Episode 40 - Dave Caraway - Owner of Sons of Toil Brewery

Welcome

Welcome to episode 40 of

Let's Talk Claremont. I am your host, Patrick. Thank you for tuning in. I'm happy you're here. I'm happy you're listening.

And I am really happy that it's almost Thanksgiving. I know it's been chilly out there. I like the cold. I know some people don't. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, though, so I'm really excited for that next week. And that means Christmas is right around the corner. Hopefully, we're gonna have our tree up soon.

I am a especially since becoming a father,

I am

kind of a sucker for Christmas. I I I admit it. I used to be a Scrooge.

I am now an absolute sucker for Christmas. So I hope everybody is having a great holiday season, And I think we've got a fair bit of new people tuning in.

And I think that because as I'm looking at my analytics, which I don't trust a whole lot because I don't know. When you get into analytics, it gets funky, and you never really know what you're tracking when you get down to it. But

it seems like people are downloading older episodes, so my guess is is that you're new to the show. You've gone back, and you started going through the archives and listening to old shows, which is great. And, that's awesome. So if you are new, welcome. Hope you stick around.

And if you are new, let me tell you what we're doing here. We're gonna go over some news, and then we're gonna get into our interview, and then we will wrap everything up with some events

from around the county.

So with all of that said, let's get into it. We're gonna start with some news from the county as a whole. The public defender's office has been renovated and expanded, and there was a ribbon cutting on the on the eighteenth

to dedicate these new offices.

The project more than doubled the public defender's office space, adding 1,200 square feet. The state of Ohio also covered more than 90% of the project's cost, which is pretty nice. So congratulations to the Clermont County Public Defender's Office for getting,

some new digs.

Hopefully, they're nice.

Next for the county, the northern lights have been visible. In Claremont County, there was a strong solar system that lit up the skies across much of The United States,

including our very own county. The aurora was visible from places like Milford, Loveland, and Batavia,

and the display happened because of a coronal mass ejection from the sun. Charged particles hit the Earth's atmosphere and produced bright pink, green, orange, red, all kinds of colors,

in the sky.

Scientists note that the sun is at the peak of its eleven year activity cycle, which is why auroras have been more frequent and visible further from the poles.

And

I absolutely love this part.

Space weather experts say we can likely expect more aurora events

in the near future as this active phase continues.

I gotta be honest with you. I think space weather expert is a made up job. I don't think that's a real job.

So I don't know.

I don't know. If you know a space weather expert, please get in touch because I would love to interview

a space weather expert. I'm I'm sorry. It just sounds like a made up job. I don't know what to tell you. So,

so, anyway, space weather experts aside, let's keep going.

Let's look at Loveland.

Loveland needs citizens to fill committee openings.

Any citizen of Loveland that wants to be considered for any board, commission, or committee

must complete an application and submit it to Misty Clark, clerk of counsel, by Monday, December 1. And I'll run through the commissions and,

committees

that are looking for people.

Then I'm not gonna go over descriptions of them, though, because that would that would take way too long. In the newsletter, though, I will link out to the notice, and I will link out to all the different committees so you can look through them and see if this if you live in Loveland, if this is something you might be interested in. So here are the commissions, committees, things like that that they are looking for citizens,

to become a part of.

There's the arts commission, the Beautification Committee, Board of Tax Review, Board of Zoning Appeals,

Civil Service Commission, Community Improvement Corporation,

Finance Commission,

Fire Department Board of Trustee Representative,

Hill Wagner Cemetery Preservation Committee,

historic preservation planning commission,

law and ordinance committee, and lighting district equalization

boards. So if you're interested in that and frankly, you know, if you've if you've been looking for a way to get involved, this seems like a great way of doing it. I can't imagine

there's a lot of work involved with this, but you'll you'll get your you'll get yourself into

city government, and you'll get yourself involved in Loveland. So if you live in Loveland and you've been looking for a way to maybe give back to your community or,

start doing doing more stuff in your community,

this seems like a really good way of doing that. So if you're interested,

check out the Loveland website, and I'm sure they'll tell you more on how to apply.

Also in Loveland, they will host the their

fifth annual Christmas tree lighting festival on Saturday, December 6 from four to 8PM

in historic downtown Loveland.

The centerpiece is a 60 foot pine tree decorated with around 2,500

lights and 250

ornament ornaments. That sounds gigantic.

The festival has family activities, seasonal entertainment treats, and participation from local businesses and community organizations.

There's also gonna be a gingerbread house contest for residents

and businesses. So if you are good at making gingerbread houses, this sounds like the contest for you.

It also sounds like a really, really nice

Christmassy thing, which as we've discussed, I love.

Alright. Let's look at Milford. They have an America two fifty ribbon cutting. On November 20, the historic Milford Mural at 5 Points Landing will be unveiled.

Again, all part of the America two fifty celebration.

The artist is Kate Albert, known for her folk art style and other murals, like, I think she's got one at Claremont County Fair, the fairgrounds,

Crome Conservatory, and she's got one at the museum center. So she is,

no stranger to murals.

So if you got nothing going on on the twentieth, check that out. I'm sure it's I'm sure it'd be really cool.

All the other ones have been really cool, so I I don't doubt that this one is too.

Moving on to Felicity. I this was one of my favorite bits of news, I think, this week. They've updated their procedure for parades.

You now need a permit to have a parade, or I guess previously you didn't. I guess anybody that just wanted to have a parade could, I don't know, just,

I guess, talk to the mayor and be like, hey. We're gonna have a parade.

But now you need a permit, so that's probably for the best.

I still like the idea of a town where you can just have a parade without any kind of paperwork. That sounds great. But

there are no fees for the application or the permit,

and anyone that wants to have a parade needs to go to the village office and fill out an application at least thirty days prior to the event.

There's also a list of rules that all permanent applicants will need to follow,

And I'm sure you can learn more about that at Felicity,

Felicity's website. But,

seems a little sad to me that you can't just have an impromptu parade in Felicity now, but probably for the best because you don't want, you know, wild crazy parades happening all the time.

Luckily, Felicity is a small place, so,

I can't imagine they had a whole lot of parades to deal with. Anyway, let's get on from parades and look at Union Township.

The Union Township board of trustees is going to hold a public hearing on Tuesday, December 9 at 6PM

in their regular session and again on Monday, December 15 at 6PM

in a special session at the Union Township Civic Center to consider and receive public comment

regarding the adoption of a resolution levying

an additional annual license tax in the amount of $5

on the operation of motor vehicles on the public roads and highways in the township for any authorized

purpose. The proposed

effective date for the collection of this license tax is 01/01/2027.

So if you've got an opinion about that tax,

I would show up to, either the regular session or the special session and

voice your opinion.

Also, out of Union Township,

there was a zoning hear hearing that,

about a proposal

to reuse the vacant former Big Lots Toys R Us at 4585

Eastgate Boulevard

as

a single AutoZone

store about 42,000

square feet on 4.25

acres

in the main Eastgate commercial corridor. Now the plan kept the existing building at it,

kept the existing building. I'm sorry.

And would have added facade upgrades and things like that. And after a mall the mall easement expires in 2030, it would remove 78 parking spaces and convert the area into a new green space slash pocket park

type thing.

And I mentioned this before, but the site is constrained by a mall easement

slash operating agreement and that is valid through 2030,

and it's already blocked previous redevelopment

attempts.

Now you might have noticed that I was using the past tense in this story, and that's because the hearing was held on the eighteenth,

and it was denied.

So it does not look like there will be an auto zone at that Big Lots Toys R Us location. And I don't know if that was because of the mall easement or operating agreement. I don't know the details of that. But if somebody does, let me know.

I know they're really trying to figure out that whole Eastgate Mall thing and and what to do with it. So I'd love to hear from somebody in Union Township, Eastgate area, kinda boots on the ground, what's going on there.

But let's keep trucking. We're gonna look at Pierce Township.

The Pierce Township board of trustees

honored nine first responders,

and one civilian for saving the life of a four year old boy. Now this boy nearly drowned in a backyard swimming pool, which PSA, if you have kids and a backyard swimming pool, be super careful.

I mean, it doesn't even have to be

I know with my little kids, if I don't pay attention to them for a second, they can get themselves in pretty big trouble. So just a PSA. Got kids, got a swimming pool, be careful. But in this particular story,

the boy nearly drowned in a backyard swimming pool and was pulled from the water

by his father with no pulse and no breathing. The boy's father flagged down, and I really hope I get, this person's first name right, Jeraca Hazelbaker,

who had CPR training, luckily,

and she began res resuscitation

efforts.

Pierce Township officer Dustin Wade arrived, continued CPR, and fire personnel, including

lieutenant Elijah Hammonds and firefighter Kevin Barkley the third,

arrived within minutes and continued advanced care.

Child was transported to Cincinnati Children's, stabilized after several days in intensive care, and released October

31.

So I'm at least I'm happy. I don't if you're not happy that the child's okay,

then you should probably seek help. But

so, the trustees, Pierce Township trustees presented public service commendations

to all first responders involved,

and Hazel Baker received a civilian

certif certificate of recognition.

So thank you to all of the first responders and Juraka, who I really hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly.

That's a really nice story, and I'm really glad that that had a a happy ending because,

boy, that could

be that could be tragic.

And another quick PSA,

if you've got a little bit of time, do some CPR training. It's not hard to do. I took I had someone I was 13, and this is gonna be an embarrassing story. I took a babysitting class.

I never babysat anybody after it, and I I think,

if I remember my motives, I was 13,

and there were a lot of girls that took that class. So,

you know, that's just kind of what 13 year old boys do.

However, I let my raging hormones make a good choice because

I know CPR.

I should probably take a refresher, but not hard to do, and it saves lives. So if you have the means to do it, go, go learn how to do CPR.

It can it can really make a difference. And the Heimlich, that can make a difference too. So alright. Enough public safety announcements.

Still in Pierce Township. There will be a public hearing on December 1 at the Pierce Township Administrative

Building, and it is to approve, deny, or approve with conditions

the recommendation of the Pierce Township Zoning Commission. The commission is requesting a text amendment

to the zoning resolution

to establish a zoning overlay for development nodes along State Route 125. Now

zoning overlay for development nodes typically set special rules

like uses density design access, stuff like that for targeted areas. So here, it's gonna be along State Route 125,

and it's gonna shape how that corridor

develops.

So think of it like a zoning blanket that you put on top of an area, and then you set rules that are kind of special and unique

to that area.

All materials about this are avail available for review at the Pierce Township Administration

Building. And if you wanna know what's going on or you wanna voice your concern or your approval of this,

go to that meeting. Things like this are special because if I'm guessing this is 125, like, around Amelia where all those businesses are, This is really gonna

do a lot to shape how that develops and what kind of business is going there. So if you live in Pierce Township and you are concerned about that 125 business corridor,

go there. Listen to what they're doing. Make recommendations.

All good

stuff. Let's move on to Batavia Township.

We're looking at the, aftermath of the removal of article 30 of 36, which was part of the zoning resolution that allowed the township to do planned

developments, the township's now gonna have to revisit development rules from scratch.

It has no local zoning regulations in effect, which raises questions about how future development proposals will be handled in the short term.

Township officials say they will draft a new, clearer, and more community friendly zoning code with a focus on public input,

transparency,

and avoiding the kinds of conflict that led to the referendum.

Because if you recall, there was a referendum on the ballot to remove article 36 from the zoning resolution for Batavia Township.

It was handily defeated.

People really didn't want that anymore. So now the township's gotta go back to the drawing board. The process to write the new code is expected to involve multiple public hearings,

legal review, and planning input, and could take many months before a new set of rules is adopted. And just as an FYI, I have emailed Taylor Corbett, the zoning director at the township, and just let him know that whenever he's ready to come on and talk about what they're doing,

we'll be happy to have him because I'd like to hear what they're thinking and how they're they're gonna work through this process and what might potentially replace article 36.

And I imagine a lot of people in the township would be interested in that too. So stay tuned. We will probably get Taylor on in the future to talk about what's going on,

post article 36.

And last but not least, my absolute favorite place for village updates, the one, the only,

New Richmond, Ohio.

I I love their website updates because they are you know, normally, you'd get some kind of I don't wanna say fluffy, but press releases can be kind of fluffy and, you know, you put in things and they're long and they don't need to be that long. Whoever's doing it in New Richmond, man, they don't care about that at all. It's just just the facts, ma'am.

So New Richmond don't ever change. Alright. And

I'm going to read

these verbatim because I I just love these so much. So, anyway,

the first is a Liberty Landing update.

Currently,

Pruss and the subcontractors

continue to install

the new permanent Ohio River sheet pile wall for the next several weeks, which enlarges and enhances the plaza area on Front Street.

Once all the sheet piling is installed, the wall will be backfilled

and tieback anchors will begin.

Also, they will also soon begin the installation of the underground utilities within the Front Street corridor

sanitary and stormwater improvements.

So,

it sounds like Liberty Landing is coming along. So good for you, New Richmond.

And the last one from New Richmond,

River Valley Boulevard paving has been completed.

That's it. So so River Valley Boulevard

is now completely paved.

New Richmond, I love your updates. Please never change. Whoever is writing these for you needs a raise. I promise you. It's wonderful.

Okay.

Alright. That's all the news we got for today. And we don't have any producers to thank, which is fine. But we are still running a holiday special from now until January 1, half off donation special. Producers that donate $25 and above will get a special mention on the show,

and you can tack on a short holiday message. And when I say short, I mean a well constructed sentence.

I'm not gonna read off a paragraph long sentence about, you know, all the people in your life and your dog and whatever,

that you wanna wish a Merry Christmas to.

Not because I'm a Scrooge as we've established. I'm certainly not.

But it wouldn't be fair for anybody that might donate 200 and above.

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However and we'll actually

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we're doing this because this is a value for value podcast. And that means when you listen to the show, you decide what it is worth, and you return that value back to the show in the form of time, talent, or treasure. And this is important. It's what keeps us independent, keeps us focused on the things that matter to you, and keeps us focused on Clermont County and not on clicks or, you know, trying

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Just tell people about the podcast. Tell people that you get value out of this podcast, and tell them they should listen to it.

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And I've been, asking two other things. What is the character of our county? Write in and tell me. We've got a lot of development pressure here. And if we want to preserve the character of our county, our townships, our villages, whatever the case may be, we have to define that. If we don't know what that character is, we won't know what we're trying to preserve,

and

we're just gonna get angry about everything.

So write in. Let me know what you think.

And if you are interested in ascending in a high school sports rundown,

get in touch, and we will figure that out. I love high school sports, especially high school football,

but I just don't have the time to keep my eye on it. If you do and that's something you like, please get in touch so I can put a little sports rundown in here somewhere, and we'll figure out how to get that done.

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What normally would be 50 would just get you a special show mention.

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And we got that newsletter,

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Click the newsletter tab. Put your email in there. We only email you once a week when that show comes out, and we've got some other goodies in there. And like I've prom like I promised,

I think I found a way to spice up that newsletter a little bit and give you a reason to sign up for it.

I am

trying

to create a Clermont County crossword puzzle, and it's not gonna be like those those silly crossword puzzles

that you get in, like, elementary school. They're super easy. No. No. No. No. This is a real deal crossword puzzle. It is 21 by 21,

and it's gonna be hard.

And it's gonna be themed, like, Clermont theme, and there's gonna be Clermont specific clues. And there's gonna be some generic clues because it would be impossible to make all of them Clermont County specific.

But

as a whole, as a theme and and

the big clues, those are all gonna be Clermont County specific. So I think that's pretty cool. And I've started constructing the first one. It is not easy, I gotta tell you. But I'm hoping it gets a little easier the more I do, and I'm hoping to have the very first one to ship out next week to everybody. And if you solve it, if you're on the email list and you get it and you solve it, send it in. And I'll give a shout out on the podcast to the first person that gets it all right because I think that would be that would be fun.

I also this week, I need

to, do a make good. Because last week, I said, in the newsletter,

I would put some videos of interviews with Ken Geiss, who's the Batavia Village administrator. If you remember from last week, we talked about

some of the development

around

Batavia,

and I got a little opinionated about the things that are going on or at least my not maybe not opinionated, but I gave some of my views around it because a producer wrote in and asked

what I thought.

So I thought I'd tell everybody what I thought.

But I talked about Ken Geist because nobody from the village has

agreed to come on the show.

But Ken Geist is the one who is,

to my knowledge I mean, the whole council is, but he's really driving the village's

economic development

strategies and execution policy, things like that.

And he doesn't do

I don't think he does any interviews. He's he's only done a handful of them, and I found some. So

that's a very long winded make good. I'm gonna put,

two interviews that I found with him,

on in the newsletter, and then there's an investigative report that was done in his time in Union Township.

I will put those videos in the newsletter as well,

if you're interested in his background because

that's really the only way to know anything about him. Unless you I don't I don't know. I guess you could

see see if he wants to get lunch with you or something, but I don't know. That that would probably be odd. In

any event, that's all we got for the newsletter.

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It helps the show out a lot, but it's gonna help you out because you'll be notified whenever there's a new show.

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Info @let'stalkclaremont.com.

Send your message in. I would love to hear from you.

Alright. Let's talk about some interviews.

Next Thursday, which is gonna be Thanksgiving. I can't happy Thanksgiving.

Oh, man. I'm

I'm really, really excited for Thanksgiving. Anyway, next Thursday,

our interview is gonna be with Taylor

oh, man. Her last name. Johengman.

Taylor, I really hope I got that right if you're listening.

I I know I didn't get it right the first time I said her name. In any event,

she said most people call her Jo, so we're gonna go with Jo. But she's training sled dogs for she for, dry land mushing, which

you'll learn all about in the interview. It's pretty cool.

I didn't know dry land mushing was a thing at all. It is.

But we talk about how she trains the dogs, and she shares some stories from past races. And I actually did the interview before all that election madness. And since I did the first interview,

she's come back from competing at the world, like the world dry,

dry land dog mushing competition, which was held in The United States for the very first time ever this year. And I haven't talked to her about that yet, but I'm gonna do a follow-up interview with her on Monday, next Monday. So that will also be part of the episode. So you get to hear, you know, where she was as she was preparing,

for worlds, and then you'll hear her experience at worlds. And I'm excited to hear how it went. I haven't talked to her about it much at all, just to schedule the interview on Monday. So I'm excited to hear how that went. And she's a really cool person, so I think you'll like the interview.

But today, we are talking with Dave Carraway, owner of Sons of Toil Brewery.

And, yes, I know that Sons of Toil is not in Claremont,

but I figured it's close enough, and they sell beer at the Bean and Brew. So,

we're we're gonna be a little lax with the boundaries of Claremont sometimes if there's someone interesting doing something somewhere.

We're gonna we're gonna bend

bend our geography a little bit.

Also, I do wanna say, I have tried to get in touch with Paradise Brewing out there in Williamsburg,

but I haven't had any luck. If somebody could put me in touch with them, I'd love to do an interview with them.

Because, actually, fun fact, I bought my first mead brewing supplies

from Paradise

when they had that brew store, which I think was on 01/25. I'm not I can't remember exactly where it was.

But, anyway, enough about Paradise because we're talking about Sons of Toil.

In our interview, we talked today about how he started Sons of Toil, the brewing process,

and what it's like starting and growing a business. I mean, it's it's not an easy thing to do.

So it was interesting to talk to him about that. And we talked about some of the events they had. They have a stand up comedy there. I had no idea. I think they even had a murder mystery party. I don't know.

They do a lot of really cool events out there that sound really fun. So

and overall, I enjoy talking to him. It's always fun talking to somebody who brews like that professionally because

I do it, you know, as an amateur, and it's fun, but it's really nice to hear a professional's perspective. And he's just a really nice guy, and he's got a really cool brewery. So I enjoyed the conversation, and I hope you do too.

So we're recording. Okay. And the way I start all of these is just tell us who you are and what you do. Okay.

I go by Dave, Dave Caraway.

I'm a brewery owner.

I don't brew so much these days. We have a brewer that we hired from,

Cincinnati State's brewing science program. Nice. And so,

right now, I do more, you know, management and fix stuff that's broken and, you know, I get my head in on new recipes and that kind of thing. But,

that's basically what I do. And you're with Sons of Toil. Right? Oh, absolutely. Sons of Toil Brewing. Yeah. Let's get that in there.

Sons of Toil Brewing out here on Klein Road in Mount Norville, Ohio. One exit, on, past 68 if you're going east. So you're not in Clermont County, but you're you're pretty close. And you sell into Clermont County. Right? Yeah. We do. We distribute some at Bean And Brew Yep. In, Batavia, and we have,

some other places that we

distribute to.

Not so much in Clermont right now. It seems like we're in Hamilton or we're in Yeah. Highland or We got into Hamilton, like, in Cincinnati? Yeah.

Couple places strange places.

There's an Ameri stop out in on Resortle. You know? They'll so

just kinda it basically, if they ask ask us, we'll distribute there. So

but we haven't really done a big push on trying to get into distribution so much. I imagine that's a whole new game. It's a whole new game, and Yeah. And, it's one that we really haven't explored too much. That's something for the future. Yeah. And we've talked about canning and that kind of thing. But, right now like, yeah. Yeah. Getting out there in cans. But, right now, we sell bombers out of our taproom. Okay. That's about the and howlers and growlers too, of course, for the go beer. I mean, with canning too, that's a whole like, you need machinery, and I'm sure there's new health regulations. And Yeah. There's a lot to it. Yeah. You know, Barcodes

and labeling and Yeah. Yeah.

So how did you how did this whole thing start?

I think it started out of the love of beer for me, I guess, over thirty years now.

There was no craft,

and I enjoyed drinking

European style beers, beers from around the world. A place called Uno's was around back then, a pizzeria that had a 100 beers bottles of beers from the world. Chicago deep dish stuff. Right? Yeah. And so after work, we'd stop in, and we'd try two that we hadn't tried before, you know, that kind of thing. Yeah. Tried to get around the world eventually with those 100 beers.

But, yeah, I just didn't care for the regular

lagers, you know, those Yeah. The street street lagers. And so,

the European styles, and then I really couldn't afford to spend a lot of money on beer. So

the obvious choice was to start making it yourself, and you couldn't make that style of beer, you know, at your house. So so did you start it off with lagers? Oh, I'm sorry. No. No. No. No. Started off with just, porters and stouts and and, not really lagers. Lagers just take take I was gonna say that that's a different kind of thing. It's a different animal. Yeah.

So no ales and stouts and porters, that type thing. And,

then after

after a certain period of time, then I got pretty good at brewing home brewing.

And

my son used to help me bottle the beer when we were, you know, right there in the kitchen. And Yeah. And,

then he,

graduated

college with

a science degree and started brewing with me. Yeah. And so the beer got a lot better when we brought science into the game. Yeah. It was pretty good before, but when he started helping me brew, we got a lot better. And we used to do I bet the consistency is what really

consistency. Yeah. I bet that that from

prescience, you would say, to post science is that, like, scientific process of tracking everything. And Yeah. Yeah. You you get to worry about oxidation and things that you didn't worry about before because we just brew it and drink it. You know? And then we started brewing, and we used to go on what we call brewcations

Yeah. And, go to a lot of different breweries when we were on vacation.

And one day, he just said, hey. You know what, dad? He said,

our stuff's as good as what we're drinking at these breweries. He said, we should just do this. And so we started looking for property, and that was the impetus that started Sunset Oil Brewing. So what what did you do before you were a brewery owner and slash brewers? I was an electrician.

Okay.

Worked for Ford Motor Company. Nice. Yeah. And,

it's robotics training and that kind of thing there as well. But, yeah, it was my background. So what was the first beer you ever ever brewed? Do you remember?

I believe it was something that I got from,

we called him home homeboy, home Homer homeboy. He had a,

a shop.

It was over in Blue Ash, a little little tiny hole in the wall.

And twenty, thirty years ago, those weren't very common. No. No. They weren't. And so Homer Soman, that was the guy's name, and, went there and bought it was a light,

ale

that had won some awards

in

I don't know.

Not Ireland, but somewhere European had won some awards, and he had the recipe and the stuff that you needed to make it, so that was the first one. And it actually turned out pretty good the first time around. But You hear a lot of people, their first beers are terrible. Yeah. Well, we had tried wine making before the beer because we had fruit trees and stuff, so we always tried, you know, wine making. So we had a little bit of the idea

of of how we kind of understand fermentation. Yes. I mean, that's once, like, the temperature and the time and Yeah. And that kind of stuff. All critical elements. Yeah. And once you understand fermentation, it's like the whole world of

beer and wine and bread and everything just kinda opens up to you. Yeah. That's true. No.

That's absolutely true. So what were some of the,

I guess, you'd say early challenges that you that you had to figure out

in home brewing? Because I'm gonna ask you about business. Was

bottles. I mean, you know, we would we to to get the bottles, we weren't sure, you know, how to get the bottles that we could cap because everything was twist off and that type of thing.

So, I found these long necks from Rolling Rock,

and they were they were ones that you'd find in the bar. Mhmm. So I asked the guy in the bar where they came from, and he said he got them from a distributor. So I went downtown town to where

the bottles went back to,

and I said, how much for a a box of he said, well, we we charged $2

deposit.

And so I said, okay. Can I buy 20 boxes for $40? Yeah. And so that's how we got the bottles to start with. That was one of the challenges. So they were old

they were old Rolling Rock bottles? They were returnables Okay. That they used in the bars that you couldn't buy them from a store. They were just returnables that they took to the bars. Uh-huh. So they would take them out. Now I gotta say the first time I went through them, there was, you know, cigarette butts Yeah. Yeah. Chewing gum, everything

inside these things. I put a lot of things in empty beer bottles.

Yeah. Exactly. I bet that was kind of a nightmare to clean all that out. Yeah. Because you have to be pretty sterile through the whole process. Yeah. Yeah. I guess not sterile, but sanitary.

Yeah. Yeah. That's true.

So so did when you started out, I assume you didn't start out all grain.

No. No. No. We started out extract. Did you move into all grain? Yes. Yes. What was that transition like?

It wasn't too difficult. It's just the equipment. Yeah. We got, we bought a set of kegs that were modified Mhmm. You know, old 15.5

half barrels.

And, we used those, and we had three of them. And,

two with burners and one without. Mhmm. We used as a mash tun with the with the just took some insulation and put around it. Yeah. Bubble bubble wrap type thing.

And, but, yeah, that was it was it was different. You know? I didn't know what laudering was. I didn't know, you know, how you had to you capture the the sweet sugars that come off of when you rinse them through. And so, yeah, it was a And, actually, we might wanna back up and just explain

what all grain versus not all grain, what that actually means. Well, the when you do,

extract brewing, that that part of the the job is done for you. You just take the extract.

You just put it in a pot with some water, and you boil it, and then you ferment that. That's your wort,

which is the that product. It's like a grain tea almost. Yes. A grain tea ferment. Exactly. And then when you use all grain, you take the actual grains,

you grind the grains,

crack them to a specification,

and then you heat those up,

and you run rinse water through those, and you collect that

liquid wort

that goes into your brew kettle. So And and you have to extra step. And the temperature is extremely important there. Right? Yes. Temperature is extremely important for your process depending on what you wanna do, and you can get into a myriad of

different concoctions that you have to do. Well, I've seen Concoctions. Yes. Okay.

I've seen because I do mead. And so, you know, you just go into the brewing world and you learn about all different kinds of things.

Meat is far different than beer. It's actually much easier. You just stick a bunch of honey water in a bucket and throw some yeast in it. So good. It's really delicious.

Problem with me is is it's commercially, it's so expensive because honey is not cheap. That's true. So, like, your base products are to get a really good mead,

you wanted to do it commercially, you'd have

to charge a lot for bottles of mead. And they do. They do. They do.

Whenever you know, you get into it and you see people brewing beer, and it's like, you know, you gotta hold it at one sixty for half an hour and then bring it down to one fifty for forty five minutes to catch all these different

enzymes and because that's what you're trying to do is just release these enzymes and sugars. It's true. Because the starch, right, it's if you just put a bunch of grain in a bucket and boiled it, you'd just get oatmeal. Yeah. And all none of the starches would break into sugar. Right. And then there's all kinds of trip tricks of adjuncts that you use, like, you know, use rice hulls Mhmm. To keep that spacing in there so when you you don't have a gelatinous Yeah. Did you ever has that ever happened to you where you Oh, absolutely. Grain and they're all absolutely.

Yeah. There's bunch of porridge. You know, maybe maybe the grind is too fine there or or there it's a big beer with a lot of grain. Yeah. And that you know, the compaction that happens.

Yeah. There's all kinds of situations that will cause problems.

And but once you get through a certain,

recipe,

then you know the pitfalls. You can make adjustments and then everything. It's pretty much just a

cookie cutter after that. Yeah. It's, you know, it's just like anything else. You you gotta fail a couple of times Yeah. Before you get it right. Yeah.

So you talked about watering. What is that? That's that process,

where you where you rinse the grains and you collect that. Yeah. Okay. That's called watering when you collect that, wort, and then you put that in the the brew kettle. So if somebody was interested in getting into home brewing, where would you suggest they start?

There's some really good books,

that that I use that I think are still viable today.

The Joy of Homebrewing is the one that really stands out, and there's some others as well. And there's some really nice programs now.

Beersmith is one.

I think there's another one I'm forgetting. I haven't used it.

Do you have, like, an app or an app? Yeah. And it and it helps you with all those things that you were just talking about. It kinda guides you through those processes. It makes it easier for you. You put your recipe in. You can tell what your final ABV is gonna be Yeah. When you set it Which is important. Yeah. Yeah. Unless you wanna make, like, a 10% beer. And maybe you do. Maybe you do.

Says the mead maker. Yeah. I was gonna

yeah. I'll tell you when I make mead, I try to just get it as dry and as high as I can. Yeah. Because that's I don't know. I just don't like sweet

drinks. Yeah. So Yeah. You know, and that's that's what's nice about brewing at home, which you get to make what you like. You know? True. So what what's the kind of cost associated with home brewing? Because I imagine it can

be simple all the way up to complex.

The I mean

You don't have to give actual Yeah. And I don't I don't really even know what the cost would be to get into to it today. It was so long ago when I bought that equipment, but,

I'm thinking you could probably get in with a with, an all grain set up for less than a couple grand Yeah. For for everything you'd need, burners and,

you know,

your kegs and the whole nine yards. After that, I imagine it's just time. Yeah. It's just time. How long does it take to to brew,

like, an all grain beer?

The actual brew itself? Well, like, you know, getting it ready, fermenting it. Oh, okay. Well, the brew day is a few hours. It's set up and and cleaning and tear down even beyond what you're doing. So I'm thinking brew day is probably gonna take you five hours, six hours, maybe, something like that. Again, that's probably depending on the quantity. Depending on the quantity. Yeah. If you're just a 10 gallon type of thing. And then,

and then it takes

I mean, we've had stuff ferment out in six, seven days. Yeah. And then

depending on if if you're adding and you're dry hopping, that kind of thing as you move forward, it could be as long as three weeks for for an a o or

an IPA or whatever.

But, of course, lagers can take longer because it takes longer for the fermentation

process.

So you talked about hops,

or you mentioned hops. Can we talk about hops? Because that's a whole world into itself, isn't it? Yeah.

Well, I guess for the first question then would be, what what is the purpose of hops? Like, why do why do people actually put hops in their beer? Well, it's a bittering. You you put and and it it adds,

aroma.

It adds flavor.

Of course, it adds

qualities that keep your beer stable. Mhmm.

And the old story about the where the IPAs came from was and they shipped this beer to India. India Pale Ale. Yes. Yeah. And they they really loaded it full of hops because it they needed to make the journey Yeah. And stay viable. So that's where the India pale ale came from.

But,

the hops these days,

the they're proprietary

hops and and for the most part, when you start start talking about Citra and some of these proprietary hops, they can only be grown,

by the companies that created those Really? I just thought that. Yeah. So you can't grow them locally. It's it's illegal to grow. You couldn't grow that particular strain of hops. Yes. That's correct. And those are the ones that people use for their IPAs and that kind of thing. Okay. And, of course, there's new ones being developed all the time. So what if I'm making a beer, what how do I and, honestly, this is kind of a selfish question because

I tried to and it turned out alright. I dry hopped a mead.

It was a kind of a low alcohol mead, and then I

carbonated it. And I liked it, but I'd I when I started looking at the hops, I just had no idea

where to even start because there's just so many of them. Yeah. And I don't know anything about hops.

There's there's a chart that shows the different varieties, the main varieties, and it tells you what to expect

from

as far as flavor, as far as aroma. Mhmm. So you can look those up Okay. And get an idea.

You know, there's just

any like I said,

there there's so many hops now as opposed

to back in the day when I first started was the old world hops, and it was just the regular

saws and the tenanger

and, you know, the just this just the

the old world hops. Yeah. And then these new ones started coming along, and now it's just crazy. Yeah. So how do how do you pick hops? How do I mean, is there

what kind of hops do you I mean, I guess I don't want you to give away secrets. We no. No. No. We use, we use a lot of old world hops still because I make a lot of old world style beers. Mhmm. But when you start getting the IPAs and some creative new stuff that you're coming out with,

I I go to those those, sources

that tell me what kind of flavor and aroma to expect, and I'll try to pair that with the type of beer that I'm brewing.

So as you went from

home brewer

to commercial brewery owner, what was that transition like? Like, what were some of the difficulties

that you had to overcome?

I think equipment was probably the biggest.

You know, when you've got a a a 10 gallon batch and you're trying to cool it down to get it to ferment,

to to get it to where you can pitch the yeast, you try to do that as quickly as possible.

You run it through a small chiller plate and

it's cold enough. It's only five gallons because I was I was taking 10 and go into two separate five gallon batches so I could try different yeast in each Yeah. Yeah. Five gallon batch.

But when you've got a 100 gallons or 200 gallons and you're trying to cool it down,

You know, we tried,

a whole different types of things. The little chill plates just didn't get the job done. We hadn't didn't have the money to buy the big chill plate. Yeah. So we were running it through, like, a cooler with coils, and we would throw ice at it. It would melt. It was just it was a battle to try to figure out some of these processes that needed to be done, but, eventually, we came around and figured it out. Yeah.

Well, that's good. Yeah. So, really, it's just an issue of scale. It's like, you know, when you make a 10 gallon something,

it's not that difficult. But when you scale it to a 100 gallons Yeah. That was probably the big thing. Because the brewing equipment, I'm it's not cheap, like a commercial brewing equipment. No.

And I think my electrical background helped a little bit in some of that. Just as an example,

when you get the beer into the fermenter, you have to keep it at a certain temperature

for a long period of time.

And so

large breweries usually what they call it,

a chiller they use for,

a glycol chiller. Yeah. Yeah. And so I came up with this idea

where you took a

a window air conditioner

Yeah.

And you took the coils and you bed them and you put them inside of a big cooler Yeah. And then you put your glycol in the cooler with a sump pump. Yeah. And then I set up these controllers that when you needed to cool down the firm air, it would call for it, and then the air conditioner would kick on and cool the liquid down and circulate it through the fermenter. Yeah. So that unit cost me about 4 or $500

to build.

A glycol chiller was about four grams. Yeah. That's I I love hearing stories like that because I did. It's not just for brewers, but it's I interviewed a guy who owns a mushroom farm, I think, around Goshen area. Yeah. It's the same kind of thing. Yeah. Like, he just started out loving growing mushrooms,

and then he had kind of a carpentry background. Yeah. So he's building hoppers and his things, and he's just Yeah. Because the equipment's expensive, you gotta find a way

to make these things sometimes. You do. You have to be creative. And so, you know, we found a lot of ways like that to be creative. What were some of the other, creative kinda hacks you use? We had a

we we actually got

a a keg washer

from

Northern Row, which came from,

Rheinggeist

originally. Okay. And it was outdated.

The pumps were three phase. We didn't have three phase.

The PLC that was in there was outdated. We couldn't really get into it to program it.

So we ripped that out, and we put in a little touch screen.

And I programmed that, and that's how we got our keg washer going. We put new new tanks on it, new pumps, and the whole nine yards. So that was another thing that we did that saved us a lot of money. And, you know, washing kegs,

Yeah. We had a little manual thing that you turn valves and you'd run the pump, and you had to do set on the almost on the floor and Yeah. Run all these valves independently.

So that saved us a lot of time.

The washing, that's the one thing when I got into brewing. A lot of that. Oh, man. I've washed so many bottles. Yeah. Just because, you you know, the bottles aren't cheap, so as as a home brew, you wanna reuse them and Yeah. And, man, just hours in the sink just rinsing these things out, trying to figure out how to dry them.

Oh, yeah. That's where your young children come in handy.

I'm really I'm I'm I can't wait till that moment

when our kids are old enough where it's like, you go cut the grass. You go do this for me. Yeah. I'm just I'm waiting. I I guess I want little slaves is what I want.

So what's your favorite style to brew?

Well,

I like Oh, break it up style to brew and style to drink. Okay. Well,

I like the easy stuff. So I like the browns and the and the the heffies and the

the stouts really are are pretty cool unless you get something really, like, a high gravity style, which you use a lot of grain. Those are kinda tough.

But, yeah, those things are pretty easy to brew, and, so that's, you know, Kolsch.

Yeah.

And even the pineapple heffi, which is one of our more popular beers, is easy to brew. It's just the fruit additions later. Yeah. You know? Well, actually, could you talk about fruit addition? How how does that

work with with beer? Like, when when do you add it and or what challenges do you have with adding kind of a fruit to a beer?

Well,

it's it's a challenge,

but,

you you need to make sure your fruit is aseptic. You need to make sure that it's a purified

form of fruit, and then you add that into the fermenter. Yeah. And then Do you have to worry about pectin?

Not so much. Okay. Yeah. You're you know, when you add fruit, you you

you resign yourself to the fact that you're gonna have some haze. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then I,

again, I'm I feel like I'm just asking you questions about brewing

because I've run into these issues.

But it the haze is trying to get rid of that haze. Yeah. Yeah. But, that's not a problem. When when you got a fruited beer, people expect to see that fruit in there, and they expect that taste. So Yeah. Well, fair enough.

So what

what's the favorite beer that you brew? Like, what what do you like drinking that you make here?

I probably drink the,

the porter, the American porter.

I love a good porter. It always it always changes,

you know, with the seasons, with what's going on, but I like our hazy. I think our hazy IPA, New England IPA is is really good. I enjoy drinking that.

I like our mango habanero, which I think we've got the heat just right on that Yeah. Over time.

That's tough to get heat in a beer too. Yeah. Yeah. It's Heat is anything is tough. It's a really niche beer too. We have people coming from

distances to buy that beer. Really? Because it's so unique.

And, of course, I like, you know, just the the English brown, which we recently won a gold medal for in the world in the US Open beer championships. Congratulations. I didn't know that. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. So it's one of my favorites too. It was one of those that when we were brewing at home, we did the 10 gallon

all grain,

and I brewed five gallon, then I put American

yeast in, and then the other five, I put the English yeast in. So we let people try it, and they all like the English brown. So

that's how the English brown got here. Nice. Well, then I'm glad you brought up yeast again because I would like to talk about yeast. What kind what kinds of yeasts are you using?

A lot of different types of yeast. Yeah. And we use that per style. Like, with the English brown, we use an English style yeast.

Americans, we use American style yeast.

IPAs,

you know,

sometimes we'll just use a standard dry nice dry yeast for that.

For our New England's, there's special yeast to get that hazy

final product. Yeah. I think it was I think it's Lavalin. I think that's how you pronounce it. They they mainly do wine yeast, but I downloaded an entire

PDF of all their yeasts, and it's just the world of and that's just one company. Yeah. That's not those that's not even ale yeasts or Yeah. Or anything like that. Yeah. The whole I mean, it's all I I think it's a lot like hops is

and, again, a lot of it's just experimentation is is using like you said, you'd have one five gallon, another five gallon, use different yeast. Find out which one you like the best, which one the customer likes the best. You know? We we listen to our customers.

Yeah.

They're the they're your they're your best resource. Yeah. Whether something's good or not, they're gonna tell you the truth. Yeah.

So what do you I guess there's so many different beers and so many different yeast you use with those beers.

I guess the more appropriate question would be,

what is it about different yeasts

that give beers different characteristics,

if that makes sense?

Well, that's a good question.

Yeast is

is bred and derived for specific applications, and it's we we rely on those people that do that to

to give us what we need

to get certain flavors, phenolics, and Yeah. You know? That's kinda what I was getting at. You know, esters and things like that. You get different flavors of different yeast. It's all written out. Yeah. You know exactly what to expect, and they do a good job as as long as you keep them at the proper temperature. I was about to say that too. Yeah. Is the temperature super important for these different yeasts?

It's like with lagers. I mean, you ferment at a lot lower temperature,

and then you go through,

variance.

You know, as it's fermenting, you raise the temperature, then you lower until you get to the point where you crash it Yeah. And carbon.

So have you noticed have you played around with temperature a lot with different yeasts?

Again, this is a selfish question because I've

We have some. In baking bread,

you can do a cold ferment overnight, and that'll typically add a lot more flavor to your bread. Mhmm.

I'd suspect it's the same

with

wine yeast.

I just haven't played around with that yet. Just trying to take, like, a a a brew

and fermented

at, like, the very lower limit of what the yeast can handle.

It'll take a longer time, but, you know, I don't know if you've ever experimented with that. We pretty much follow guidelines Yeah. On yeast.

Of course, one one thing we have kinda played with is our Hefeweizens.

If you ferment at a warmer temperature, you get more of the banana flavor versus the clove and that kind of thing. So we have we play with that a little bit, but for the most parts, we follow guidelines.

So sons of toil.

I love that name. Where did that come from?

It came from the Brown County history book. Okay. There was an excerpt, and they were talking about the people that,

that came into this land, and they they ditched and drained. And, you know, they were the immigrants. And if it were not for those horny handed sons of toil, then this land would never have been,

peopled Yeah. Yeah. Is is the line, I think. And so we got, not only, our

brewery name, but we got a beer name out of it. Yeah. The horny handed ale and sons of toilet brewing.

Gotta be careful with that name. Right? That might have been something a little bit different back in eighteen hundreds. I don't know horny handed. You know? It's rough. It's rough. Hard work. Yeah. That's yes. Definitely. That means hard work. Yes. Yes.

Yes. But, yeah, that's where it came from. My daughter found that in the Brown County history books, and, and we really liked it too because

we were all,

from farming Yeah. Families and That's why I love the name. Yeah. Because you're out here in Yeah. On the Ourope, and there's farms all around. Farms all around, and everybody knows what it takes on a farm is a lot of hard work. Yeah. And the same to brew beer. It's Yeah. It's a lot of hard work. How many hours do you do you spend a day brewing beer? Well,

I don't brew anymore. Well, when you were? When I were, when I was brewing,

oh, I would say we brewed probably three or four times a week, and it it took us back then probably six six hours or more Yeah. To get through a brew. And then, of course, it's all the other stuff while you're doing it. You're cleaning fermenters and washing kegs and, you know, so it's really a constant

a lot of work. Yeah.

Because I've interviewed

a couple people that have owned owned their own businesses and businesses like this, you know, breweries, restaurants, mushroom farms.

And a lot of these businesses, I think you

it's kinda like guys when they're 40.

They'll sit around and go, oh, we should open a bar. That'll be great.

But they don't realize

how much work

owning something like hers.

Can you speak to that at all? Like, what, like, the

the dream versus the reality, I guess you'd say.

Oh, that's a good question. I I think I knew what I was getting into. I don't know that my son did. Yeah.

And I kept saying, are you sure you wanna do this? Because this is a lot of work. Yeah. And,

but we were both excited about it. And,

my wife, of course, is involved, and then we brought on a partner. And he also helped,

with the building and getting everything ready to go. He didn't have a brewing background, but he know he knew how to work. So,

so Which is really all you need. Yeah. Yeah. But we we kinda knew what we were up against, and,

and it's gotten easier, I think, as we went on even though you get a little bit bigger and you have more employees.

That part of it, I think, is I'm glad my son's handling that part because I don't

that's not my thing.

But, yeah, I think I think it's it's

it's been okay. Yeah.

Well, you know, I feel like to open a business like this or any business, really, you either gotta be

really dumb and know how to hard work hard, or you gotta really know what you're getting into Yeah. And be prepared for it. Yeah. I think we were that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, well, I think there's a lot of dumb might be the wrong word, but naive. You know? Yeah. Naive. I think that's a better word. But you're willing to work a whole lot. Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. That's

because it's not easy. Yeah. I mean, you've got a lot of stuff going on. So can you talk about the other things that go on around here? Because it's not it's you're not just a brewery. It seems like you've you've got events and things like that. Sure. Yeah.

We're we're we're really proud of the fact that we do work a lot with the community. We have a lot of fundraisers.

One of them that I always like to talk about is,

my best friend passed away of pancreatic cancer, and they started a fund, the Jim Young Memorial,

Jim Young Foundation.

And, so we do a chili cook off every year

with, Jim Young,

Foundation

at the and they come over, and they help us a lot. And we put on and we raise money for,

we pick a family or an individual

each year

for the proceeds to go to. And, so we do that. We we work with the, Georgetown,

Humane Society. Mhmm. Brown County Humane Society.

We have actually have that coming up in October.

But we do,

you know, a lot of fundraisers for a lot of various events. And and,

we also have events here where we have live music

on the weekends. We've had comedy shows. We've had You've had comedy shows. We have. We have that kind of on a regular basis. Like, every two, three months, we have a comedy group come through, and we sign them to come here and do it. So is it like stand up or or do they do it? Stand up, and it's we've had I mean, they've all been really, really good. Yeah.

We we talk people that come to them still talk about it coming here. Remember that one? Yeah. You know?

I imagine it'd be hard to find a stand a place to good good stand up out in Mount Horeb. Yeah. I mean, they're traveling

and we try to catch them when they're coming through. Yeah. We have one group that's out of Columbus that we sign them when we you know, in that interim if we can't find somebody,

and they're really good. They and they have somebody new with them each time. Okay.

And so that's always good. We've had recently had a,

a dinner a mystery dinner Oh, nice. Thing. Like a murder mystery thing? A murder mystery. I I went to one, but I was in my early twenties, and I really just wanted to drink. I wasn't interested in the murder mystery.

Yeah.

But I but since getting a little older, I think I've always wanted to Yeah. We had some people here that had just in that in mind that, oh, I'm just coming to drink. I don't wanna participate.

And one guy,

he what? Everybody dressed for the period. He was for the twenties,

and he was in, like, shorts and a cutoff T shirt. You know? I just came to drink. That was me. That was me at this dinner party. He end up being picked to be in the into the thing, and he was like, okay. You know, I'll do it. Yeah. Well, his name was Izzy Sleazy. That was his name. Yeah. And he still wants us to him we want he wants us to call him that still today.

But he said he had the best time. He said, I've he said the next time you have it, I'm buying a whole table for my friends and family. So,

but, yeah, that was a really, really cool thing. That's really cool. I because, again, that's one of those things that you

you typically associate with something a little closer to Cincinnati. Yeah. That would put some We had some people from Anderson and Yeah. Yeah. Places to come out here for that. So and we got a nice new pavilion,

for those type of events. Yeah. That's really awesome. Yeah. So are there any other cool things like that that

Yes. We do, single on Wednesday night. You know? What's single? It's,

they play songs. And if you know the name of the song, you cover it on your bingo card, and then when you get it, you win prizes. So we do that on Wednesdays, and we're doing trivia on Thursdays.

And so we have that kind of stuff going on. Of course, the farmer's market here on Saturday morning. Yeah. That's going on right now, as a matter of fact.

And

I'm sure there's other things that I can't think of, but there's my wife does the event planning, and she does a good job with that. There's always something always something going on. Event planning is Yeah. That's a whole I did,

PR marketing for a hot air balloon festival in Middletown.

Man, events are if it the thing The thing about communication.

Oh, and the thing about them is if you go to an event,

if it's a good event,

you don't notice anything. You just have a really good time. That's a good one. Like, that's

if things start falling apart. Yeah. So Like, you said that. Well, yeah. Exactly. Like, oh, this is terrible. Everything's falling apart around me. This is an awful event. But if it's a good one, you don't notice

all of the work that goes into it. You just are there for a fun time. That's true. And it's

man, it is not it's not easy to do. Yeah. Especially

when you get personalities

involved and then those people like, I want this. I want that one. And the balloon event was like a it was a huge event. So

in any event, you mentioned,

a brewing

from,

Cincinnati State.

Yeah. What is that? I I don't know if I've heard. They have a brewing science program at Cincinnati State. So you go through this program and you learn how And you got a a brewer here from him. And

I'm I guess is he a good brewer? Yes. Yeah. So that's a good program then. It's a really good program, and it's it's really cool because the

the graduates from that program all keep in touch, and they all work for breweries around the city. Yeah. And so they're constantly,

you know,

bouncing ideas off each other. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And if they need this or need that, there's support. You know? That's really cool. And so we we feel very fortunate to have Nate working here. And

and, So amongst the brewers, there's it's not like cutthroat competition amongst all these small brewers. It's not like that at all. That's interesting. Yeah. I would have thought it kinda would be that It's a it's a brewery would be like their own little silo, and you'd be very, like, guarded about what you do. No. It's a community.

Really?

Yeah. That's wild. So if somebody was if, like, a young person was looking to get involved in that, you'd suggest that's the place to go. It's one of the few in the country. Really? I had no idea that even existed.

That's kinda wild. Mhmm.

You have met a lot of people

through Nate and through the Cincinnati,

state program.

And, consequently,

you know, going to these breweries,

you get kind of a behind the scenes look at some of the bigger breweries and stuff. They welcome you in. And like I said, we've we've got some cast off equipment because of it. Yeah. Yeah.

That's that's awesome. Yeah. And I think that is one of the

because I go back and forth about college with because of my young kids. Right? Like, I don't want them if they wanna be an engineer or a lawyer or a doctor or something, you gotta go to college. But if you don't know what you wanna do, just go get a job and start working. Yeah. I got to think that's what I'm gonna tell my kids. Yeah. But one of the things about college is is the network that you create in that school. And I think that's a good example of something that's probably worth it if you wanna get into this world, you know Yeah. To find the people that can really help you out. Yeah.

I thought you're gonna say if you don't know what you do, go brew. Go brew.

Well, yeah. I mean, that's you know, it's one of those

things. It's like an 18 year old

young man. I had no idea what I wanted to do, but everybody said go to college.

Degree in geology. And, you know, now I'm a copywriter that has a podcast. So it's like,

I

and granted, I I could have stuck with geology and

geologist and done stuff like that. But

as I went through college, I realized that's probably not what I wanna do with my life. And if I would've just taken a couple of years to work and figure that out,

I probably would've been in a better position to figure out what I wanted to do. Sure. You know? And I think from my generation, it was the same thing. They they said, you know, you gotta go to college.

But,

the the kids that I talked to, I say, hey. Right now, you you know, if you're not ready to go to college, look at trades too. Yeah. I mean, trades, people are making really

good

living. Really good living. Really good living with benefits

Yeah. And a pension.

And if it's if it's in your nature, you can start your own business in the trades. Absolutely. Again, it's not easy to start a business, but there's plenty of customers out there. But you you just can't say just go to college. There's just so many different

avenues to to explore. And the other thing is small business.

I mean, it really is kind of the backbone

of the American economy. I mean, there's, you know, the stock market and they really are and things like that, but and I can't remember the exact numbers, but it's something like

60% of the people who are employed in The United States are employed in these small businesses.

So,

you know, and you don't

you need to you need to have a good head on your shoulders, but I don't know if you need to go to college to start a business.

You know? You just need to find the right people and

probably a good accountant and Yeah. And then get after it. You know? Sure. I agree. Yeah. Yeah. In the trades too, it's

I'd not that I'm I I don't know. My kids are still young, and who knows what it's gonna be like in twenty years, but, you know, that's just something that's always on my mind. Yeah. Yeah.

So what do you,

what do you what do you have planned for the future? Are you planning on growing, getting into distribution?

It's a good question.

Right now, we're just kinda standing pat. We like where we're at. But, yes, probably

some canning, I think, is in our future.

That seems to be the topic that comes up more often than not. Now with canning, do you have to actually build that out in house, or can you ship to somebody that can? You can, but that's not our style. We'll we'll do everything in house. We we almost bought a canner at this past year's,

brewers conference in Indy, the national brewers conference. And,

I you know, I think that that's probably where we'll go next. And, honestly, I don't see us getting into a lot of locations.

Mhmm. But there's some locations they won't carry your

your draft beer unless they have unless you have cans like retail locations.

So I think, you know, we'll we'll look at that and probably not go too crazy with that, but I think that's our next move. And what are some of the the hurdles when it comes to canning and distribution?

Storage of cans. Yeah. Cans take up a lot of room if you don't have some storage.

Of course, you gotta design labels and Yeah. So on and so forth for each individual,

flavor that you put out there.

The equipment and a place to store the equipment, somebody to run the equipment when you do your canning.

We do a small amount

of that with our bombers right now. We do 22 ounce bombers, and we do those in house, and we sell them just out of our taproom. So we got some idea of what it takes to Yeah. To get through some of that part of the program.

You you mentioned designing cans and things like that. I'd be remiss to ask, who signed all your logos and stuff? Because it's really nice.

Our logos was a friend of mine.

He was a graphic he is a graphic artist, and

he's an honorary Founders Club member because he's given us a lot for, you know, for nothing over the time. He's put a lot of time in, but,

so he's done everything. He does our T shirt designs. He does he still And he's local. He's local. Yeah. He's he lives in Loveland.

His wife's done our menus or for our food. And

so, yeah, we we we think a lot of, the Coles. Yeah. Yeah. His father just passed away. His mother just passed away. They lived in Mount Orbs. So Okay. Yeah. He he grew up here. He does a real bang up job. Yeah. He's I mean, science and the the whole

thing. It's really nice. Yeah. Backs and Dedita Cole. Okay. Yep.

You mentioned food, and I'm glad you did because I would've forgot to ask you about it. You've got a menu here. Yes. When did you add that, and what was that like adding food to the mix? Oh, I can't remember when we added the kitchen. I think it was in

2121,

I think. Okay. So it's been a few years. Hurt you guys a lot? Were you open? I can't remember when you opened. You know, we managed to get through COVID pretty well. We we had our spacing when they allowed us to open. Yeah. We had our six foot spacing. We had everything all, you know, plexiglass

off and Yeah. And, so we managed to get through it okay, actually. Yeah.

But it was right after that that we opened the kitchen. We had a hard time with,

food trucks being reliable. Yeah. Either wouldn't show up or they didn't have enough food. Yeah.

And so it and we needed something here, you know, for for people to eat. So we decided what we didn't really wanna do a kitchen, but it was just necessary. Yeah. And, it's turned out to be a pretty good thing, though. I mean, people seem to like the food, and we've gotten better at it. Yeah. Add new things to the menu. And What kind of stuff do you have? I haven't seen a menu. Well, we smoke our own brisket. Oh, really?

Brisket sandwiches.

We make pizzas.

Do you have a pizza oven?

We have pizza ovens. Yeah.

We do,

tacos

and

wraps,

salads,

got a couple soups. We got a girl that comes in and does our baking. So we have some baked goods that we sell out there for desserts. I was about to ask you because I'm assuming you you're not the one cooking all this stuff. No. I'm not. So you brought in a Yeah. We have chef. Yep. We have, we have a chef that's here during the week, and then we have one that works on the weekend.

Then we have a baker that comes in and bakes. She makes homemade biscuits for biscuits and gravy. And Really? So yeah. We do a the the menu is huge, really. Yeah. What's your favorite?

I like the brisket. Yeah. You know? Can't eat it all the time. Well, I mean, it's really good. The dill pickle pizza is really good too. It's unique. You know, I'd recently had a pizza with dill pickles on it. Yeah. And it's It was different. It's it's different, but it's better than It's got the white sauce, so it really works. You know? Yeah. Yeah. You get that tangy pickle and Get that with the cauliflower crust. It's pretty good. Yeah. You can have a cauliflower crust pizza too. Yep. I don't know if I can get on board with that. That Yeah. That seems a little strange. Pretty good.

I might just have to take your word on the call. Okay. Alright. Alright.

I get it.

Well, I'll be honest with you. I think I'm kinda at the end of my questions. Okay.

If there's anything we haven't talked about that you wanna talk about or something I should ask, you know? No. I think we're good. I've you know, we've been here. Our eight year anniversary is coming up, and we every year on our anniversary, we have six days. We're open in a row that during the anniversary week, and we release a new beer Mhmm.

Every day for cider. So, you know, come out. It's the third week in September about every year. So just look at our website and our Facebook page and come out and try the new stuff. Awesome. Is there anything else you wanna plug? I'll give you the floor. Promote as much as you want. Let's see. Well, that that's one for sure. But, no, just just come out and check us out. Check out the farmer's market and check out some of our events. Yeah. The comedy show tickets sell quick, so get those when you see that on the on Facebook or website.

And,

I think she's gonna do another mystery dinner. Mystery dinner. Yeah. Murder mystery. We might have to find a babysitter and come Absolutely. So much fun. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Well, like I said, that's all I got. So I'm gonna call this successful, and thank you so much for that. Thank you. Appreciate

appreciate your time. Thank you.

Well, thanks again to Dave for sitting down with me. Really appreciate him taking the time. And like I said, really enjoyed the conversation, and we'll try to get him back on, obviously.

I just like talking to people about brewing booze, frankly,

and I hope you do too.

So thank you very much to him. And between recording the intro and the outro, I had a thought. If you would like to become Let's Talk Claremont's official space weather expert,

let me know.

Yes. I'm still cracking up about that

space weather expert. That's not a job.

That's that's like a make believe thing.

Anyway, I'm sure it's a real job of space weather or whatever.

Anyway, let's talk about some events so I don't get myself in trouble and upset

all of the space weather experts out there, the space weatherman.

Okay. Alright. Events. We're gonna talk about events.

First we first up,

we have homeschool discovery day nature crafts. This is gonna be November 21 from 1PM to 2PM at Clingman Park. It is a nature themed arts and crafts hour where homeschoolers and others, not just homeschoolers,

can create sustainable art from natural materials. It's a free program,

but you need to preregister,

and I imagine you can do that over at the park's website.

Next, we have Forged Tea Time and Hike Rose Hips

on November

to 12PM

at Clingman Park. Learn how to forage wild plants. This session features rose hip tea from wild roses and enjoy a guided hike. It's geared towards adults, but all ages are welcome, and it is free. But you need to register, which again,

you can do at the park's website.

Newtonsville Wayne Township Holiday Craft Fair, November 22, 9AM to 6PM

at the Wayne Township Fire Station fifty five.

A full day

holiday craft fair showcasing

local crafters

and vendors.

Free admission, open to the public to shop for handmade gifts and seasonal goodies in a festive

small town atmosphere.

Next up, we have a ribbon cutting for letters to literacy who we just, recently interviewed, and that'll be coming out probably in a few weeks. It's a really cool place. They're doing a lot of really good work there. And if you listen to the interview, I I had no idea there was

such a pervasive literacy problem, not just in Claremont County, but across The United States.

So tune in to that interview. It's actually pretty eye opening.

In any event, their ribbon cutting will be on November 24 from twelve to 1PM at 150 West Main Street, Batavia.

It is an open house celebration for the nonprofit letters to literacy

as it opens a brand new expanded learning center. The Claremont Chamber hosts a ribbon cutting at noon, and it'll be followed by tours of the facility,

which provides tutoring and reading,

speech language therapy,

and math for local children.

This next one seems really fun. I think my son, Dom, would love it. He's

about he's almost two now, but he's brilliant into dinosaurs. In any event, dinosaur party. It's a library youth event on November 25

at the Claremont County Public Library at the Bethel branch. It is a free dino themed party for kids ages six to 11

featuring and you're not gonna get this pun because it only works if you're reading it, but featuring terrific games spelled p t e r r I f I c, like pterodactyl,

curdate Cretaceous Crafts,

and even a mini fossil dig. I just put a copy there.

Children can celebrate Dinovember

with fun activities and snacks in a prehistoric

wonderland at the library.

You do have to register, but it is free.

Next up, Milford hometown for the holidays festival, November.

This is gonna be all day. The downtown Milford business district. This is Milford's annual holiday festival with family friendly activities and local shopping.

Stroll the charming downtown as you enjoy visits with Santa from twelve to 6PM,

strolling carolers,

free antique fire engine rides from 11AM to 4PM, which sounds pretty cool,

And horse drawn carriage rides from twelve to 6PM,

which sounds pretty cool and slightly romantic.

And you can browse specials at shops and restaurants.

Kick off the season and get a jump on your holiday shopping with this two day celebration.

Another Milford, Christmas thing. City of Milford tree lighting ceremony will be on November 28 at 7PM at the 5 Points Landing Park.

Join Santa and the Sin City Shakers dance troupe for Milford's holiday tree lighting.

The community gathers as Santa Claus counts down to illuminate the new city tree. Complimentary hot cocoa will be available for spectators during this festive

outdoor ceremony.

I mean, if for nothing else, go to get some free hot chocolate, man. Who didn't like hot chocolate?

Next, we have Loveland Legacy Foundation's fifth annual biggest tailgate, November 29

from 9AM to 4PM

at the tailgate lot behind Paxton's Grill.

This is a community tailgate party to watch Ohio State versus Michigan, which I didn't know the game was

was this close,

on a huge 15 foot outdoor screen. Setup begins at 9AM for tailgaters, and you can reserve a spot with a $25

donation.

It's limited though. So if you wanna do this for the for the big game,

I would do it quick.

Enjoy a noon kickoff with a game with game audio, a Sam Adams beer booth, and Dora drinks, food from Paxton's and Ramsey's Trailside, plus cornhole kids games and charity football squares.

All proceeds benefit Loveland area community projects.

Next, we have small business Saturday shopping. This is also in Loveland.

November 29, it'll be all day downtown Loveland.

Support local shops on small business Saturday. Loveland's businesses will offer special promotions

and a shopping passport program

organized by the Little Miami River Chamber Alliance.

Shoppers can pick up a shopping pass and collect stamps at participating boutiques, galleries, and cafes.

Completed passes can be entered to win prizes. It's a fun way to explore and patronize hometown businesses.

And last but certainly not least, Beaks and Talons live raptor show on November 29 from one to 2PM

at the Loveland Branch Library.

Lots of stuff going on in Loveland.

An all ages wildlife presentation by Raptor Inc.

Featuring three live birds of prey up close as animal ambassadors.

Learn about the amazing adaptations that make hawks and owls

supreme sky hunters.

See real feathers, talons, and other artifacts, and hear recorded

recorded

bird calls.

You can't touch the birds, but it is free to attend, and you do need to register because space is limited.

So no no touching the birds there.

Okay.

Quick note on the events. I do the best to find as many as I can, but I know I don't get them all. So if you have an event or you know of an event that you'd like people to know about, just send an email. Info@Let'sTalkClaremont.com.

Can't promise you I'm gonna get all the events because I don't want, like, a fifty minute event section. Honestly, that would probably strain my voice to just read off all those events. But

send an email. I'll do my best to get it in the,

the event rundown here.

And that will lead us right into our final value for value pitch.

We are a value for value podcast. What that means is you listen to the show, you get some value out of it, you decide what that value is, and you share it back with the show. And it can be in the form of time, talent, and treasure. And for time and talent, like I've been saying,

the best thing you can do, and it doesn't take a whole lot of time, just tell people about this podcast. Tell them you got value out of it, and they should listen to it. It will really help the show out. I mean, word-of-mouth

really means a lot, and it's hard to get. So if you like the show, please please tell people about it and share it on social media.

And for treasure, don't forget, we've got that holiday special.

$25

donations

get you a special mention on the show and a brief holiday message. As always, 200 and above

will get you an executive producer credit that I will vouch for. And I will read your note

on air, and that note can be virtually anything. But again,

I am not going to read some kind of crazy hate manifesto or something like that.

And, of course, any dollar amount is greatly appreciated.

It could be a dollar. It could be 5¢. It doesn't matter. If you get value out of the show, you determine what that value is, and you determine how to get give that value back to the show.

And, of course, you can connect with us on Facebook, Let's Talk Claremont podcast, Instagram, and Let's Talk Claremont. And we got that newsletter with

crossword puzzle incoming.

I'm really excited. I love crossword puzzles. So sign up for that newsletter. Www.info

I'm sorry. Www.let'stalkclaremont.com.

Newsletter tab. Put your email in there. You're only gonna get one a week on Thursday when a new show comes out. I don't I don't like it when people flood my inbox with emails, so I'm gonna be respectful of that.

And, of course, please follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or whatever it is you use for podcast. It helps to show up, but it's gonna help you out because you will be notified

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And if you wanna say hi, let us know who you think we should be interviewing. Tell us what's going on in your community, boots on the ground reports,

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Info at let'stalkclaremont.com.

Get in touch. I would love to hear from you.

Well, that's all we got for today. Thank you again for tuning in, and I will see you next week for Thanksgiving. I hope you're getting excited for Thanksgiving. So thanks for listening.