Welcome back to Fremont Brewery Part 2. Sara Nelson takes off to head to an important meeting and Head of Brewing Operations, Matt, joins in. Somewhere along the line, the cliff hanger question about different brewing waters is left unanswered so I figured I’d fill in a bit of time answering that question before Matt takes it away. Next week we return to some Texas Breweries.

I’ve still got a few more Texas breweries, but while I get those ready, here is the Fremont Brewery episode I’ve been waiting to put out! Sara Nelson is the co-founder of Fremont Brewery. A real beer MVP, she champions independence, environmentalism, and brewing high-quality beer. Sara applies one of her many mantras, “there is no waste, just resources out of place” to running an environmentally friendly brewery that is constantly looking to improve its use of resources. In the constant search for the secret sauce to create the perfect brewery, Fremont Brewery is a story about how mixing together hard work, a little cross-industry experience, and a financial downturn might be what it takes. Sara is part 1 of 2. Part 2 will be released next week!

Jennifer from No Label last week pointed me towards her old homebrewing buddy, Aaron, who now runs beer operations at Saint Arnold Brewery. Saint Arnold is the oldest craft brewery in Texas, an order of magnitude larger than No Label, and a Houston cultural staple. Aaron has been in the beer business for years shares what it is like climbing the beer ladder.

I hate making excuses, but the mic Aaron was wearing was picking up some interesting background music from a totally unknown source (if I had to guess, earbuds playing softly in his pocket) and as a result, his audio is pretty doctored to have the music removed. I figured I’d get ahead of that one now so you can know of my shame.

This week is my first favorite brewery and the star of my home town, No Label Brewery out in Katy (a suburb of Houston). It’s the only brewery this far out west of and is the 3rd oldest in H-town. Jennifer Royo, co founder, joins me today while I wax nostalgic about Texas and gives us her take on the industry. She and husband Brian started a family around the same time as they started they brewery, so she also talks a bit about the juggling act of raising a young family and a young brewery at the same time.

Co founding couple Dave and Haley and brother/salesman Mike, run Peddler Brewing. They combined their two passions, biking and beer (hmm, that sounds familiar) into a bike themed brewery. We talk about the collectors market, what it’s like running a brewery right next to Heineken’s big taproom, and wholesale vs taproom sales.

In March 2013 Peter Charbonnier opened up the smallest brewery in Ballard. Even after moving out of their tiny bachelor shack brewery and into the grand place next door, they still have their 7-barrel brew house and their smallest Ballard brewery prize. Pete recounts the early days of trying to keep beer in the wall, selling out of everything, and brewing the quickest beers possible to keep up with demand. We talk about the other breweries in the neighborhood too and discuss what it means to be creative in the brewing industry.

Outlander Brewery over in Fremont is quite a unique story. Known for its strange recipes featuring tons of unexpected ingredients, it started off much like any brewery: friends Dragon and Nigel build a small brewery in an old house and brought it up from nothing. 6 years later, they are ready to get out of the game. In August of 2018, everything they’d built traded hands to friends Angela and Johnny, who found themselves thrown straight into the frying pan learning about running a business and the beer industry at the same time. Assistant Brewer, Jason, who was being groomed to take over operations at the brewery, became the senior employee at the brewery over night and an indispensable part of keeping things going. Will they figure it all out? Sounds like they have a great shot at it!

I swung through Colorado for a hot minute and popped into WeldWerks. Of the many options in Colorado (the famous Ft. Collins is not far) and the growing number of breweries in Greely I chose Weld Werks (named for the county they are in, not for their welding skills) because I had the hookup. The head brewer is a friend of a friend of a friend and I’m glad he was because Weldwerks was a fantastic choice. They have an insanely large menu of beers and while many of them are stellar hazy IPAs, they really specialize in barrel-aged beers. We talk steam boilers, barrel aged beers, and branding with Nick and Kristin.

Ryan Petz, co founder and CEO of Fulton Brewery in Minneapolis joins us today on the phone to talk about his big Minnesota brewery. That’s right we’re back in Minneapolis for one one more bonus interview from the best bike city in America. Ryan’s brewery started off brewing contract only and as the business grew, Ryan saw his role and business model changing drastically.

Founded in 2008, Chuckanut is the second oldest brewery in Bellingham and one of the oldest in Washington. This isn’t Will are Mari Kemper’s first rodeo: Chuckanut Brewery takes all that they have learned and makes it work hard as their medal wall shows. They consider themselves the parents of many local breweries who got their starts brewing here. They specialize in lager beers, recently opened a new production brew house, and earlier cracked the top 25 largest breweries in Washington. I couldn’t be more excited to talk to the folks behind so many award winning beers. It’s obvious that the know what the are talking about and put great care into everything they do.