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Running a Craft Brewery: A Guide to Success 25% of craft breweries operate at a loss. High grain prices, utility costs, and market saturation squeeze profits. Success requires both brewing skill and business operations knowledge. Inventory Management - Track each ingredient's shelf life and usage rate - Split bulk purchases with local breweries to reduce costs - Example: One brewery saved $45,000/year by optimizing grain deliveries - Install management software to reduce waste - Real result: Software cut 20 hours of weekly labor at mid-size brewery Energy and Automation - Monitor utility usage with tracking systems - Install energy-efficient equipment - Automate cleaning cycles - Use digital work orders - Example: Sierra Nevada's brewing control systems provide live data Resource Recovery - Sell spent grain to farms - Install water recycling systems - Example: Allagash Brewery recovers CO2 during fermentation - Benefits: Lower costs, reduced waste, community connections Financial Management - Build supplier relationships - Negotiate payment terms - Monitor cash flow weekly - Add revenue streams: - Private events - Food service - Merchandise - Example: Dogfish Head expanded into restaurants Key Questions: 1. What drives your highest costs? 2. Which processes waste time? 3. Where do you lose ingredients? 4. What equipment needs upgrades? 5. Do you track utility usage? Next Steps: 1. Audit current expenses 2. List potential automation points 3. Contact local farms about grain 4. Research management software 5. Track energy use for 30 days Success combines brewing excellence with lean operations. Each saved dollar builds resilience. Source: - https://lnkd.in/g8_6Hid5

As the sun rises over the misty hills where hops grow tall, the world of craft brewing is in a constant state of flux. 🌞🌱 From the meticulous blending of flavors to the precise timing of fermentation, every aspect of the brewing process demands a high level of attention to detail. 🍺🔩 Yet, amidst the chaos of managing inventory, tracking orders, and coordinating staff, many breweries struggle to stay afloat, let alone thrive. The solution, however, lies not in a mystical elixir but in the mundane and often overlooked—labor cost control software for your corner shop. 🏪 By embracing technology, breweries can streamline operations, optimize labor costs, and focus on what they do best: crafting exceptional beer. Discover how efficient labor scheduling can revolutionize your brewery's efficiency and profitability. 📊 #CraftBrewing #LaborManagement #EfficiencyInnovation

💡 Craft brewers, are you making the most out of your equipment investments? Understanding ROI is crucial when selecting industrial machinery for your brewery. This article, sponsored by Craft Kettle Brewing Equipment , covers how to maximize returns and ensure your brewery’s success. Read more on this important topic here: https://zurl.co/wU1Y #CraftBrewing #BreweryEquipment #ROI #BrewerySuccess #CraftBeer #BeverageIndustry

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Zoom in: The beer and spirits industry has moved to cans as the #packaging choice on retail shelves. Why? Spirits, no-alcohol and low-alcohol brands believe cans offer brand differentiation (I agree). My latest article in Food Engineering Magazine reveals how small and big #brewers have invested in #automation and process optimization at the plant level. Big takeaways below: • To offer more diversity of brands, grocery stores have cut into that: ‘You can use cans or you can use bottles.’ That has forced producers to assess what is selling better,” says Pfriem. “Looking at all the trends across the board, the consumer is heavily leaning toward cans.” • With these industry drivers, regional craft brewer Lakefront Brewery transitioned from bottles to cans and unified its control system at its Milwaukee plant. • (Sapporo USA) The control logic and HMIs are connected via Sepasoft’s Batch Procedure module, based on the International Society of Automation’s (ISA) 88 standard. “These built-in components, like the batch monitor, batch control and recipe editors, are built in (to the module),” says Fred Zaboli, principal engineer at Wunderlich-Malec Engineering. “There’s no need to write code or scripting to get to that point. Rockwell Automation Lakefront Brewery KHS Group Wunderlich-Malec Engineering, Inc. Inductive Automation Jacqueline Eldridge Sam Wilson Michael Leonard https://lnkd.in/gHSnueH2

Let's talk about purchased CO2 in breweries 🫧 From the 55 breweries data I collected via Brew Resourceful last year, for the Brewery Sustainability Report 2023 I split all entries into 3 categories based on their total annual packaged volume (in hl). As breweries increase past 10k hl p/a, their purchased CO2 increases by 27%. Which is contrary to the economies of scale you could expect from growing a production facility. The all-important question here is, why? There are a few 'production' factors at play such as: 📈 Growth of production often happens very quickly in breweries, meaning volume cannibalises efficiency 🚦 Few 'small' brewers track their raw material consumptions, as at the time they do not represent large £ of stock. A couple of 'number' factors are at play such as: 🍾 As breweries grow they might look to bring small-pack packaging in-house, which requires substantially more CO2 🍺 The same as above, but for keg cleaning At least one 'human' factors at play such as: 😶🌫️ The larger the team grows, the further away the 'front line' brewers are aware of the costs of their materials (economically/environmentally) So why do 100k hl p/a breweries purchased CO2 intensity fall by 68%? Because they fight back. Generate your own nitrogen and replace 85%+ of your CO2 usage. Recapture the CO2 from your fermentations, and use that to replace your purchased CO2. Want to check out my full analysis and 4 other key metrics? Check out the Brewery Sustainability Report - 2023 here 👉 https://lnkd.in/et2sTTmD What are your thoughts on purchased CO2 in breweries?

Discover 10 groundbreaking automations to revolutionise your craft brewery operations today with Pabbly Connect assistance

Transform your craft brewery operations today with these 20 automations Discover how simplicity can lead to success

The integration of BrewOps automation into the operations of the brewery showcases how technology can revolutionize traditional brewing methods and bring about efficiency and productivity gains. #brew #brewing #innovation #automation https://lnkd.in/epsfFKF4

The GEA LAUTERSTAR 2.0 revolutionizes brewhouse efficiency, cutting lautering times to 70 minutes, achieving 98.7% extraction, and enabling up to 14 brews daily. In the brewhouse, the capacity of the lauter tun time and again proves to be a bottleneck for productivity and efficiency. Large international breweries in particular are looking for ways to unburden the lautering process: "Brewers have grown used to filtration taking a lot of time. We scrutinized these processes and found that we can lauter faster if the filter cake can be prevented from clogging. The GEA LAUTERSTAR 2.0 achieves a productivity increase of ten percent and an extract efficiency of 98.7%," explains Peter Sterk, Product Manager for Brewhouse Technology at GEA. Additionally, the new lauter tun is smaller, which results in material savings of ten percent. Technical Innovations for faster lautering processes To increase the efficiency of the LAUTERSTAR 2.0, GEA optimized the geometry and drainage points of th