In the middle of all this canning and the roll out of our beer to our Texas County friends, we haven’t had the opportunity to fully express how excited we are about this coming Saturday.
A couple of years ago Big Brothers and Big Sisters of the Ozarks began “Ozarks Beer Fest”, an opportunity for craft beer lovers to gather in Springfield to enjoy distinctive craft beers and great food. To top off a great event, all the funds raised by the event go to a great Southwest Missouri cause–Big Brothers and Big Sisters of the Ozarks.
When we attended Ozarks Beer Fest last year, we anticipated the thought of bringing our beer to the event to share with fellow lovers of craft beer in the Ozarks. I don’t know if we really thought it would happen in 2011, but it’s going to. We couldn’t be more excited to share our beer with craft beer drinkers in Southwest Missouri.
There’s always behind the scenes stuff that goes on in business and breweries that is hard to explain, and how you attend a beer festival is one of those things. Just because we make beer, it doesn’t mean we can just go to any beer festival anywhere. To have our beer available at a festival, we must have an agreement in place with a distributor in the area.
As you know, Grellner Sales in Rolla invited us to join their craft beer line in May. Grellner does not distribute in the Springfield area, so in order to attend the Ozarks Beer Fest, we had to contract with a distributor in Springfield. Once again, Rodney Edwards with Grellner really helped us out by introducing us to the folks at Heart of America Beverage Company.
Lance Foresee and Bob Walkenhorst graciously invited us to the Springfield office in October to talk with them about distributing our beer through Heart of America. Not only were Brian and I thrilled that Heart of America was interested in our product, we were completely stoked to hear Lance and Bob talk about the “need” for canned craft beer in their market. Heart of America already distributes our friends at Mother’s Brewing Company, and they also carry the great line of Lagunitas products. Piney River Brewing will have the opportunity to share shelf space with some great craft beers!
Shortly after our meeting with Lance and Bob, we were able to put a contract into place between Piney River Brewing and Heart of America. We’re not going to be able to provide beer to Heart of America for a few months while we are ramping up our production here on a larger scale, but we are so excited to have another great partner to work with!
Thanks to Heart of America, Brian and I will be in Springfield at Ozarks Beer Fest on Saturday sharing our beer with craft beer lovers in Southwest Missouri. You’ll find us at the Heart of America table…not too far from Lagunitas, Magic Hat, Breckenridge and Mothers.
On tap we will have that oh so popular Black Walnut Wheat (shhh…don’t tell the folks at the taproom on Saturday) and Old Tom Porter. That curious cracking sound you’ll hear at the Heart of America table will be CANS of Missouri Mule India Pale Ale and McKinney Eddy Amber Ale being opened and poured. How cool is that?!
Do you want to attend Ozarks Beer Fest and take part in sipping Piney River Beer and a hundred or so other beers? Click this link for more information: Ozarks Beer Fest
And, if you cannot make it out to Ozarks Beer Fest, the BARn will be open from 12 to 5 p.m. We will be filling growlers with Missouri Mule IPA and McKinney Eddy Amber, or you can take home cans of each. Old Tom Porter and Black Walnut Wheat will also be available by the pint. And…we’ve invited a special guest to join the taps at the BARn this week–Boulevard Pale Ale. Boulevard makes excellent craft beer that we’ve enjoyed for many years, and since we haven’t had time to brew our Bronzeback Pale Ale, we decided to get another Missouri craft beer for you to enjoy.
Cheers!
