, we couldn't get it.
00:51:03
Speaker
You know, we just couldn't couldn't source it because it was in demand so much. So the everything was changing. um And again, for us, the the whole point of the act, so we were pouring other people's beers. They were brewing it at their breweries. We wanted to brew beer at our own brewery. Definitely a risk. We definitely, ah yeah, some hunters didn't like it. Like they wanted to still come here and drink other beers. um you know And and you know I get that. In some cases, there there was also, you know people wanted to drink beers from from overseas, regardless of freshness. And there was the perception that, you know well, it's from US and it's an IPA. From the US it's an IPA. So it is deaf if by definition better than anything that's gonna be here. So, you know, some of it was fair enough. Some of it, I think, was based on misconception. um
00:51:49
Speaker
And also I think some of it is ah it is the notion of diversity is interesting too. So, you know, I had had a punter the other day just like, you know, used to have such a such a diversity on tap. And I looked at the tap list and I said, find me another menu.
00:52:03
Speaker
at this point in time, anywhere in the country that is covering that diversity of styles, you know, so it's not just hazies, it's not just IPAs and pales and not just lagers and you're getting, you're getting oak fermented stuff and you're getting co-fermented stuff and you're getting hand pull traditional ale and you've got a lucre side pour and you, you know, It's range. what What do you mean by range? you If you mean, you know, IPAs from six different breweries, no, you're right. We don't have that. If you mean a diversity of styles, then yeah, we yeah we do. And, you know, if we do it, we'll do it as well as we can. So we, will you know, we're using, we've used 50, 60, 70 different yeasts or more. You know, we we we experiment, we play a lot. There's a lot of work in the little brewery. We do a lot of things. um And surely, again, I go back to this thing, you know, ah of beer is is best drunk in the shadow of the brewery in which it's brewed. I don't want to go to Sydney or Melbourne and drink my beer. I know i want to drink what's made there. Unless it's part of origin, obviously. Unless it's... Part of origin, of course. But even though, wouldn't drink my beer. i yeah No way. i wouldn't But you I want to drink what's made locally. yeah
00:53:06
Speaker
So, yeah, definitely. There was a bit of pushback. um and And obviously, you know, to begin with, we had, you know, we had to learn the ropes in terms of the brewery and... um you know We didn't release anything we didn't think stood up, but we definitely learned a lot in in time as well and you know become you know better better brewers, better at the whole the whole process. so But I think overall was an enormous amount of support and I think overall people got it. And it's like, yeah, this is of course, this is the natural conclusion you know because a lot of what we you know we've always done, ticketed ticketed tastings and and and encourage kind of you know thinking drinking. we We want people to know as much as possible about what they're drinking, whether it's whiskey you know, wine, beer, and we have visiting brewers and distillers and winemakers. And, you know, we go deep with this kind of stuff. And a lot of our punters, they really enjoy that, you know. And at the time, you know, certainly sort of 20 years ago, like we believe we had some of the first ever whiskey tastings of their kind anywhere in the world. Like we were looking at whiskey folks. Mm-hmm. People were paying good money to drink shit whiskey yeah um and and pull it apart. We put whiskeys through spectrometers to analyze different peat phenolics and stuff like that. there wasn't There was almost none of that happening 20 years ago. There's not that much happening now. It's more common now. you know But that that whole culture of thinking drinking... um and And involving anyone. We're a pub. So that you one of the things I love about pubs is is is democratic. The pub is a good leveller. We're not a specialist bar that sort of caters to you know people who have one kind of interest. um
00:54:38
Speaker
we're We're generalists in that respect. you know It's like anyone can, anyone does walk through the door. And one of my favourite things still... is kind of ambushing people with good beer. They might come to see a band. ah They're here for the music. We ambush them with good beer. They might come for a whiskey. We ambush them with good beer. They might come for, you know, ah a beer and we ambush them with good wine, you know, because we're serious about our wineless as well. So it's just, you know, it's it's democratic. It's accessible. um You know, we've... we've we basically pitch it. Anyone who's genuinely interested in flavor and, and character, like we'll find something for you, you know, rather than, you know, just pitching it out, you know, at, at, at hazy boys or just pitching it. at you know That doesn't interest me. And that's not what a pub is or what a pub should do. A pub is community, you know, warts and all, and it's much broader and it's, it's more democratic. Talking about community from a Wheatie perspective, you know we talked about um beer, whiskey, you know, but you've also been great supporter of the arts, of live music. um
00:55:40
Speaker
Beyond that as well, you want to talk a little bit about that? I think especially, I guess, indie music and indie beer are often facing the same challenges with either venues being closed down or regulation changing against them. um Is that something that... And also some very big operators.
00:55:53
Speaker
Yes, it is. Holding them back as well. Yeah, we're very fond of monopolies and duopolies in this country. So lot of similarities between music industry and beer industry. Increasingly, you know, elephant in the room is those foreign based publicly listed multinationals that own more and more of the Australian live music industry. There was an article in Sydney Morning Herald a couple of years ago, Michael Sainsbury, I think was the journal. And he was interviewing various players in the Australian live music industry and they posited that up to 85% of Australian live music industry was owned by Live Nation, AG and TEG, the big three. And they're, you know, genius. They're vertically integrated. They own the entire supply chain. So they own venues, they own festivals, they own ticketing companies, which is where they make most their money. They own merch. They take merch cuts, you know, promotion companies, agency, et cetera, et cetera. And increasingly the kind of deaths are multinationals. They kind of draw you in with a tractor beam. And if you don't play with them, you don't have a career as a musician potentially. And as an independent venue, trying to operate alongside them is pretty tricky stuff. You've chosen all the areas that are really hard to succeed in and try to make things as hard for yourself as often as you can along the way. Pretty much. You've only told the bank, no, no, no, we want to be an original live music venue. Well, sure, how much money do you want? Yeah, I mean, we think the beer industry is in trouble. I think, you know, grassroots live music is in deep trouble and there are, you know, it depends on the metric, but anywhere upwards of 30% of independent live music venues are closed during and since COVID and there's no sign of that letting up really. Mm-hmm. So yeah, catastrophic. Well, do have literally the top end of town making record profits and got grassroots venues on their knees and closing, like the system is broken, you know, and where you get, for example, you know, the top end of town not only being enabled by governments, federal and state, but being subsidized directly.
00:57:51
Speaker
Often, you know, Harvest Rock Festival got state government money. um That's a Live Nation event or indirectly because they're not paying like any self-respecting multinational, they're not paying as as much taxed as they should be, shall we say. um And that's a problem. It's going to get to the point where we where we don't have any any original live music anymore. What we've found is interesting. interesting was we are we are Obviously, it's been happening at the Wheat Tea all the time. but And I guess it's on a small scale, but a number of breweries offering or adding some sort of music offering. So just recently, Three Ravens turned their storage warehouse into a ah venue for you know for um
00:58:30
Speaker
labels to come in and and do showcase nights or to do DJ nights or whatever. And yeah there's the seeker is it that there are places around the country getting behind music, often but there might be you know musicians behind the brewery. yeah um you know is is Is there feasibly some way of know independent beer and independent music coming together ah to to have a greater voice, do you think? Or are they both so caught up in fighting their own battles? A bit of both. So, I mean, yeah, definitely. and Each is just sort of fighting for survival and, ah you know, with venues and and there already is, I think it already. So just as there are, you know, ah breweries who are supporting live music, um there are live music venues that are supporting independent breweries as well. So, you know, i'm just thinking of a handful of of of our live music venues here and they will pour either predominantly or exclusively local craft breweries. And they have partnerships with those breweries, which is, which is excellent. know i think one of the best ways you know we just need to support each other in that sense so you know buy buy local you know keep local or alive i think is is still very much the case you know even and you know ridiculous things like post mix like go go local you know go locals go local softies like support local business and it
00:59:42
Speaker
The thing with that, i mean, it's important, but it's also a slower burn, you know, and I think with live music, it's crisis for a lot of venues and, you know, it's got to the point that they're they literally week to week, you know, and you've got shows that, you know, even here um that would, you know, pre-COVID would fill the room and now getting 50%, 60% and that's kind of par, you know. you know, and then every and now and then you get a show that is, that is, it is chance cost of living related as a large part of it. Yeah, definitely. And, and people who, you know, who, who tend to go out to pubs to see music are getting smashed, um, whether they're renters or they've just got ah a mortgage or whatever. There's not a lot of disposable income there. Um,
01:00:19
Speaker
and And demand has changed as well. I think people culturally, I think there's been change as well. People are used to staying at home. Everything is is can be delivered. Everything is streamable. there ah you know Everything's vicarious now. um So that's part of it. And it'll be really interesting to see when and if cost of living pressures ease if people come back. And I think that's the million dollar question that we're all kind of hanging on is if once and if there is an upturn and an uptick, will people start coming out again? You know, anecdotally, a lot of our punters are like, look, we'd love to come here more often, but we just we just can't afford it. We're paying another 200 bucks a week in rent or our mortgage has gone up or, you know, whatever. um
01:00:56
Speaker
But also, i think people are kind of used to chucking on the trackies and the uggies and ordering everything in. You just need to get them out once or twice, either just into a good pub to have a good time or to go to a gig.
01:01:08
Speaker
whatever size it might be to go, why i why am I not doing this more often? This is what I work and live for really is to get out and have these moments, I think. Yeah, and i mean, you know, obviously very vested in this, but i I think that, you know, throughout humanity, like people have always needed this. They've always needed, um you know, so social interaction. They've always needed to to go out and listen to live music. There is something completely different about seeing a band live. You feel it.
01:01:33
Speaker
Like it's an emotional thing. You feel the music live. You feel the interaction of the band and the and the audience. Like you can't get that any other way. And same with going out for a beer, you know, you can have catch-ups online. It's not the same thing. And people need that. And I like to think people will always need that or we're all bugging. Pubs and in have been around a long time. A long time. Survived a long time. You know, they're also closing in a rain of knots, you know, and certainly independent pubs are. And I think that I guess that's my concern. There'll always be music and there will always be pubs and there'll always be hospitality and be breweries. But, you know, what are they going to like? And how many owners will there be or how many operators in the industry? Exactly. Right. There'll be two, you know, there'll be two and subsidiaries and, and, you know, lot of our content will be AI, you know, created and, and, you know, I just think, you know, it'll be shopping mall central. And I think that's, that's the concern. There will always be
Ownership and Community Role
01:02:24
Speaker
these things, but we're just losing the owner operators, um, and, and people doing anything, you know, interesting really. And it just becomes cookie cutter kind of stuff and lowest common denominator stuff. And that, that's pretty scary. Jayde, we talked about sustainability and sustainable businesses before and sort of running them. Obviously you've done it the way for a long time, but originally there were three of you and now it's just you. There's, I can't think of too many sort of businesses, beer businesses that have lasted in that way and where now is a sole ownership. Like how have you sort of managed that or how's it felt?
01:02:58
Speaker
Yeah, it's been it' been has been a wild rise. It was it was three of us. um And then 2016, Trotty died so at cancer. um And that was, you know, while, you know, we'd had a couple of years to prepare ourselves for that, still it still was, you know, obviously hit pretty hard. um And I had a broken back at the time well. One of many ailments you've been dealing with. Yeah, that was where it all started to unravel. 2016 was a time. So yeah, I mean, that was absolutely awful, obviously. And, you know, Trotty was their dear friend. So that was pretty rough. And then it was Liz and myself. And obviously there was like big shake-ups and, you know, how are we going to negotiate this?
01:03:43
Speaker
And for a couple of years, you know, we just kind of just changed, did what we had to do to get through that period, basically. And then as these things tend to do, you know, death teaches us how to live. um Cautionary tale and and Liz decided she wanted to do other things. It was like she didn't want to continue with the weedy. It kind of lost the love. um Whereas i I still very much, you know, this is what I want to do. cut the weedy and it bleeds jade. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. I mean, i you you know, 22 years, like i cut it's difficult remembering like before the weedy, post-weedy, you know, ah a few ideas what that might look like. But it's... um It's a pretty daunting thought. So i was still absolutely committed to the pub. So then it was a question of, right, Liz was going to leave. Then I had to, you know, bite it. Again, I'm a control freak. So I never liked the idea of being accountable to anyone really other than, you know, lawyers and and bankers in in a strict sense in terms of what want to do. Because a lot of what we've done here doesn't make sense. It just doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense in lots of ways.
01:04:42
Speaker
A lot of it has worked. Some of it hasn't. But, you know, I kind of, you know, they'd to take that it's my responsibility, you know. It's like I live and die by the sword. Like it's, you know, if I if i fuck up, then I fuck up. um But I don't want to have to answer too Shareholders, for example. um That doesn't interest me at all. That's not why I got into my own business. I'm pretty much unemployable, I think. i i know No one would have me because I'm so used to doing things in my own way. um So that that was not an option and and and it was not an option for me to to to give up the weedy.
01:05:14
Speaker
And it's very important going forward that the weedy stays the weedy. So it was negotiating that and then again, more time talking talking to banks. um And then we got you know got there ah but ah in the end. and And again, thankfully, it was a year before COVID. So it was 2019, became sole owner, benevolent dictator, as I like to say. um a year before COVID, um if it had been, COVID had been a year earlier, then it would have been seriously, seriously problematic. Like I would have been in a lot of trouble because it took me a year to kind of, you know, turn the ship around, um you know, reorganize things. There was a lot of work to be done and I was changing
01:05:52
Speaker
because at that point I was probably 75% in the brewery, 25% bar and overall business, then I basically had to be fifty fifty um So a lot of stuff to turn around. If COVID was in a year earlier, I would have been in proper trouble.
01:06:04
Speaker
um So again, it's one of those, isscent there's a bit of a narrative that, you know, is shaking down the industry and, You know, the places that needed to go are going and I think that's, you know, it's a bit like Darwin's, you know, natural selection. So much of it is just dumb luck. So much of it is dumb luck and timing. You do something in a certain time and it makes sense in the context of the time, global pandemic, and suddenly that investment looks like a really silly thing. And it's like, what was I thinking? So pulled that together. But of course, in all of this, like I'm not running by myself. So my partner, Maeve and I are effectively running it. She runs the bar side of things, wine lists, yada, yada, yada. You know, kept, you know, held me together over some very, very tricky years, my own health problems. And we have a fantastic team. So, you know, Jimmy in the brewery now, like, you know, you can't run a pub on your own. So, yeah, culturally I think things have changed around the industry. And, again, I really hope that comes back. And I think and I hope that as, you know, things pick up and people are going out more and there's more of the fun side of things that people will see this as a viable industry. But, again, it needs to be. sustainable to be viable. And at the moment, no one in their right mind really would, you know, run an original live music venue with a brewery out the back, you know. But obviously, you know, a lot of, you know, lot of skin in the game. Yeah, yeah. It's like me with Crafty Pine. What else am I going do? Yeah, exactly. It's like this is, as said, unemployable and a lot of skid in the game. So, yeah, I'm not going anywhere. The thing for me is that this continues to be – seen myself as a guardian, like guardian of – a caretaker of the pub essentially. And there is something about pubs unlike any other kind of venue and just it's that continuity. This is what they're built for. This is what they do. They're a public house and I think that's kind of special and there aren't many places like that anymore where you can just be. You don't even have to spend any money. You can just be. You can sit in the paper and have a glass of water and read the paper. You can come in jeans and t-shirt. You can come in a suit. There aren't many places left where you can do that and I think it's really important. So when eventually move on, the goal, and not quite sure how this is going to happen, is for the weedy to be the weedy. So whether it's, you know, kind of a venues trust kind of situation where effectively selling the freehold to a, you know, a venues trust, which then rents back to operators,
01:08:31
Speaker
as you know grassroots music venues like the MVT in the UK, which is a fantastic model. So more and more you know people I'm talking to are thinking about those kinds of models because we want this to survive beyond – And survive as it is, yeah yeah. Give or take. I mean, obviously, people can give it their local – But I want it, you know, in a a hundred years, ideally, I want this to still be a pub. i want it to be a community pub, no pokies, original live music and beer, you know, and I think a lot of people want that. And i quite frankly, I think there are people staying in the industry ah for that reason. You know, I think they might be ready to move on. Not not me yet, but um and ready to move on. ah But...
01:09:08
Speaker
they want what they've created to to remain as a thing because I think it's what it's worthwhile in the broader sense. you know I think we need places like this, not exactly like this, but this kind of thing. um I think for all of our you know all of our sanity and and and humanity really.
Evolution of Craft Beer and Inclusivity
01:09:24
Speaker
You're almost uniquely positioned to sort of take overview of the evolution of beer and hospital the last 20, 25 What have been some of the best or maybe even the worst sort of trends or changes you've seen over that time? um Yeah, because you really have
01:09:40
Speaker
experienced and been a part of so much of it. The evolution of craft, I guess, and you know, ah of beer and good beer. And you know, 20, 22 years ago, ah you know, if you'd asked me like, what what what do you think will be the beer scene in, you know, in 20, in a couple of decades time, would have been thrilled at how much good beer there is everywhere. And I think that was always kind of the base thing is like, we want there to be good locally brewed beer pretty much everywhere you go. We want it to be mainstream. um And it is, you know, which which is fantastic. ah You can get good beer pretty much anywhere. A lot of that good beer, though, now has come to be owned by, ah you know, two or three big companies. And I think that, you know, again, it's the evolution of it. You know, initially, I think craft beer was poo-pooed by the big companies and and by Coopers. It wasn't taken seriously. And then obviously as it became established and was became something was here to stay.
01:10:37
Speaker
bigger part of the market it was it was here to stay and had changed beer here permanently then obviously there was going to be pushback then and the more successful it became the more attractive it became and then a lot of interest uh you know rather than people getting involved because they loved beer loved hospitality wanted to see how far they could go with something It then became something we would, you know, the Craft Bankers Conference, you know, in America, for example. So, you know, and it suddenly becomes something supermarkets are interested in and so on and so on. So I think, you know, obviously the danger of that is that it's ripped, you know, ripping the soul out of beer. And I think there's a bit of cynicism from punters now, largely in response to that. You know, if all these breweries that swear by independence are selling out, then, you know, you're sort of eroding that trust. So that's, I guess, one of the downturns it. I think beer being more widely available and being available to all. So I think we've shaken up beer culture now and I think it's a much more egalitarian industry in a lot of respects. And if it's not, we're aware of the fact that it isn't we're talking about the fact that it isn't. You know, I would like to think it's still a sexist industry, but we're calling that shit out now, you know, and I think, and it's a discussion that we can have. And it's, you know, we've always said, you know, one rule at the waiting, don't care who you are, what you look like up until the point, the point which you're a dickhead, you're welcome. Like everyone's welcome unless you're a dickhead. It's that simple. And we've sort of taken a similar approach to, you know, barrel-aging beers. It's like you need to – if you barrel-age beers, wild ferments, you need to be prepared throw out often and much. And we take the same approach to our punters. Like, you know. Dickhead beers. Yeah, they're gone. They're you know. And it's not a particularly high bar, but some people –
01:12:33
Speaker
guys struggled to to to you know to to make it there but it's just it's and that's it's a daily thing you know it's it's not just having a policy it's not just being able point to something it's it's practice and it's praxis and it's every day it's like no not okay pull your head in or you're out and it's like no you're out done you know and that that kind of stuff but and over that 20 years definitely seen a change and and overall a change for the better again there's backlash and The American president certainly, um you know, um um evidence of that. um
01:13:06
Speaker
And so definitely backlash, but I think i think progress has has has been made. And I think, you know, that that is a really positive
Future of Craft Beer and Economic Pressures
01:13:13
Speaker
thing. And beer has been seen more as it's less just blokey and it's more something anyone and everyone can, you know, potentially should enjoy. So that's ah that's a real positive.
01:13:23
Speaker
Jade, ah what about the future of beer? like Like, where do you hope it goes? What are you sort of wishes for, for where it's heading ma as well? Spacer is in your craft. Lager, lager, lager. Again, you know, it's come full circle, you know, and as much as joked about it. I think now, uh, again, ironically, we're getting to the point where lager could potentially be a, you know, a, uh, a gateway beer, um, which is kind of the opposite of where we were 20 years ago. So people are trying craft lager and go, wow, this is amazing. Let's, let's head into this. um
01:13:55
Speaker
You know, it's a more like ah definitely there'll be more lager and I think cleaner flavours and and um sadly, I think there's going to be more consolidation. um And I think there's going to be increasing issues with the big end of town um and particularly at a time from a venue perspective where venues are struggling as well. So I think the economic pressures for them are to go with what's safe and what is cheap. Yeah, it won't be hard to say no. Exactly right. And it's harder to support indies, particularly if they're charging what they need to be charging, um when, you know, as a venue, you're under pressure yourself. So I think that's that's one of the other real shames about this is that a lot of venues that would have supported independent at the moment, they just can't. yeah um
01:14:37
Speaker
And so hopefully when and if there's an uptick that they jump back on that. Um, so I, I mean, it's, you know, it's, it's really hard time. And I think, I think we'll see more closures and I think we'll see more venues closing. Um, there'll be more consolidation. And I think, you know, the big, the big end of town are gonna, you know, the empire strikes back. Um,
01:14:58
Speaker
Some will get through, definitely. And I think, you know, and there will there there there will be, ah continue to be independent brewers. I think, you know, I think the beers are getting better and better. I think the standard of brewing is just getting higher and higher, which is amazing. I think we have amazing suppliers now, um ah you know, local yeast producers, you know, local maltsters, you local small indie hop growers, you know, all that kind of stuff is really, really exciting. And I think, you know, technically now much, much higher level. um So all that kind of stuff, I think the the beer itself is heading in ah in a better direction. I think punters, there is a base level now of of appreciation for good beer that is fantastic and is more than we could have hoped for 20 years ago. And as an indication of how mainstream beer has got, um not often that a punter kind of surprises me after 30 years in pubs. But a good guy came in the other day. is you know He's looking at the taps. And we still get this you know because we're Western Suburbs pub. So you people rock into the bar and they're looking at the taps and they don't recognize any of them. And he's just looking up and down, up and down. He goes, oh, you know, I'm just sick of all this fucking craft shit. I just want a pint of hazy.
01:16:07
Speaker
That is comic genius. That is comic genius. And by hazy, did he mean Cooper's Pale? Yeah, no. He meant a hazy pale, a hazy IPA. I was like, wow, that is comic genius. But he meant it to the point where his regular drinking beer was a hazy pale, hazy IPA, and anything that wasn't that was craft shit. It was awesome. So it's a good thing, I think, that we got to that point. And there's no going back. I think once you're onto this stuff. So I think there's been a lot of gains. I think independent hospitality is under pressure. Grassroots live music menus are under extreme pressure. Independent breweries under extreme pressure. But it's just hold fast. Yeah. You know, hold fast and stick to quality, like, you know, as much as is possible. Just make the best possible way you can. Stick to your guns and hope, you know, basically just hope that it turns around. And I, again, invested in this because this is my life. But I think
Conclusion and Support for the Industry
01:17:07
Speaker
people will come back to it. There is something fundamentally human, the human need. to catch up with people and have a drink and talk, to listen to live music, to feel live music, all that kind of stuff. I think if we've moved so far away from that that we can't support the venues who provide that, then it would be pretty sad world. So I guess the hope is almost that consumers make the effort to find out
01:17:30
Speaker
who the indie brewers are, where the indie venues are or whatever, where the indie live music is yeah and get behind it. And if they give a shit about it, tell their friends, bring them along and, you know, make them part of the the magic. Yeah, absolutely. And, it's you know, as, as ever, where you spend your money really matters. And it's still really, really, really matters. And just, you know, think about, think about where, you know, where you're spending your money and little, little bits, you know, little bits count. And, you know, so if you want it to be there, support it.
01:17:56
Speaker
you know, support what you love or it might not be there much longer. And, you know, it it sounds very melodramatic, but the reality is we are losing as you guys have written about so many breweries, so many venues, so many live music venues are closing and they're not going to, you know, they're not coming back. You know, you can't flick a switch and bring them back. There's not a lot of apartments being knocked down to to build pubs in either. Yeah, no, exactly. Maybe that's ah that's something we can hope for in the future is that, you know, these kind of, you know, pop-up dog boxes are knocked down and then we replace them with live music venues and breweries and brew pubs, you know, that that would be awesome. um
01:18:28
Speaker
But, you know, on a very dry level, like some kind of protection, so I don't know if you were over it, but then the Crown & Anchor, which is ah a famous live music pub in the city, was slated to be knocked down by developers and and turned into student accommodation and huge community pushback on that.
01:18:43
Speaker
which is excellent. And it now looks like, it's not a silver bullet, but it looks like there'll be some protection for live music venues in the CBD. Obviously we want to extend that protection beyond that and for it to be a planning overlay, essentially. Say this is a grassroots original live music venue and this is designated because it ticks these criteria, which is, you know, independent, it's original live music on a dedicated stage, dedicated PA, dedicated sound engineers. um Therefore, all this stuff follows from that. So, for example, have, you know, 10 temporary change of use a year. So you can have your street festivals without having to, you know, bleed for council and and work for them for a week. um You know, all these things to actually support these venues. You know, if we value them, we need to support them. And, you know, if we don't invest, you know, certainly when it comes to live music venues, if we don't invest immediately and Top End of Town doesn't reinvest in grassroots without which they wouldn't survive, we're just going to be left with ah a heap of highly paid administrators and and no industry to administer. and you know Nobody wants that.
01:19:46
Speaker
no No. Well, it will drive us all to drink, i think. And there'll be nowhere left to drink. Exactly right. Exactly right. You know. Jade, thank you so much for, um, this been such a thrilling conversation.
01:19:59
Speaker
Thank you. Absolute pleasure. And, uh, you know, we've got another, another couple of hours. we could well no Otherwise there'll be no live music happening behind us tonight. Yes. not exactly All right. Thank you so much, Jade. Absolute pleasure. Thank you. Thank you.
01:20:16
Speaker
The Crafty Pint podcast is produced and edited by Matt Hoffman. You can get all your beer related news and reviews on the Crafty Pint website, craftypint.com and can stay up to date on future podcast episodes via our socials.
01:20:30
Speaker
We wouldn't be able to produce the podcast or the website, events or festivals we run without the support of the beer industry, whether that's suppliers, bars, breweries or bottle shops. If you'd like to support the show or partner with The Crafty Pine in other ways, please reach out to Craig via the details in the show notes.
01:20:46
Speaker
And if you're a beer lover who'd like to support what we do, you can join our exclusive club for beer lovers, The Crafty Cabal. Visit craftycabal.com for more. And until next time, drink good beer.