Is it time for a National Home Brew Conference in NZ?

[Peter Smith]

I have been watching with interest the US and Australian HBC 

Is it time for a weekend conference here in NZ?

Brewing presentations?

Brewery Visits?

Would it be best to link this with the SOBA NHB Competition?

I think the support would be there , just need the organisational skills to make it happen....

[Samuel Loader]

I completely agree with this except, I think we need to do this a week behind the Australian NHC so we can attract some of the main speakers to jump the ditch either before or after

[Peter Smith]

Good idea,  still think this would sit well under the Soba umbrella of events.   There are a lot of Pro brewers in NZ who have come from the HB route,  there is a lot of talent in NZ to draw on, I would love to listen to Luke, Richard, Soren, Jo etc etc etc    as well as international gurus.   

[Barry]

Be really interesting to see the comparative straight numbers of homebrewers in each country.

USA would of course have tens if not hundreds of thousands, gee possibly even millions. My gut is that Aussie would have considerably more than us, just based on the ANHC conference I attended 6 years back (can't believe it was that long ago!), and sheer volume of posts on the aussiehomebrewer forum. It's far more lively than this forum.

My hunch would be we've got a long way to go before a conference like this would be viable, in fact I kind of doubt NZ would ever have the numbers.

Sorry for the wet blanket post!

[Barry]

So just on forum member numbers, this forum has 2016 members

Aussiehomebrewer.com.au has 31,692 members.

We're talking several orders of magnitude.

[Samuel Loader]

I wet blanket indeed :) the first US NHC had only 200 people attend and look where it is today. This would  also be a medium for malt/hop/equipment suppliers to showcase their product to a select audience which can be lost at other events

[Peter Smith]

huttbrewer forum on facebook has 300 odd members...     mate I reckon you would get 200 easy,   as long as people could bring a keg or bottles and the steward licence stuff was covered.... 

If under soba control you may even get a decent crowd of non HBers that just love good beer.

the key to holding such an event is to minimise financial risks to ensure no one gets burnt, cover off licence issues and have decent stewards etc to make sure no one goes overboard at evening events...   

[Samuel Loader]

yeah i'd bring a couple of kegs, even do what the US do and have a 'pro brewers' night

[Barry]

Yeah I guess my point isn't so much that you couldn't start small, it's more that the growth potential is limited. USA has 300 million people. 

That said, I'm sure every homebrew shop/supplier would be keen on the concept, plenty of opportunity for sponsorship. Would cost a bit to get the marquee names here to speak, I like the idea of piggybacking off the ANHC.

You could even keep it homegrown for the first year, there's plenty of local pro brewers with a heap of knowledge to offer.

[Peter Smith]

Watch how many stc1000 controllers are being sold on trademe to new home brewers...   its going nuts out there....    

All the home brew shops are the key to it, many people just buy at the shop don't participate online.....  promotion inside shops will be key in pulling in the people who dont participate on social media.

[Samuel Loader]

just look at how quickly places like brewshop sell out of corny's every time they get a shipment in 

[Crusader-Rob]

I think a conference is a good idea, we may have a smaller community than the othe rcountries, but we're up there with the best of them for craft beer quality and, given the exports of the likes of some of the commercial beers in New Zealand, there is definitely course for something, and of course, sponsorship and so on. 

You've got

a number of clubs to start with in the country as well, running it off the back of ANHC is a good idea, which will bring forward the HB Competition as well (probably more suitable, for hop freshness, given the harvest time in NZ and America)

Theres a wealth of possibilities.

[Paul Finney]

It is certainly worth exploring and even if the first one had 50 attendees the next one would have more, then more etc. 

Homebrewing is following in the craft beer revolutions wake and is on the increase. The more shops there are around that sell grains, hops yeast etc with the knowledge to put it together for a beginner the quicker this will happen to. 

I'm glad someone has put their hand up to push this forward. I am way to busy to do so, so will fully support anyone willing to do so.

Good Luck