The Little Brewery That Can

November 17, 2014, by Crafty Pint

The Little Brewery That Can

A few days ago, Matt Bebe had a moment. A little over four years ago, he was working as an HR manager. And now here he was packaging cans of IPA bearing his brewery's name – the first Aussie IPA to appear in a can, no less – while over his shoulders stood the shiny tanks of Mornington Peninsula Brewery's newly installed second brewery, a 25 hectolitre system similar to that operated by Mountain Goat.

"I looked at the IPA can in my hand," he says, "and thought, 'Who would have thought I'd be doing this after where I've come from?'."

He has a point, with the brewery that established itself in a factory that used to manufacture exploding golf balls just down the road from Mornington Racecourse only four years ago now one with a national reputation as one of the best and most consistent in the country. Last year, head brewer Andrew "AG" Gow collected an AIBA trophy for Best Stout for his Imperial Stout and, along with his brewing team, he can't brew beer fast enough to meet demand no matter how hard they try.

"We've been well received," says Matt. "At the end of the day, if you listen to what the punters are saying and can give them what they're looking for you can be successful."

Giving the people what they want is something they've done from day one, covering plenty of bases along the way with many fans who love their hoppy beers, others who can't get enough of their superb range of dark ales, and plenty of other beers – including some Aussie firsts in terms of styles and new hops – appearing along the way too. Earlier this year, they became only the second Australian micro to install a canning line and this week they're doubling their canned offering with their IPA.

"[The response to the Pale in cans] has been very, very positive," says Matt. "The only issue has been people saying it drinks faster than a bottle – and it does seem to!

"We want to expand the Australian craft beer can scene and have had a lot of requests from people wanting them for festivals."

As for the IPA, there are only a couple of pallets of cans in this first run, with the beer chosen partly because it's one of their three best sellers (along with the Pale and Brown) and also because they figure cans preserve the hop profile of a beer well.

"We had some of the first batch of Pale Ale that came off the canning line and tried them side by side nine months later with fresh cans and you couldn't tell the difference from a hop point of view," says Matt.

The second brewery (pictured right), which is found in a large warehouse just a few hundred metres from the venue where the original brewery is still operational, took a little longer than expected to be installed (as always seems to be the case) and ran over budget but will allow them to get closer to satisfying the growing clamour for AG's beers. That said, after a recent brief spurt of limited release specials when the brewing schedule allowed, the brewers have been told it could well be nothing but core beers from now until early next year.

"Demand is so high, there's only our regular beers in the tanks at Watt Road [the original site that they hope to use for more specials now the new brewery is in place]," says AG. "We banged out some seasonals [last month] then Matt said the White IPA we've just done would be the last of the year.

"It's frustrating," says the former Mountain Goat and 5 Islands / Illawarra brewer who loves nothing more than trying out new recipes, "but I totally understand. It's been a tough period for everyone with the change, with a few little teething problems that we've got our heads around now and spreading the extra work around the existing team.

"It's really good to have another beer in cans; in another 12 months hopefully there will be another."

Who knows, by then he may even have achieved his goal of having more beer in the brewery than the expanding East Coast sales team can sell.

"[With the new brewery] I thought there might be more pressure on the sales team than the brewery," says AG. "But no, [head of sales] Michael is always after more!

Another tank to further expand capacity is on its way, with more due to be ordered soon, while their Wild Goose canning line will at some point be upgraded to one twice the size; thankfully, they have plenty of room in which to expand...

"The way the new brewery is set up, we can keep banging in more tanks as the infrastructure is there for them," says AG.

"It just continues to grow," adds Matt. "We had two options: be happy with what we have got or try to make an impact on the Australian craft beer scene."

Having opted for the latter, he is confident they can.

"We have the right beer and the right brewers to do that," he says.

And there will be few among those who've sampled their wares that would disagree.


NB We've added heaps of new photos to the brewery's page, which you can view here.

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