Behind every beer brand you drink is an impressive team of beer professionals — brewers, barkeeps, bussers, canners, sales reps, CEOs, COOs, lab techs, interns and everyone from marketing and HR teams to warehouse and restaurant workers. “Beer professional” encapsulates a wide variety of jobs and skill sets, and breweries are constantly making moves to secure great employees and industry leaders. Oftentimes, it’s not even a beer pro, but a food or technology wiz that’s needed. Craft breweries and their suppliers and trade associations have many facets and require specialized employees. Here are a few of the big personnel headlines from the craft brewing industry in the last month plus. Send your beer pro news to [email protected].
Colorado’s Dry Dock names new head brewer — craft beer veteran Rob Kent
Dry Dock Brewing Co. has hired Rob Kent, formerly with California’s esteemed Bear Republic Brewing Co., to serve as head brewer for the Aurora, Colorado, brewery. A professional brewer for over 20 years, Kent got his start at Utah’s Uinta Brewing Co. and became head brewer there. He moved to Bear Republic in 2011 to become brewing manager and held that role until 2022.
While he served at Uinta and Bear Republic, the two breweries earned numerous accolades including twelve Great American Beer festival medals and six World Beer Cup medals. While at Bear Republic, Kent helped the brewery increase its production to a peak of 82,000 bbls. Kent is also a longtime judge in Great American Beer Festival and World Beer Cup competitions and a BJCP-certified beer judge.
His goals at Dry Dock?
“I hope to mentor our brewing and cellar staff,” he said, “on a combination of old-world techniques and new-school approaches to brewing. I am very interested in the evolution of brewing. My hope is to inspire creativity in the next generation of brewers while learning something new for myself along the way.”
Kent’s successful time at respected craft breweries played a big role in his hiring at Dry Dock.
“We have a long history,” said Dry Dock Cofounder Kevin DeLange, “of hiring very skilled brewers who have helped us make exceptional beer. With his deep knowledge and experience, Rob can continue this tradition at a time when high quality beer is more important than ever. His years of making great IPAs are especially appealing to us, as are his years as a beer judge and an adopter of new and alternative processes for making delicious beer.”
In addition to brewing and perfecting the beers at the brewery’s North Dock production and packaging facility, Kent aims to expand the techniques and beer list at Dry Dock’s original South Dock brewery and taproom.
“We have a great opportunity to be creative and experimental at South Dock,” Kent said. “I’d like to continue with the evolution of IPA there and work on some new and classic beer styles that might someday be brewed at North Dock.”
Kent’s move to Dry Dock was spurred by his appreciation of the metro area’s many assets and a desire to live closer to family members in Colorado and Wyoming. “With Denver being a beer-centric city as well as a destination for outdoor activities and live music,” Kent said, “the decision to come here was easy to make. I decided to work at Dry Dock during the in-person interview because the company culture and positive employee outlook sold me on the place.”
Memphis’ Wiseacre Brewing welcomes Amanda Thompson as new COO
Wiseacre Brewing Co. recently launched distribution in central and south Florida via Progressive Distributing. Check out that news here. Wiseacre’s expansion into the Sunshine State comes on the heels of the recent promotion of long-time employee Amanda Thompson to COO of Wiseacre Brewing. Thompson began her time at Wiseacre in the taproom as a way of returning to the workforce after the birth of her two children. In her more than seven years with the brewery, she has worked her way up from the taproom to administration, events, human resources and operations, all the while exhibiting an incredible work ethic and exceptional communication, organization, and execution skills.
“Davin and I value Amanda’s opinions and insights tremendously, and we are grateful for her ability to recognize challenges and her assertiveness about how to address them. Anytime Amanda faces a hurdle, it’s become an opportunity for her to shine,” said Kellan Bartosch, cofounder along with his brother Davin Bartosch, of Wiseacre. “Amanda has done all of this with a great attitude, patience, a sense of humor, creativity, and showing the world that ‘everything is figure-outable.’ Beyond work functions, her contributions to company culture have been massive. Her title change is both a recognition of the work she has done across many departments and a reflection of additional levels of responsibility that she’ll take on as Wiseacre continues to grow.”
One of Thompson’s first projects as COO will be working with staff to manage the production increases necessary to accommodate Wiseacre’s entry into the Florida market, including the populous communities of Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville, among others.
“In my time at Wiseacre, I’ve seen the industry evolve at each tier, but Tiny Bomb has anchored us in every wave of change and will continue to be the compass that guides us forward through whatever obstacles and opportunities lie ahead,” said Thompson. “We are just starting to package off of our four new 300 BBL fermenters and it couldn’t come at a better time — this recent equipment expansion is what’s making it possible for us to get our beer in the hands of our fans in central and south Florida. Florida is definitely a competitive market, but our focus on an amazing pilsner continues to be a strategy that resonates with our distributor partners. We are getting great enthusiasm from our distribution partner Progressive and we feel confident that it will trickle down to retailers and customers.”
Wiseacre’s Tiny Bomb has grown to become the No. 4 craft pilsner in the country, growth fueled in part by the state-of-the-art production facility Wiseacre built in downtown Memphis in 2020, which quintupled the brewery’s previous capacity. The new facility also led to the development of new beers and the creation of new packaging options, which include 12-, 16- and 19.2-oz cans coming in six-packs, four-packs, 12-packs, variety packs and single-serve.
Wiseacre is currently sold in Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Wisconsin, meaning that Wiseacre fans in a total of 20 states and the District of Columbia can buy their Wiseacre favorites closer to home.
Crooked Hammock’s new Head of Brewing Larry Horwitz releases first beer
Created by new Head of Brewing Operations Larry Horwitz and released last week (May 27), Crooked Hammock Brewery is ringing in beach season with the debut of its newest and most crushable beer to date — Hammock Light — a light lager brewed for cookouts where the conversations keep going and the sun never sets.
At 4.2% ABV, this unpretentious beer is a modern take on the old-school light lager: unapologetically smooth featuring premium pilsner malt gently kissed with maize and a sublime ratio of Continental and American hops. Every sip conjures up a refreshing memory, much like the nuanced brewing process that went into making it: cold fermented for at least 28 days with traditional Bavarian lager yeast. The brew marks the first from-scratch recipe created at the Hammock by Horwitz, who joins the CHB team with 30+ years of experience in the industry, including a celebrated reputation as the “Light Lager Whisperer.”
Hammock Light will serve as the first new core beer for Crooked Hammock, followed quickly by a forthcoming Belgian-style witbier in July and a New England-style IPA in August. The endlessly drinkable lager entered Hammock’s year-round lineup on Memorial Day weekend when all three Crooked Hammock brewpubs (Lewes + Middletown, Delaware, and North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina) hosted bi-annual Yard Sales featuring screaming deals on branded merch, the drop of its summer selection of graphic T-shirts, sweats and active lifestyle wear.
Crooked Hammock’s decorated new brewmaster has a contagious passion for creating tasty, approachable brews ever since he graduated from the Masters’ Brewers Association of America’s Malting and Brewing Science Program at the University of Wisconsin, as well as the American Brewers Guild Brewery Science and Engineering Program. Horwitz is a dedicated service member of the Brewer’s Association with nearly 20 years of service on various committees, including a former at-large seat on the Board of Directors. When he’s not crafting and enjoying great brews at the Hammock, Horwitz serves as chair of the Draft Beer Quality Subcommittee for the Brewers Association and judges for the Great American Beer Festival and World Beer Cup, on top of teaching courses on brewing, judging beers and more.
Boston Beer announces Philip Hodges as chief supply chain officer
The Boston Beer Co. Inc. recently announced that it has hired Philip A. Hodges as its chief supply chain officer. Hodges will report to Chief Executive Officer David A. Burwick and will have primary responsibility for overseeing the company’s integrated supply chain, including brewery management, procurement, customer service, engineering, safety, quality and planning.
Hodges, with over 30 years of senior operations experience in the consumer-packaged goods industry, has been an advisor for the company in supply chain management since May 2022. During this time, he has helped Boston Beer begin to improve its brewery performance by reducing freight and warehousing costs, implementing systems to improve forecasting and inventory management, and enabling the company to be more reactive to changing demand.
Prior to his work with Boston Beer, Hodges served as the executive vice president of Group Supply Chain at the Carlsberg, an international brewing company based in Copenhagen, from 2017 to 2022. Before that, he was appointed group director and chief supply chain officer for SABMiller. From 2011 to 2015, he served as senior vice president of integrated supply chain Europe for Mondelēz International, a multinational beverage and snack food company, with his office in Zurich. Before that, Hodges held various senior operations roles with Kraft Foods Group from 1991 to 2011.
“Phil has influenced our supply chain approach since he first started consulting with us last year,” said Burwick. “The supply chain team has been working hard to modernize our supply chain through investments in equipment and process and by implementing thoughtful, gross margin savings plans. We’re looking forward to the significant impact Phil will now make in his new leadership position as our CSCO as we seek to generate substantial gross margin expansion from our supply chain over the next few years.”
Thomas Raiser is promoted to management board of BarthHaas
Thomas Raiser, the long-serving head of sales and marketing at BarthHaas, one of the world’s leading hop services providers, will become the new managing director of markets as of August 1, 2024. In his new role, he will be responsible for purchasing, supply chain management, and sales/marketing. The 55-year-old will join Peter Hintermeier and Oliver Bergner as the third managing director with effect from August 1, 2023.
Peter Hintermeier is retiring on July 31, 2024. Thomas Raiser and Oliver Bergner, who is responsible for human resources and finance, will then lead the company in the tried-and-tested tandem management structure. During the transition phase, Raiser will continue to focus on sales until a successor has been found and onboarded.
“I’m looking forward to this new role and the possibility it gives me to bring my extensive experience in the international hop business to bear in a wider area of responsibility at BarthHaas. The hop market is wide-ranging and offers a lot of variety; even after 30 years, it is as exciting as ever and still presents quite a few challenges,” said Raiser, commenting on his appointment.
“I’ve known Thomas for more than 20 years and am delighted that he has been chosen. With his experience and knowledge of the company he’ll be able to hit the ground running, allowing us to tackle new projects from day one,” said Hintermeier.
Raiser’s appointment was preceded by a thorough selection process. Thanks to his experience, his personality, and, above all, his ideas on the further development of the company, he was able to come out on top against a strong field of external candidates. The members of the board of directors voted unanimously in his favor.
“We are very pleased that Thomas Raiser is willing to take on this responsibility and that we were able to win him over for this position” added Stephan Barth, one of the company’s shareholders and chair of the board. “Having him on the management board will enable us to maintain continuity at the top of the company, as he has for years been a member of the management team that has shaped and implemented our strategy.”
Thomas Raiser began his career in 1990 as a trainee and went on to become sales manager with Hopunion Raiser, Scharrer KG, Nuremberg. He joined BarthHaas in 2000 and today, as well as being head of sales and marketing, is a member of various committees within the group. By the time he completed his education, Raiser had already gained extensive international experience: He earned a Bachelor of Science in Economics at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, and a Master of Science in Japanese Business Studies at the Chaminade University of Honolulu and Tokyo.
With the new management board and the management team, BarthHaas has two strong bodies who are responsible for the future-oriented design of the family company and thus enable it to leverage more strongly than ever the potential of hops and other naturally occurring substances as natural flavorings. In addition to the managing directors, the management team includes Thomas Kastner, head of supply chain management, and Stephan Schinagl,
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