A BIG update

I want to start by apologizing for waiting so long to update the blog. I had planned on timing our next blog update with the arrival of our Federal license... little did I know how long the Federal license process would actually take.

On a sunny afternoon in June, June 19th to be exact, we submitted our brewery's application for Federal approval. At that time, the government was indicating that approvals were taking between 45 and 55 days on average. Shortly after submission we received word from several industry sources that the approval process was becoming backlogged... little did we know that our approval would take closer to three times the original estimate, clocking in at over 130 days.

But let's not focus on the negative... thankfully, Triptych Brewing is now a federally licensed microbrewery!! We have begun the process to acquire our last state licenses, and we sincerely hope that process goes a little more quickly. Unfortunately we can't begin brewing until we receive the state licenses but we are still hoping to be open before year's end.

Even though our Federal license felt as though it was a standstill, our remodeling efforts have been well underway. We are wrapping up construction on the tasting room. All of the electrical work has been completed. The walls all have paint and trim. The new restrooms are completely functional. At this point we are working on the serving counter and finishing up rehabilitating our seating and tables.

I have attached some photos of progress to this post. I hope you will bear with me; I want to share the progress but I also want to save some of the surprise for your first visit. For those of you who joined us at our Kickstarter party, I am confident that you will be surprised at the complete transformation of our space. The photos share the nifty walk-in cooler's epoxy floor work, some painting, some seating refinishing work, and the very beginnings of the tasting room counter construction.

Thanks again for everyone's patience; we hope to share more good news and progress soon.

An Overdue Update!

Construction is moving on forward at the brewery. Framing was completed and followed by the electrical and plumbing rough-ins shortly after. And this past weekend, we began putting sheetrock on the walls. Paint will be next :)

The framing in progress!

In other news, almost every single Kickstarter reward has now been delivered. We still have a couple of folks to deliver to and we also have a few people for whom we never got a mailing address. If you happen to be one of those missing addresses, we will be contacting you directly in the next couple of days. After we deliver the last couple of rewards, we will be transitioning away from the Kickstarter project page and bringing the official "founder" mailing list online. If you missed your opportunity to become a Triptych Founder, watch this space, we may still be able to accommodate some additions after we take stock of both the remaining rewards and our estimated production capacities.

As always, thanks for your support. We're building as fast as we can and hope to be brewing beer for you soon!

Another milestone complete!

Some of you may remember, back in March, Triptych's first major acquisition was a rather large walk-in cooler. We disassembled the cooler and brought it back to Savoy for eventual reconstruction.

This weekend, we were finally ready to put the walk-in cooler back together again. It went back together much easier than it came apart. We even shot a time-lapse video of the construction (linked in at the bottom of this post).

Over the next week, we'll be working on framing in the tasting room, the new restrooms and the brewing area.

On solid ground

A view of our new
bathrooms

We had a very productive week. The brewery is looking much less like an archaeological dig. As expected, the in-ground portion of the plumbing rough-in was finished this week. The plumber has been doing an awesome job so far.

On Thursday, our concrete guys came back to fill and compact the dirt and on Friday, they poured the floor. Over the coming week we will be getting ready to put the walk-in cooler back together. You can click on the picture to the right to see a slideshow of the progress so far.

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

Beer Industry numbers and where Triptych fits into it all

There's been much hullabaloo about some industry statistics the Brewer's Association released this week:

Not only are sales up, the total number of breweries in the United States has reached a 125 year high. Overall, this is great news. Americans now have more choice than ever before when it comes to craft beer. And for any sector of our economy to show resilience like this against recession is nothing short of impressive.

But inside the industry there are also some rumblings. Craft beer has experienced significant contractions in the past and many feel as though we are moving faster and faster toward a major correction. Even we are forced to admit that opening a brewery seems to be in vogue. With the explosive growth in breweries, there is even more demand for brewing equipment and brewing ingredients, which in turn raises prices. 

So far, Triptych's only real experience with the unfortunate side of this wave of popularity has been with the Federal government who is currently swamped trying to process hundreds of breweries' requests for permits. Overall, we are still extremely excited for our opportunity to enter the market. At the end of the day, stats are just stats. There will definitely be breweries opening and breweries closing in the coming years. And from the start, we've worked to architect something that is svelte enough to weather a significant industry shake up while still being big enough to make waves of our own. 

Craft beer is still only responsible for about 7% of total beer production in America. And Triptych is going to do its part to try and push it up to 8%.

Steady progress

A great turn out at Radio Maria!

First of all, we would like to thank everyone who came out to Radio Maria last week. Lots of folks picked up their Kickstarter rewards and a fair number of people had an opportunity to belatedly pledge their support as well. The event was a resounding success and we will definitely look to do more gatherings like this after we get open. If you didn't have an opportunity to pick up your Kickstarter reward, fear not, we have already been dropping them off, mailing, and making whatever other arrangements we can to make sure folks get their swag.

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

The initial excavation

Work continues in Savoy at the brewery. One of the big reasons we brought this blog online is so that we can provide more communication including updates on the construction progress. For the last 7-10 days, we have been knee, waist, and sometimes shoulder deep in the plumbing aspect of the brewery. We initially had the floor sawed open and dug out where we needed to make hookups to the existing sanitary line but very quickly discovered that the sanitary line in place no longer met code and would be insufficient for our drainage needs. Soon after we were digging up the entire line so that it could be replaced. We're hoping to have the drainage work finished this week so that we can patch the floor back up and move on to even more exciting work. Click the photo on the left to see more pictures of what is currently going on.

Tanks!

Last week also saw another big equipment acquisition arrive in the form of 6 mixed use tanks that will both ferment beer (at least initially) and serve beer at the brewery. Right now the tanks are tucked safely away during construction but we can't wait until they are filled with beer for you to enjoy.

Many of you are very excited for us to open and would like a more exact opening date.... so would we :) It is clear at this point that we are going to miss our original estimate due to the initial hiccups in acquiring needed permits and due to surprises like the sanitary line mentioned above. As we get closer, we will give everyone plenty of notice before we open our doors.

Our tentative plan is to update the blog at least once a week and transition away from the Kickstarter project update format. We will post one final Kickstarter update directing folks to this blog in the near future. Of course you can also follow our Facebook page and our FlickR photostream for updates as well.