Conference Pans Out New Job Prospects For SRJC Students In
Liquid Gold Rush
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| Sonoma County EDB's confernece on Beer, Cider & Spirits |
Sonoma County’s first-ever Beer,
Cider and Spirits Conference tapped opportunities for Santa Rosa Junior College
students in the county’s $200 million home-brewed industry. Speakers and
panelists included 2nd District Assembly member Wes Chesboro and brewers from
20 breweries, five cideries and four distilleries in Sonoma County, the
birthplace of the modern microbrewery.
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| 2nd Dist. Wes Chesboro addresses the EDB conference. |
Chesboro said California’s 422
craft breweries, opening at a rate of about one a week, employ 48,000 people,
pay $850 million in taxes and add $4 billion to the state’s economy. Chesboro
described California’s craft beer industry as “guerilla capitalism” battling
the “culture of sameness placing mediocrity over adventure” and tapping into the barrels of people looking
for a new favorite.
California Craft Beer Association
Executive Director Tom McCormick outlined the industry’s positive impact on
city and state economies, as well as Sonoma County’s world-wide fame as the
cradle of the craft beer countermovement.
When Sonoma’s now-tapped-out New
Albion Brewery opened in 1976, Jack McAuliffe transformed used dairy equipment to
build from the ground up what became the first microbrewery in the U.S.
McCormick said New Albion is known around the world, even in recently-visited
Denmark where he said, “they treat you like a rock star if you say you’re a
brewer from Sonoma County.”
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| Keynote speaker Tom Magee of Lagunitas Brewing Co. |
Tom Magee, owner of Lagunitas
Brewing Company in Petaluma, delivered the keynote address, dropping only one
F-bomb in the process. Lagunitas accounts for 70 percent of the county’s beer
sales and half the county’s 680 craft beer employees, and their soon-to-open
expansion in Chicago will quadruple their production. Magee said the decision
to expand came after “running the numbers” of their shipping costs of $150,000
per week and discovering he could borrow $25 million with that kind of cash flow.
Magee also spoke about “bankers,
not brewers” running multinational beer conglomerates like InBev, the world’s
largest brewing company that owns Budweiser, Busch, Löwenbräu, Michelob, Natural Light and several other brands
found in supermarkets. Magee said Budweiser’s release of American Ale was “full
of capitulation; it gave drinkers permission to leave the reservation” by
offering an option besides the standard pilsner style.
“If the tail can wag the dog that hard, it’s not the tail
anymore,” Magee said. Lagunitas attracted the interest of several Dartmouth MBA
students “turning their backs on the morass of soullessness of Wall Street.”
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| "Branding of Sonoma County" panel |
Ken Weaver, author of “The Northern
California Craft Beer Guide,” sat on the panel “Branding of Sonoma County.” Weaver
said the county’s craft breweries benefit from the tourism industry already
deeply rooted and growing for another purpose, Sonoma County wine.
Jay Brooks, a syndicated beer
writer on the same panel, spoke about the built-in recognition of the Sonoma name.
While wine drinkers might view Napa and Sonoma interchangeably, craft beer
drinkers only know Sonoma. “Around the world, people know the Big Three,”
Brooks said, referring to Lagunitas Brewing Company, Bear Republic Brewing
Company and Russian River Brewing Company. “People come to visit the Big Three
and find out about the other 17.”
The panel on “Liquid Assets”
included Richard Norgrove, owner of Bear Republic Brewing Company in
Healdsburg, who said his biggest resource was his employees, but even with
great employees a company still needs to have a product. “There is no such
thing as a ‘loss leader,’” Norgrove said. “Every aspect of your business must
be profitable, every decision has to make sense – but your bottom line is not
always key.”
On the same panel, Fred Groth described
using the Kickstarter website to raise $25,000 for equipment to expand his
Sonoma distillery, HelloCello & Prohibition Spirits.
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| Natlie Cilurzo [left] on "Brewing Solutions" panel |
Natalie Cilurzo, owner of Russian
River Brewing Company in Santa Rosa spoke on the “Brewing Solutions” panel
about the country’s most regulated industry. Of the nine regulatory challenges
she raised, waste water topped her list as a barrier for new or expanding
breweries. Cilurzo said Russian River Brewing Company, whose annual limited
release of their Pliny the Younger brought Sonoma County $2 million in tourist
dollars this spring, is not considering expanding their world-famous brewery
partly because of regulatory barriers.
While brewery waste water is not
toxic, it provides rich nutrients for organisms that overpower sewer systems. Assuming
Russian River invested $1 million in a water treatment system for a brewery
three times their current size that discharged only 100 percent pure water, sewage
hook-up fees would be $1.2 million in addition to any monthly fees, Cilurzo
said.
During the tasting session after
the conference, some of Sonoma County’s world-famous home-brewed legends
offered advice to SRJC students intent on tapping into the craft beer industry.
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| Russian River pours the world-famous Pliny the Elder |
“Biochemistry knowledge is critical
if you want to be a brewer,” said Lagunitas’ maketing head Ron Lindenbusch. “If
you want to be in the marketing end of things, SRJC has a great culinary
program to be able to take the whole ‘beer & food’ thing to a whole other
place.” Students interested in restaurants and hospitality, already in place
for the wine tourism industry, benefit by incorporating craft beer into those
existing programs. “You learn that, and then you try to put a ‘beer’ angle to
it, and you’ve got something that has a dual purpose in the consumer’s mind,”
Lindenbusch said.
“There’s not currently any type of
brewing science class [at SRJC],” Lindenbusch said, “but anything you know
about making wine translates into beer in a lot of ways – a lot of the same
chemistry, the same biochemistry. But you’ve got to make sure you’re old enough
to drink before I can encourage that!”
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| Sebastopol's family-owned organic Devoto Orchards cider |
Cilurzo advised SRJC students
interested in opening a beer bar or a brewery that having enough start-up money
is essential. “You need to have tons of capital, and you need a plan,” Cilurzo
said. “You need money. No matter what you’re going to do, get money. If you
just get to the almost-open point, but don’t have enough money to open, or once
you get open and can’t get people in your door, it’s not going to work. It looks
like a money-making venture, but it’s not; it’s a money-spending venture.”
Santa Rosa City Council member Gary
Wysocky, former adjunct professor of accounting at Sonoma State University, advised
SRJC students interested in any industry, “It’s all about personal connections.
You do what you can to get in front of people, you do whatever job is offered,
and you work your way up the food chain. But people skills are what matter.”
Wysocky also said desire was
essential and “timing’s not the only thing – it’s everything. You can have
forever-bad timing but you just have to be ready when that break comes your way
– and it will. You just have to be patient for it and ready for it.”
Don Winkle, business attorney with
Spaulding McCullough & Tansil LLP and moderator of the Brewing Solutions
panel, advised SRJC students against sloppy texting habits to set themselves
apart. “Learn how to write,” Winkle said. “Learn how to express yourself
clearly and professionally and you will have a leg up on many, many people – regardless
of what degree you get."
