This is the second straight year we’ve done a wrap-up of the year – the first is here.
We discussed how we made out against predictions for 2012 during last year’s review. We didn’t make quite as many predictions for 2013 – we only made one – and that was that we’d be open by the end of this year.
Well, that didn’t quite work out. Sorry! It certainly wasn’t for lack of trying.
But - perhaps even more surprising than that is the fact that we’re not open because we chose to not be open.
Allow me to explain.
Here are the things we needed to finish to get open this year:
- Finish securing financing.
- Establish the corporation.
- Order the brewing equipment.
- Sign the lease on our location.
- Get approval from the city zoning board and planning board.
- Submit our TTB application, get it approved.
- Submit our SLA application, get it approved.
- Complete construction.
- Brew beer – taste beer – serve beer. Done.
The first fact is: we finished everything on this list except for the last two. And, had we really pushed to get the brewery open by the end of the year, I believe we probably could have completed these as well.
The second fact is: we didn’t begin construction because we chose not to start it too early. Why?
Well, we spent a lot of time going over our facility plan. Much longer than expected. Like, three months longer than expected. We spent that much time in order to make sure that whatever we were doing with the facility, we would be set for the foreseeable future. As a result, in addition to taking more time to develop the plans, we wound up taking up more space than we originally thought we would. The tasting room, in particular, which was originally intended to be a small space for trying the beers, will be significantly larger in scope than we originally planned. We still have one more license to apply for – which is our on-premise license to serve full pints of beer. We expect to serve food here as well.
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One of the things we hope will come to define our brewery is that we'll never compromise our quality. One early example of this is not rushing to get the brewery open in order to ensure the facility will meet our high standards.
You can be sure our beer will be no different.
Because of this delay in working through our facility plan, we actually pushed back our equipment delivery. But we’re just about ready to get underway with construction. We’re now looking at a spring opening. The first few months of 2014 will be exciting for sure!
As we did last year, we also drank some amazing beers this year (as we plan to every year as long as we’re doing this...) Bruery Sour in the Rye, Ommegang Gnomegang, Founders All Day IPA, Southern Tier Live, Sixpoint 3Beans, Evil Twin Even More Jesus, Dieu du Ciel Aphrodisiaque, and New England Gandhi-Bot were some impressive beers we’ve had. Several breweries came to Buffalo for the first time in 2013: Ballast Point, Uinta, Jack’s Abby, and Bells immediately come to mind. From those breweries, we particularly enjoyed Kalamazoo Stout from Bells. And Buffalo’s own Community Beer Works continued to impress: Rutherford B. Haze (their summer Belgian-style Pale), Mister Superfantastisch (their Berliner Weisse), and Bringer of Nuclear Fire (their Imperial Milk Stout brewed with chiles that we helped with) were all excellent.
No predictions for this upcoming year. We’re just hoping at this time next year someone else is putting one of our beers on their list of best beers of 2014. It’s gonna be a great year.
Happy New Year, Buffalo!