2003 - Volume #27, Issue #4, Page #09
[ Sample Stories From This Issue | List of All Stories In This Issue | Print this story
| Read this issue]
Farmer-Brewed Wheat Beer Adds Value To Crop
 |
"Beer" is the answer we got from Tom Schafer, Marlin, Washington.
"I'd always thought we could make a good beer out of wheat," he says.
Schafer, who represents the fourth generation on his family farm, grows about 5,000 acres of wheat and other small grains, with help from his sons Kolby and Zach.
When his doctor told him to slow down because of chronic back problems or look forward to spending the rest of his days in a wheel chair, Schafer figured a microbrewery would give him something to do while turning the hard work over to the younger generation.
"It not as physically exhausting, but between the farm and the brewery, I'm spending as many hours or more at work," he says.
Schafer put together a business plan and coaxed a couple of experienced brew masters to work for him part-time.
He put up a building in nearby Odessa, where, he says, he has room to expand if he needs to. He located used brewing equipment that he and family members hauled to Odessa in the farm truck.
Schafer says getting everything in order, including all the necessary state and federal licenses and permits, was a three-year process.
Once the brewery was up and running, he called on his two brew-masters to help him create some distinctive beverages. The first keg went out the door in June 2002.
"We started with four different beers. We dropped one of those and added two more, so now we have five," he says.
All are wheat beers, heavy on the grain and light on the hops, although they vary in taste and color.
Schafer uses both barley and wheat in his beers, but so far, he hasn't used any of his own grain. "We buy 55-lb. bags of malted barley and wheat from companies that provide them to breweries. Malting grains to make beer is a labor intensive, long, precise process, and we don't want to get involved in that," he says. "We are trying to negotiate a contract to produce white wheat for one of the malting companies. Then we could assume that we'd be using some of our wheat," he says.
Schafer says after just one year of operation, the brewery is breaking even. "It's doing better than we anticipated," he says.
Rather than competing with canned and bottled beers, Schafer decided to make his beers available only in bulk. He sells kegs for the bar and restaurant trade, self-marketing them in the eastern part of Washington and into Oregon. A distributor handles sales in the central part of the state. "We haven't pushed too hard to get into the Seattle area. The competition is pretty stiff there, and we need to concentrate first on meeting the demand in eastern and central Washington," he says.
Schafer spends much of his time calling on bar and restaurant owners. "I want to get to know them and find out what they like or dislike about my products," he says. "I want them to associate me with my products. I don't want Rocky Coulee beers to be just another beer on the wall."
In and around the Odessa area, local customers can buy Rocky Coulee products in pigs, which are pressurized 2 1/4-gal. dark brown plastic jugs designed to fit neatly on a refrigerator shelf.
"The brewery is open one day a week to the public. Our customers know that from 2 to 8 p.m. on Fridays, we'll be there to refill pigs," Schafer says. So far, pigs are available only direct from the brewery.
He says the entire endeavor has been a family affair, involving his wife, Lynette, their sons Kolby and Zach, and daughter, Kelly. Also involved have been Kolby's wife Kelly and daughter, and Kelly's husband, Larry Weber.
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Tom Schafer, 17477 Road South NE, Marlin, Wash. 98832 (ph 509 345-2216; email farmsinc@televar.com).
Click here to download page story appeared in.
Click here to read entire issue
To read the rest of this story, download this issue below or click here to register with your account number.
