Hire a Brewery

[Michael]

I was surfing around on Youtube, and saw this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DsD52AvAO8

Since I have some mates that live in Condos where gas is not an option due to fire  concerns, and they do not have much room, I thought something like this would be great in big cities.

Hopefully a place like this would let you follow your own recipe though.

What do you guys think?

[Llew Bardecki]

This concept is pretty popular in Canada, where it's commonly known as Brew on Premise (or BoP.)
Due to high taxes on beer in Canada, homebrewing and BoPs have bigger economic advantages than in many other places.

As I recall, the price of brewing at them works out to somewhere in between home-brewing and buying craft beer (roughly C$60 for a 23L batch.)

I've never tried brewing at a BoP myself, but I've thought about working at one if/when I move back to Canada. Lots of fancy homebrewing equipment to play with and (I'm imagining) not QUITE as much stress as working in an actual brewery :)

[studio1]

Yeah when I saw that brewery for sale on trademe I had a similar idea. so how would the rules here work out?

[Doublehoppy]

Probably no problem with any laws. There used to be a BOP in Henderson in Auckland. I'm talking '95ish. I think the key was that the punter had to do the actual brewing him or her self so that it qualified as beer brewed for self consumption.

[denimglen]

I've heard it works the same way in the states.

They just provide equipment - but since you're providing ingredients and doing the work you're brewing for yourself.

Anyway, technically, you're only making wort - yeast are making the beer :-P

[Horace]

I think there was some thing like this in Rotorua at some stage - similar set up but may have been running as a commercial brewery.

[Greig McGill]

Yep, it was a "UBREW" which, I think, was part of a franchise which never took off. The owners slapped a bit of a "Jake the Muss" pub on the front, and sold their own brews. It was extract only. Alex and I went over to look at the possibility of buying it at one point, as it was going for a ridiculously cheap price, but unfortunately, being extract only, and requiring a truckload of maintenance/renovation to get what we wanted, we decided it wouldn't be a great idea. It then became Waipa Brewing... not sure what happened to them, though I've heard many a rumour.

[Martin Bridges]

There used to be one of these in Acton when I lived in London. I always thought it was a great idea, but it only survived for about a year.

[James P]

Same down here in Christchurch in the nineties. It went the way of the Dodo with all the cheap shite beer on the market!