Sierra Nevada

I stumbled across this great Q&A from Sam Calagione - the founder of Dogfish Head - with one of the founders of Sierra Nevada, Ken Grossman. I think the most interesting part is the similarities between the stories of these startup microbrews. They used second-hand or hand-built equipment, had little sense of the market and mainly went off a deep love of the product.

They also received a lot of help from other breweries. In no other business that I can think of do the competitors help one another in the way that microbreweries do. Grossman got yeast from other commercial breweries around San Francisco in the early days and Coors even was willing to sell him malted barley from its own stash. Today, the pathway for a microbrewery is much more difficult and easier. More people drink and seek out craft beer, but many more people are offering it as well.

In Detroit, there's an emerging brewing district off of Cass. With the impending arrival of a microbrewery near the Motor City Brewing Works and Traffic Jam, the potential to market the area as a destination has improved. Sadly, that area is where I had hoped to put my pie-in-the-sky green microbrewery. Opportunity lost, or delayed.