Episode 78
The Great Beer Revival: Post-Prohibition History
What did it take for beer to rebound after Prohibition? Joel continues post-prohibition history with the transformative role of marketing, the resurgence of home brewing, and how the brewing industry adapted technological advances. Perpetual stew, the evolution of beer cans, and even contemplate a hypothetical modern-day shutdown.
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TIMELINE
00:00 The Power of Marketing in the Beer Industry
01:20 The Rise and Fall of Breweries Post-1933
02:13 Home Brewing Through the Decades
03:11 Supply Chain Challenges in Brewing
11:06 The Evolution of Beer Packaging
15:16 Adapting to COVID-19: A New Era for Breweries
16:03 Pivoting in a Crisis
16:54 A 547 Mustard?
20:15 The Romance of Wine vs. Beer
21:47 Prohibition's Impact on Beer Replication
23:31 The Role of Hops in Beer Production
25:08 Canadian Beer History and Cultural References
26:22 Psychological and Economic Shifts Post-Prohibition
27:40 The Three-Tier System in Alcohol Distribution
28:53 Support us on Patreon!
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CREDITS
Hosts:
Joel Hermansen
Music by Sarah Lynn Huss
Recorded & Produced by David Kalsow
Brought to you by McFleshman's Brewing Co
Transcript
Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of Respecting the Beer.
David:This week we're continuing our conversation about how beer bounced back after prohibition.
David:So if you're wondering,
David:did beer just need a little marketing?
David:Let's find out.
Bobby Fleshman:I wrote down this word marketing.
Bobby Fleshman:'cause I think marketing's a big part of this story.
Bobby Fleshman:The, the, the technology, the science of, let's just call it that.
Bobby Fleshman:Of marketing became a thing and it was able to program and a populace to buying the a Wonder Bread of beer.
Bobby Fleshman:Mm-hmm.
Bobby Fleshman:A Heinz ketchup of beer.
Bobby Fleshman:The, the technology, the science of, let's just call it that, of marketing became a thing and it was able to program and a populace to buying the a Wonder Bread of beer.
Bobby Fleshman:Mm-hmm.
Bobby Fleshman:A Heinz ketchup of beer.
Bobby Fleshman:And it's become its own metaphor for every other industry.
Bobby Fleshman:I, I think that it's not so much as about the liquid.
Bobby Fleshman:It is about the liquid.
Bobby Fleshman:If it was bad, it wouldn't sell, but if it becomes in the background, then you can just sell it on the, on the fantasy that the marketing portrays.
Joel Hermansen:I don't think any industry has ever been able to brand banality like brewing has.
Bobby Fleshman:Mm-hmm.
Bobby Fleshman:No,
Joel Hermansen:I mean, if because post 1933 is Pabst.
Joel Hermansen:It's Anheuser-Busch.
Joel Hermansen:We went from, uh, Schlitz, several Schlitz.
Joel Hermansen:We went from several thousand breweries in the United States to a fraction of that.
Joel Hermansen:And they are all producing these mass produced rice-based.
Joel Hermansen:Mm-hmm.
Joel Hermansen:You know, blonde laggers.
Joel Hermansen:That's it.
Bobby Fleshman:And, and some, somehow they're straddling the line between a, a, a national pride and a, I don't, I guess a background liquid that will check the box for what they're, what they're looking for.
Bobby Fleshman:I, I can't put my thumb on that, but there's something there that keeps people from jumping in with their, with their own soul, their own passion.
Bobby Fleshman:I we sold that out somewhere.
Allison Fleshman:What's the home brewing?
Allison Fleshman:Like was, I know Home brewing really started to kick off kind of in the nineties.
Allison Fleshman:Oh, I that, yeah.
Allison Fleshman:That was in the, but then like, what was eighties, early nineties, but then what
Bobby Fleshman:was mid seventies?
Bobby Fleshman:It blew up.
Bobby Fleshman:And Charlie Papa be, yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, but I'm wondering like
Allison Fleshman:in the forties.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Surely
Allison Fleshman:there was, I mean, there were brewers in the 15 hundreds and they were people holding
Bobby Fleshman:the, the line.
Bobby Fleshman:You, they, well, they were just
Allison Fleshman:brewing beer at home.
Allison Fleshman:Like what where was home brewing in this time?
Allison Fleshman:I would imagine during
Joel Hermansen:World War ii.
Joel Hermansen:It, and, and I don't have any, any info on this.
Joel Hermansen:I would imagine it was fairly limited.
Joel Hermansen:I would imagine after World War ii it probably picked back up.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Because, you know, you were encouraged to send wheat, barley beef, et cetera overseas, and you're encouraged here to eat corn, rice, and chicken and fish.
Joel Hermansen:So a lot of the ingredients that a brewer would recognize, home brewer or otherwise you know, our, our.
Joel Hermansen:Are going overseas, but this is also a, an intersection between job creation too, right?
Joel Hermansen:50,000 people went to work in 1933 after the breweries turned the switches back on, which also leads you to the fact that you need institutions to train them.
Joel Hermansen:One of them was yours, your uc Davis Sure goes all the way back to the 1880s, but the high point.
Joel Hermansen:I, I, I would imagine per capita in their enrollment.
Joel Hermansen:I wish Charlie was here.
Joel Hermansen:Is Charlie here?
Bobby Fleshman:Charlie on there?
Bobby Fleshman:Well, we did send Charlie both 5 47 and there was two days from the tank, one day from the tank and Brie malted milk balls.
Bobby Fleshman:So
Allison Fleshman:can't believe you sent those to Char.
Allison Fleshman:I love you Charlie, but man, those things are so good.
Bobby Fleshman:Oh yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Keep 'em.
Bobby Fleshman:We have one more pound around here, hypothetically.
Bobby Fleshman:Joel, there's one more pound floating around.
Joel Hermansen:Please keep them away from me because if you've, for those of you who are listening, the breeze, malted milk balls.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah,
Allison Fleshman:maybe we can actually get some for our Patreon subscribers Ooh.
Joel Hermansen:Might actually be the greatest thing that a Wisconsinite can put in their mouth.
Bobby Fleshman:That's gotta be the, the top tier, by the way, Patreon.
Bobby Fleshman:Because Yeah, if you're a top tier, oh, you're a top tier, we'll get you some.
Bobby Fleshman:And
Joel Hermansen:We're not talking about Whoppers.
Bobby Fleshman:No.
Bobby Fleshman:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:No.
Joel Hermansen:Oh my God.
Joel Hermansen:I
Allison Fleshman:mean, I like Whoppers.
Allison Fleshman:Someone keep track of, we branch off, here are the industrial light lagger to the 5 4 7.
Allison Fleshman:Like
Joel Hermansen:yes, that correct.
Joel Hermansen:But anyway, uc, Davis, the genesis of that, that fermentation program goes back to the 1880s.
Joel Hermansen:The brewing program goes back to the post Cullen Harrison Act because you needed institutions.
Joel Hermansen:All of a sudden, you know, they're, they're turning on the, the switches of this industry and they're all of a sudden we, well we need brewers, we need people who are capable of, of producing this because the industry's been fallow for 14 years.
Joel Hermansen:'cause they're making cheese and yogurt.
Joel Hermansen:Right, right.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, there's a technical slant that we were, we were trying to educate the new workforce to, to imbue, but we also were trying to solve what would become the crap beer revolution some 30 years later.
Bobby Fleshman:Now, one of the other things, not that we thought that consciously, but Right.
Joel Hermansen:One of the other things they had to navigate were supply chain disruptions.
Joel Hermansen:Now you've had to deal with that a little bit, both in technological supplies, but also in, you know, the core ingredients that go into your beers.
Joel Hermansen:Can you talk a little bit about what it's like to have to deal with that?
Joel Hermansen:And then if you can have an industry, because I'm imagining the hop growers in Yakima, Washington in 1934.
Joel Hermansen:You know, were having to quickly pivot to the production of Hops again.
Joel Hermansen:Because their fields had either Wow.
Joel Hermansen:Gone fallow.
Joel Hermansen:Wow.
Joel Hermansen:They never thought about
Bobby Fleshman:that.
Bobby Fleshman:They, they probably, that's a three year process,
Joel Hermansen:right?
Joel Hermansen:I mean, so there, there was a lot of obstacles.
Joel Hermansen:Hmm.
Joel Hermansen:I think sometimes we think that, oh, well they just started making beer again.
Joel Hermansen:Right.
Joel Hermansen:Well, they didn't.
Joel Hermansen:Right.
Joel Hermansen:Because they didn't have the brewers to do it.
Joel Hermansen:The technology had been repurposed and then the supply chains, particularly when it came to the, the core ingredients had been either redirected or had gone fallow.
Joel Hermansen:And you've had to deal with that a little bit with supply chain, just supply, supply chain in general.
Joel Hermansen:That's difficult to do.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:I, well, what you're describing is way bigger though.
Bobby Fleshman:I, I, I'm, I'm kind of taking a moment to think about what it would take to replant fields, get the rhizomes growing, and get them ready to cone again.
Bobby Fleshman:That's a three year process.
Bobby Fleshman:Right.
Bobby Fleshman:And, and that's, that's sort of across your fingers moment.
Bobby Fleshman:Does that also
Joel Hermansen:explain why most of the beers that were being generated fell into this ultralight?
Bobby Fleshman:No, I really don't.
Bobby Fleshman:Pilsner, I don't think so.
Bobby Fleshman:I think we were trying to dilute the industry to the point that people were just not looking for more.
Bobby Fleshman:I think they, they were able to be swayed by marketing.
Bobby Fleshman:I think that the sell wasn't the, the flavor.
Bobby Fleshman:It wasn't that experience.
Bobby Fleshman:It was what it can create of you as a person.
Bobby Fleshman:I think that's where the magazine ads, ultimately the seventies TV ads, so forth, uh, sold the beer to the people.
Bobby Fleshman:I don't think it was ever about the liquid at that point.
Bobby Fleshman:These companies are so big on the marketing side.
Bobby Fleshman:I, I, that, that's kind of where I have to leave that I think people understand that's where that is.
Joel Hermansen:How about yeast?
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:After all of this Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Disruption with the, well
Bobby Fleshman:yeast is gonna hang out.
Bobby Fleshman:It's gonna be, is it,
Joel Hermansen:is it gonna survive for this length of time?
Joel Hermansen:How do you think that they, man, and I'm asking 'cause I don't know
Bobby Fleshman:biologists, how did they manage this?
Bobby Fleshman:Microbiology was, was fairly advanced by the thirties.
Bobby Fleshman:So at some point somebody's able to, to keep these on, on slants or on dishes or frozen beer was being produced.
Bobby Fleshman:And, and this is the thing, Gary's right?
Bobby Fleshman:There's still beer being made.
Bobby Fleshman:No one's talking about it.
Bobby Fleshman:We're just not taxing it.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, no, we are taxing it.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, if you're not paying the taxes, if we put you in jail.
Bobby Fleshman:So it was propagated it, the yeast was being used from batch to batch over these what, 11, 12 years of prohibition.
Bobby Fleshman:And at the end of that, it was still available to be propagated for all the brewers that were ready to jump in.
Bobby Fleshman:It might've mutated, which is a really fascinating story.
Bobby Fleshman:It might've mutated because of the various environmental pressures that would've been different than otherwise.
Joel Hermansen:Do you think they had to go back and get some German strains back?
Joel Hermansen:Well, that's a great question.
Gary Arndt:I think yeast would be the easiest thing,
Joel Hermansen:okay.
Gary Arndt:To propagate.
Gary Arndt:All right.
Gary Arndt:Um, there are sourdough shops that are using the same culture for a hundred years.
Joel Hermansen:I love sourdough bread, by the way, have you ever heard of a
Gary Arndt:perpetual stew?
Gary Arndt:No.
Gary Arndt:Perpetual stew is some restaurants like literally have a stew pot, and it never ends.
Gary Arndt:They just keep adding stuff in it as it goes down.
Gary Arndt:So we
Bobby Fleshman:call that in beer, a sora.
Bobby Fleshman:So we have barrels that we never stop.
Bobby Fleshman:We continue to add, pull, add, pull, add, pull.
Bobby Fleshman:They call Solaris.
Bobby Fleshman:And the culture inside is, we don't know how many bacteria or yeast are evolved, but we know that it's, it's a balanced ecosystem.
Bobby Fleshman:So we wanna make sure we don't pull too much out of it.
Gary Arndt:Just as a
Bobby Fleshman:fun fact.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:There was a perpetual stew in France that was the same stew pot from the 15th century to World War ii.
Allison Fleshman:What?
Allison Fleshman:Oh my What are, wait, hang on.
Allison Fleshman:15th century.
Allison Fleshman:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:Write perpetual stew down almost.
Bobby Fleshman:It's about years.
Bobby Fleshman:That is going to be a solar beer name almost.
Bobby Fleshman:That's happening.
Gary Arndt:Yes.
Gary Arndt:Perpetual.
Gary Arndt:But just keep putting stuff in the stew.
Gary Arndt:Just it gets down.
Gary Arndt:You put in some more so the beef gets low.
Gary Arndt:You just,
Joel Hermansen:yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Throw some chuck roast in there.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:No one's gonna buy you.
Joel Hermansen:Throw some more potatoes in there.
Joel Hermansen:No
Bobby Fleshman:one's gonna buy a perpetual stew beer.
Bobby Fleshman:Are they?
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:I think
Joel Hermansen:they will.
Joel Hermansen:People
Bobby Fleshman:pay money for that.
Gary Arndt:I think David's gonna buy it When you guys open a restaurant.
Gary Arndt:I think you should have perpetual stew.
Joel Hermansen:Oh my God.
Joel Hermansen:And it just sits on a flame on low, like all the time.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Wow.
Bobby Fleshman:I am taking a moment to write that one down.
Bobby Fleshman:Um, back to beer.
Allison Fleshman:Didn't the plague happen in between like, like 1400?
Allison Fleshman:1940. How did Perpetual Stew keep going?
Gary Arndt:No plague was before that.
Gary Arndt:Okay.
Gary Arndt:The Black Death Yeahm, sure, they had their Black death was
Joel Hermansen:in the 14th century, but the Black Death came still intermittently.
Joel Hermansen:I mean, they still age every 150 years, but professional.
Joel Hermansen:But each passing time, it was less effective because of herd immunity.
Allison Fleshman:Go team.
Gary Arndt:I'd already came across this in your research, but another big thing that happened after the 1935 is, I think when it started is the introduction of cans.
Gary Arndt:Yes.
Bobby Fleshman:Which we just looked at.
Bobby Fleshman:The steel cans.
Bobby Fleshman:You pulled up, drinking
Joel Hermansen:at home, became a phenomenon
Bobby Fleshman:and watching Netflix, oh, no.
Bobby Fleshman:Different decade.
Bobby Fleshman:But
Joel Hermansen:different decade.
Joel Hermansen:But no one had ever drank at home before.
Gary Arndt:You invite people over, Hey, wanna listen to the radio and chill?
Gary Arndt:That
Bobby Fleshman:was the the line, huh?
Joel Hermansen:But.
Joel Hermansen:All of a sudden drinking at home after the Cullen Harrison Act became a legitimate thing.
Joel Hermansen:Now, this was interrupted obviously by the calamity.
Joel Hermansen:That was World War ii.
Joel Hermansen:The brewing industry itself was disrupted yet again.
Joel Hermansen:But all of a sudden you didn't have to go to a tide house.
Joel Hermansen:You didn't have to go to a speakeasy.
Joel Hermansen:You could have people over to drink.
Joel Hermansen:And drinking was revolutionized when you can do it at, at home.
Bobby Fleshman:and bottle beer existed.
Bobby Fleshman:It
Joel Hermansen:did, but it was not particularly common.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:But then particularly with the advent of 3.2 Beer, it became kind of the norm.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:It became a phenomenon where everyone would all of a sudden have beer in their fridge.
Bobby Fleshman:We can talk about why the steel cans and the linings were not the best, but that's beside the point.
Bobby Fleshman:The, the move.
Bobby Fleshman:Can
Joel Hermansen:you notice, like if I poured you a Sierra Nevada green pale ale, we've out of a can or a bottle?
Joel Hermansen:Can you notice?
Bobby Fleshman:Um, no, not not with Sierra, no.
Bobby Fleshman:Not in the modern times.
Joel Hermansen:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:Do you notice?
Joel Hermansen:No, but I, I notoriously have a bad sense of taste,
Bobby Fleshman:so what you will notice is a keg.
Bobby Fleshman:Wait, David, I'm not cut that from there.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, I was, I I was trying to move.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm, I was trying to move as fast I could pass though.
Bobby Fleshman:No, I take a,
Allison Fleshman:take a, what I
Joel Hermansen:meant to say is I am not particularly adept.
Joel Hermansen:That's he's had a
Allison Fleshman:little too much.
Allison Fleshman:5, 4, 7 is the problem right now.
Joel Hermansen:No, no, no.
Joel Hermansen:I am not particularly adept at illuminating the very small differences between flavor profiles.
Joel Hermansen:Okay, go team.
Joel Hermansen:Now I clearly know what I like a
Bobby Fleshman:little bit of science aside here.
Bobby Fleshman:Sierra Nevada in 2025, it's making a bottle conditioned Sierra Nevada Pale L or it can condition Sierra Nevada Pale L If they're not making them the same, no one is, that's the same beer.
Bobby Fleshman:I would say that the keg versus the bottle or can, that's where the difference is because the can, the keg is not conditioned in the keg.
Bobby Fleshman:So when people see it tastes different from the tap versus the can or the bottle, it's because it is different.
Joel Hermansen:But the can in the bottle,
Bobby Fleshman:they should be the same.
Joel Hermansen:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:So Sierra Nevada, if they're, if they're not making them, if it doesn't come across the same, it can't be done.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:That, that I'll die on the hill with that one.
Bobby Fleshman:And so Gary's talking about kan is starting to be, uh.
Bobby Fleshman:I sent into the market around that time they were steel and they were all different alloy alloys, and they discovered that they were becoming rusted or not rusted, but maybe at least ions were escaping.
Bobby Fleshman:It's compromising.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:It's compromising the integrity.
Bobby Fleshman:They discovered they should probably line them.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:And then at some point aluminum became the state of the art.
Gary Arndt:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:But today, don't be afraid of glass versus aluminum.
Bobby Fleshman:The, the linings are, are friendly to the environment, generally speaking, and to leaching of those ions.
Joel Hermansen:Right.
Joel Hermansen:And to reiterate to our audience, I know a great beer tastes like I'm not super adept at We all
Allison Fleshman:heard you Joel, go team.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:You, you're wishing we were still on our 5 47 VMSB podcast?
Allison Fleshman:No, part two.
Allison Fleshman:I mean, I think that was, that was settled, but was it?
Allison Fleshman:It was.
Allison Fleshman:It was.
Allison Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison Fleshman:I, I, let's make
Bobby Fleshman:sure we, we cover all the bases here though.
Bobby Fleshman:On the prohibition.
Bobby Fleshman:Oh, yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Ion prohibition.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:We're back.
Bobby Fleshman:We're
Joel Hermansen:back to, to, to prohibition.
Joel Hermansen:So let me ask you a quick question.
Joel Hermansen:So you had to pivot really quickly when COVID happened.
Bobby Fleshman:Yep.
Joel Hermansen:And you had to go to kind of a, to go market, you had to put the little tiny door facing the alley, yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:By that van that had a, was it Kurt Vangen or was it, no, it was Kurt Vangen.
Bobby Fleshman:It was right.
Bobby Fleshman:No, it was Jim Morrison Morrison dorm.
Allison Fleshman:It was, uh, van Morrison.
Bobby Fleshman:Van Morrison's.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison Fleshman:Wrong, sorry, wrong
Bobby Fleshman:Morrison.
Bobby Fleshman:So many references here.
Bobby Fleshman:I bought this van for a thousand bucks.
Bobby Fleshman:We've talked about it.
Joel Hermansen:Was it the, the, the gray Dodge?
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:It's gone around the world now.
Bobby Fleshman:It's probably in somebody's canyons.
Joel Hermansen:So a lot of these businesses had to pivot.
Bobby Fleshman:Yep.
Joel Hermansen:Malt syrups, malted milk, um, yogurt, cheese, you know, ice cream, et cetera.
Joel Hermansen:If.
Joel Hermansen:We had a prohibition moment in, so what did our COVID beer taste like?
Joel Hermansen:2020. Let, well let's add, let's, let's say one comes in 2026 and you couldn't make beer.
Joel Hermansen:Would you be able to pivot?
Allison Fleshman:We looked into pivoting to making hand sanitizer in the beginning.
Bobby Fleshman:You're being too altruistic here.
Bobby Fleshman:You're trying to help society.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm thinking hot sauce.
Bobby Fleshman:Like something that's not right.
Bobby Fleshman:We have a hot sauce That's amazing that we do with our partners next door.
Bobby Fleshman:That's true
Allison Fleshman:because I, yeah, I didn't know this.
Allison Fleshman:Like, so you can make hot sauce in one of two ways.
Allison Fleshman:You either like blend the acid, you buy bulk acid with tomato stuff.
Bobby Fleshman:Mm-hmm.
Allison Fleshman:Blend or you ferment it.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:We do it nine months in.
Bobby Fleshman:Turns out we can ferment in barrels.
Bobby Fleshman:Yep.
Bobby Fleshman:And I think, and I'm
Joel Hermansen:also, I'm also gonna put this out there, 'cause I've been wondering about this for years.
Joel Hermansen:Why is there not a 5 47 mustard?
Bobby Fleshman:Why is there not a 5 47 mustard?
Bobby Fleshman:That I'm, I'm just posing that too.
Bobby Fleshman:Rhetorically.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, why not?
Bobby Fleshman:I mean,
Joel Hermansen:get on to, if you had a 5 47 mustard,
Bobby Fleshman:we were gonna do a 10 pastes mustard.
Bobby Fleshman:So why don't we just lean No, no, no, no.
Bobby Fleshman:Just lean in.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:You like, have you ever had the torpedo mustard from Sierra Nevada?
Joel Hermansen:No.
Joel Hermansen:Oh my word.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, there's a way to blend our two beer and programs and mustard go really well together.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:We should do this.
Bobby Fleshman:We can do this.
Bobby Fleshman:Can we,
Joel Hermansen:can we think maybe a little bit about a 5 47 mustard?
Joel Hermansen:There?
Bobby Fleshman:Go.
Bobby Fleshman:So, Joel, I think Joel was leading us to that answer.
Bobby Fleshman:I was.
Bobby Fleshman:All right.
Bobby Fleshman:Mustard.
Bobby Fleshman:It is.
Bobby Fleshman:So a mustard hot sauce.
Bobby Fleshman:Hot sauce.
Bobby Fleshman:And then Alex has the idea.
Bobby Fleshman:Hand sanitizer.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Nah, screw that.
Bobby Fleshman:People will wash their own hands.
Bobby Fleshman:We will, we'll do, we're gonna do pickled eggs.
Bobby Fleshman:We'll do all the things that come outta the sour program, plus hot sauce.
Bobby Fleshman:How
Joel Hermansen:long from a technological perspective.
Joel Hermansen:Because you, and, and by the way, I would still like to see you give a tour of the tap room on a video for our viewers.
Allison Fleshman:Oh, I should do that.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:How long would it you want me to do it though?
Joel Hermansen:Don't let Bobby.
Joel Hermansen:Oh, totally, Alison.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Like if, if you had to send everybody home for two years, what would it be like from a technological perspective to simply flip the switch?
Bobby Fleshman:You're saying, what is it, what does that look like?
Bobby Fleshman:The
Gary Arndt:door is closed for two years.
Gary Arndt:Like you're just mothballing the entire place.
Gary Arndt:Yes.
Bobby Fleshman:Are you asking what it takes to turn it off or turn it on?
Bobby Fleshman:Turn it
Gary Arndt:back on.
Bobby Fleshman:Whoa, man.
Bobby Fleshman:Wow.
Bobby Fleshman:Oh God.
Bobby Fleshman:The glycol.
Bobby Fleshman:That's a question of how do you start a brewery?
Bobby Fleshman:Oh.
Bobby Fleshman:Because that's really what it is.
Bobby Fleshman:But the, I'm,
Joel Hermansen:I'm just saying the equipment is all there.
Bobby Fleshman:I know, and that's,
Joel Hermansen:you just said, Ben, we gotta shut the doors.
Joel Hermansen:We're crisis.
Joel Hermansen:Two years later we meet up.
Joel Hermansen:Okay, whatever source.
Joel Hermansen:Well, the first
Bobby Fleshman:thing you're doing is checking your, your refrigerant levels on your, all the s fucking glycol system.
Bobby Fleshman:That's number one.
Bobby Fleshman:All the glycol, glycol, everything.
Bobby Fleshman:All the soft seals, all the, all the gaskets, that's number one.
Bobby Fleshman:And two, you're looking at, and three
Allison Fleshman:and four.
Bobby Fleshman:And then the gly, let's hope that someone drained the boiler so they didn't rust out over the, the two year subsequent, oh man.
Bobby Fleshman:Got the drains.
Bobby Fleshman:And we gotta balance the chemistry of the glycol.
Bobby Fleshman:We gotta do sequestration of, of ions, and we gotta do oxygen scavenging.
Bobby Fleshman:There's so many things you gotta do to, to turn these systems back on.
Bobby Fleshman:'cause they are arteries, they're veins.
Bobby Fleshman:And those, those are the hearts of the system.
Bobby Fleshman:They don't just turn off and on
Allison Fleshman:the draft system too.
Joel Hermansen:See, and, and I I, my asking you, this was purposeful.
Joel Hermansen:Because if you're shutting things, and yes, I know Pabst and and whatnot were making other things, but if you're literally shutting this down, uh, from a brewing perspective, the technology would be very difficult to just turn back on.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:And there, like I said, there were breweries that tried to do this seasonal, and they learned that in three to six months it's almost impossible because it
Joel Hermansen:seals mm-hmm.
Joel Hermansen:Because of, yeah.
Joel Hermansen:So many things.
Allison Fleshman:Well, I mean, driving your car, if you don't drive your car for six months, I think of it like
Bobby Fleshman:a carcass, a human being.
Bobby Fleshman:If you turn a human being off, you don't, you don't turn people off and on.
Bobby Fleshman:This is a living system,
Gary Arndt:but to counter this, wineries do this, they are not usually producing, or at least some are not producing wine all year long.
Gary Arndt:It is interesting.
Gary Arndt:They have a harvest.
Gary Arndt:It is interesting.
Gary Arndt:I don't work in a winery, but they produce it.
Gary Arndt:And a lot of the, at least the tanks and stuff, I gotta believe are very similar.
Bobby Fleshman:It's not the same, but Mo, they're not.
Bobby Fleshman:To my knowledge, there's not a lot of boiling happening.
Bobby Fleshman:There's not a lot of a ation going on.
Bobby Fleshman:Most of this is happening sort of at the whims of the environment.
Bobby Fleshman:And that's the romance of wine making.
Bobby Fleshman:Brewing is the romance
Joel Hermansen:of wine.
Joel Hermansen:Ma. That is, that should be a book.
Bobby Fleshman:Is it a
Joel Hermansen:book?
Bobby Fleshman:I mean, I would rather write a book about the romance of beer making, but, well, that would be a
Joel Hermansen:great title though.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:But it is sort of what the wine industry has done.
Bobby Fleshman:They've created a romantic vision of what it is to, to make and to drink beer.
Bobby Fleshman:The beer industry has put bikini models from Switzerland on the covers of whatever sports magazines.
Bobby Fleshman:Let's go back to the beer
Allison Fleshman:that Gary had.
Allison Fleshman:I like that lady.
Allison Fleshman:Old froth.
Allison Fleshman:Slush, yes.
Allison Fleshman:Yeah, she's beautiful.
Allison Fleshman:So the beer
Bobby Fleshman:industry has laid on its own sword.
Bobby Fleshman:The body is real.
Bobby Fleshman:They've created their own problem here.
Joel Hermansen:Can I pose another question to prohibition wise?
Joel Hermansen:I, you're here, so I'm assuming the answer is yes.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm, I'm
Joel Hermansen:trapped.
Joel Hermansen:So, 5 47,
Bobby Fleshman:ive heard that 1, 5, 4, 7
Joel Hermansen:is a recipe that you've recently laminated.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah, it's totally, it's totally like, completely can, I can't adjust it.
Bobby Fleshman:It it's on the walls.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Yep.
Joel Hermansen:You can see it in the tap room, et cetera.
Bobby Fleshman:Yep.
Joel Hermansen:So your brewery gets shut down in 1919 because of acts of Congress and et cetera, through the Volstead Act, and all of a sudden in 1933, once Colin Harrison comes in, and then two years later you can make normal beer, would you be able to recreate 5 47 after a 15 year gap when you consider environmental factors, technological factors, yeast factors?
Bobby Fleshman:I'm more concerned with the agricultural factors than any other factor.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah because agronomy 'cause agriculture follows the demand, and if the industry isn't there, they plant whatever.
Gary Arndt:He's really just asking for himself.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:This is his insurance
Bobby Fleshman:policy.
Bobby Fleshman:Well, in case 5 47 should disappear, it sounds like we need to invest if there invest, if there's an
Joel Hermansen:extinction moment of 5 47, I'm in trouble.
Bobby Fleshman:I think we to invest in a a heritage or a, a state an a state 5 47, where we, we are owners of a field like the doomsday vault where we have, that makes, that, makes those hops in those malls.
Bobby Fleshman:There's no other way around this.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:But it's a legitimate thing to think, oh, I mean, beer is hard enough to replicate.
Joel Hermansen:How often do you brew?
Joel Hermansen:5 47. Not enough.
Joel Hermansen:I mean, recently it's not been enough.
Joel Hermansen:Enough.
Joel Hermansen:Not enough.
Joel Hermansen:Actually,
Bobby Fleshman:We just packaged it last week and we know we have to brew it again next week.
Bobby Fleshman:So it keeps, yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:So how often,
Joel Hermansen:like once every,
Bobby Fleshman:every three weeks.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:And, and
Joel Hermansen:you're able to replicate it beautifully every three weeks.
Joel Hermansen:Now add 14 years to that.
Joel Hermansen:I know.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:And disruptions, you know, across the spectrum.
Joel Hermansen:Well, it comes,
Bobby Fleshman:well, 5 47 particularly is reliant on the hops.
Bobby Fleshman:So we, if there's no beer industry, I don't know where the hop industry goes.
Bobby Fleshman:Right.
Bobby Fleshman:So that's a real challenge.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:So I think this gives us a pretty good perspective of where the beer industry is in 1933.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Now, obviously they're not brewing 5 47, but it is still difficult to replicate.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:You know, and produce a consistent beer when you have people that in many cases weren't brewing the last time that, you know, uh, pre volstead act farms had had, you know, either gone fallow or had pivoted and and done something else.
Joel Hermansen:Hop strains had had.
Joel Hermansen:Right.
Joel Hermansen:I mean, this, this was almost, if you think about it, and I guess this is maybe my, one of my culminating points with this, and, and I think this is undoubtedly a, a a point that James, uh, Jason Taylor makes as well, this was like almost an extinction level moment for beer in the United States.
Joel Hermansen:In the United States,
Bobby Fleshman:right?
Bobby Fleshman:But if we're taking hops in Ger that were from Germany, that were not, uh, how do I say they weren't of the quality of what you should make beer with.
Bobby Fleshman:That's what a lot of'em American hops were.
Bobby Fleshman:They they they were flavored.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:The thing is, a lot of this could
Gary Arndt:be imported from Canada.
Gary Arndt:They never stopped.
Gary Arndt:True.
Gary Arndt:So if there was hop production there, they could import it or from Europe or something.
Gary Arndt:That's good point.
Gary Arndt:I'm
Bobby Fleshman:not sure about the hop culture there.
Bobby Fleshman:The growing, I don't know, growing industry.
Bobby Fleshman:I don't know.
Bobby Fleshman:I thought it was all south of the border, but maybe it, there's a lot more going up there than I know.
Bobby Fleshman:Maybe it pivoted.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah,
Joel Hermansen:because Canada has a, we're gonna do a Canadian beer history.
Joel Hermansen:Oh
Bobby Fleshman:yes.
Bobby Fleshman:Do we know any Canadians?
Bobby Fleshman:Can we get Alanis Morissette to do a they lurk among us.
Bobby Fleshman:You never know when you could be talking to one.
Joel Hermansen:It's not like South Parkette was a really, really quick grab for you, I feel.
Joel Hermansen:Oh, that's all I know.
Bobby Fleshman:I know there's others.
Bobby Fleshman:Oh, uh, Mike, uh, not the, the killer, but the comedian.
Bobby Fleshman:Myers.
Bobby Fleshman:Myers.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Those are your two Canadians.
Joel Hermansen:That's it.
Joel Hermansen:That's
Bobby Fleshman:all I got.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:Gary, do you know anyone from Canada?
Bobby Fleshman:Lots of people
Gary Arndt:from Canada.
Joel Hermansen:Can we get him on the shows?
Joel Hermansen:He's gonna list him
Gary Arndt:like he does the countries of the world now.
Gary Arndt:Right.
Gary Arndt:I, I know a whole lot of people.
Gary Arndt:You know how you get a Canadian to say, I'm sorry, kick 'em in the shin.
Allison Fleshman:On that note,
Bobby Fleshman:how much of this goes on?
Bobby Fleshman:Paton
Gary Arndt:giving Canadian shit is like one of my favorite things in life because it's like picking on the Amish because what are they gonna do?
Bobby Fleshman:I am so embarrassed of the.
Bobby Fleshman:South Park, bit about blame Canada right now.
Bobby Fleshman:Right.
Bobby Fleshman:That's so backwards.
Bobby Fleshman:Alright, Gary, take us out somehow.
Bobby Fleshman:Our, our Joel have we done everything with, well, I think
Joel Hermansen:the only other thing I was gonna mention there was a huge psychological shift in this.
Joel Hermansen:I mean, we talked about the economic shift, the technological shift in, in beer making and, and whatnot, the revenue shift.
Joel Hermansen:But there was a psychological shift that all of a sudden something that had been taken from you had been restored.
Joel Hermansen:And I felt that several, uh, weeks ago when I came in and I found that there was no 5 47 and it was almost like I, I was the number of text
Allison Fleshman:messages Bobby got.
Allison Fleshman:He comes to me with these puppy dog eyes and he is like, I can't handle it anymore.
Allison Fleshman:Okay.
Bobby Fleshman:So just so Joel knows, we've been working, this is not for this podcast, but just so he knows, I submitted 23 pages of documents to a, an import broker to get us a tank so that we can expand our capacity so we can continue to brew beer such as
Allison Fleshman:Tank has been stuck.
Allison Fleshman:It's, uh, it's
Bobby Fleshman:a long conversation.
Bobby Fleshman:All it's been stuck in tar wars.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:You talk about, you talk, you talk about supply chain issues, man, I can go on, right?
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:Where you get there.
Bobby Fleshman:See, I only
Joel Hermansen:deal with demand change issues.
Joel Hermansen:I, I, I'm a supply guy.
Joel Hermansen:I get it.
Joel Hermansen:Am the 5 47 demand coordinator.
Joel Hermansen:Yeah.
Joel Hermansen:I can't concern myself with the supply side.
Bobby Fleshman:No, I got you.
Joel Hermansen:But Gary, that was the last point I had on it.
Joel Hermansen:But this will give you
Bobby Fleshman:context for when I like lick this tank from bottom to top and it gets really awkward.
Bobby Fleshman:We'll need a moment with the tank.
Bobby Fleshman:The only thing we didn't touch that I
Gary Arndt:would bring up is with the repeal of prohibition regulation went to the states.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:And so you saw a whole lot of different things where some states were still dry, like Oklahoma, some states the state controlled the sale of alcohol, Alabama.
Gary Arndt:Uh, but the biggest thing Alabama, that still exists today is you saw this division between.
Gary Arndt:Manufacturers, distributors and resellers.
Gary Arndt:The three tier and the distributor part of it never really existed before.
Gary Arndt:Right.
Gary Arndt:And that was kind of put in there by law.
Gary Arndt:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:And you still see that today.
Gary Arndt:Yep.
Gary Arndt:And this is how a lot of the early, like football players and stuff, they were awarded a beer distributorship and that's where they really made most of their money.
Gary Arndt:Right.
Joel Hermansen:Can we do an episode on the three
Bobby Fleshman:we?
Bobby Fleshman:Yes.
Bobby Fleshman:Yes.
Bobby Fleshman:And we need to get someone here that knows a lot about it because I've been trying to understand it.
Bobby Fleshman:I'm in it, I don't understand it entirely.
Bobby Fleshman:Is
Allison Fleshman:it cymbal?
Allison Fleshman:Um, former.
Allison Fleshman:Oh, I
Joel Hermansen:know a guy at cymbal.
Bobby Fleshman:David.
Allison Fleshman:Didn't he do
Bobby Fleshman:distribution?
Bobby Fleshman:No, Dan.
Bobby Fleshman:Mm-hmm.
Bobby Fleshman:He was with the distributor.
Bobby Fleshman:But yeah.
Bobby Fleshman:I mean this, they sell it as a way to make the market fair, but it is manipulated.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Allison Fleshman:But they save it for the podcast.
Allison Fleshman:I know.
Bobby Fleshman:Yeah.
Gary Arndt:All right.
Gary Arndt:That I think will wrap up this episode of Respecting the Beer.
Gary Arndt:The producer of Respecting the Beer is David Kelso.
Gary Arndt:Without David, there isn't gonna be any show.
Gary Arndt:Make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast player so you never miss an episode.
Gary Arndt:And join the Facebook group to get updates between the episodes and support the show over on Patreon, where you're probably gonna listen to the vast majority of what we talked about while recording this.
Gary Arndt:You can get links to both of these in the show notes.
Gary Arndt:And until next time, please remember to respect the beer.
