Since the Great Canadian Beer Festival things have been somewhat quiet here on truecask.com. Trust me when I say that this is for good reason. That day marks what might become either an enormous paradigm shift in the BC beer scene, or a small blip on the craft radar. At this point it’s hard say what the result will be; however, you’ll be able to track the progress on the way to the end result as I will be documenting the process.

So what the hell am I talking about anyway? Obviously, during the course of this blogging adventure, I have associated myself with not only a ton of craft beer fans, but also some very knowledgeable industry people. Through this network, a collection of us have formed in order to develop possibly the most ‘core’ craft brewery north of the border, or at least thats the goal.

Some may consider this mission statement a slight on our local brewers; please do not take it as such – we love the BC craft scene. That said, we feel there is a hole in our market that’s ready to be filled. For the most part, every brewery in BC is bottling similar beers using the old formula of lager, pale ale, and IPA, combined with seasonal and specialty offerings. The quality varies depending on the specialty of the brewery, everyone does reasonably well, and there is nothing wrong with this system; however, the last thing BC needs is another brewer trying to play in this space.

What the scene is in need of is a brewery ready to take that next step and commit their entire capacity to big interesting beers. Terms like small batch, limited run, and bottle fermented will become synonymous with the brand. Efforts will be made to appease the pallet of the hardcore beer fan, offering them the efforts they can only get at special events on a daily basis. Branding & marketing efforts will be focused, and not just left as an afterthought. Passion and quality will not be sacrificed for the sake of volume and sales.

I’m sure many people will consider this idea a pipe dream, stating that there is not enough of a market in BC for a brewery like this to survive. I’m also sure many people said the same thing to breweries like Hair of the Dog, Green Flash, and Lost Abbey. The key to making this all happen will be not letting this idea die in the mash. The idea has been set, the goal has been identified, and the group’s abilities have been assessed. Now it is time to put pen to paper and construct the business plan. Step one is in the books – I look forward to telling you about step two.

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