Cost to buy wash or wort from craft brewer?

[Bcproduct]

Hello,

I am putting the final touches on my budget and with the numbers expanding... I was thinking to farm out the first step of creating the wash to craft brewers for the first year or two... Does anyone have any experience with this and some rough costs. I would be looking at 100% barley in about 250gallon batches. The way I see it, I would purchase the Barley and bring it to the brewer, they would run it through the mash tun and lauter it, I would then truck out a clear wort to stick in my fermenters at the distillery.

My hope is to get some rough ideas of cost before I start banging on doors to see if it is worthwhile?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thomas.

[Mash]

Several distilleries in Seattle do it this way. Makes for a lot less mess. Logistics is the key though.

[PeteB]

I know quite a few who get their fermented "beer" from breweries but I had not thought of the unfermented option, great idea.

That would give you more "ownership" of your final product.

Several of my fermenters are 270 g = 1,000 litre totes. If I was buying wort, one option could be pitch the yeast as it left the brewery and let it ferment in the same container.

This option could be an option for a friend of mine, so I would be interested in a price guide.

Pete

[Michaelangelo]

Someone once told me it was $1 per gallon for the work, if you supply the grain. My guess though is that the brewery will be buying a lot more grain than you so his price might be lower than yours especially if they are already buying what you want like a 2 row. You should have them quote it for you both ways.

[natbouman]

I just started a topic on this a couple of weeks ago and there is some very useful information in the thread. I've been talking to our local brewery since then and they seem pretty interested--doing the same basic thing as you. To run of Michaelangelo's comment, the buys way more grain than we would but they'd like to buy even more to get better prices on the grain.

I haven't yet gotten a quote from them. When I do, I'll post it.

[PeteB]

I just started a topic on this a couple of weeks ago and there is some very useful information in the thread. I've been talking to our local brewery since then and they seem pretty interested--doing the same basic thing as you. To run of Michaelangelo's comment, the buys way more grain than we would but they'd like to buy even more to get better prices on the grain.

I haven't yet gotten a quote from them. When I do, I'll post it.

http://adiforums.com/index.php?showtopic=5038#entry28502

[Bcproduct]

Thanks Natbouman & PeteB for posting the link. ( I had read it earlier but was hoping to have more people weigh in with pricing)

Apart from Roger posting approximately $200 for a 500 gallon batch (I am guessing he was providing grain), I did not see any other posts indicating a price.

In this thread Michelangelo has mentioned roughly $1 per gallon which would be $500 for 500 gallon batch (I supply the grain)

Anyone else want to weigh in with a quote??

Thomas.

[Jedd Haas]

I had one brewery quote $2,000 for 500 gallons (including grain and delivery).

[Bcproduct]

Thanks Jedd,

My math to end up at a raw material cost per liter of finished product....

500g x 10% yield = 50g

50g x 70% hearts yield = 35g @190ABV

35g x 2= 70g @ 80ABV

70g x 3.78liters = 265 liters of finished 40% bottled product

$2,000/265liters = $7.50 +yeast ($.50)= $8.00 per liter (this is what I use for my Cost Of Goods Sold COGS calculation)

Does this make sense?

I was thinking to buy a truck and tanks and pick it up, but the delivery makes it even simpler, I guess the more that you ask the brewer to do the more they charge....

[Panoscape]

We've done this. We bought 10 barrels of an imperial IPA beer mash for $1,000 after getting the formula approved. We trucked it over in two totes and pitched the yeast in the same totes. It was nice that the brewery put the mash through the chiller so we didn't have to cool it. It's now our Barley shine.

[Silk City Distillers]

310g for $1000 = $3.23 a gallon

500g for $2000 = $4 a gallon

How do you make the economics of this work? Is this tasting room retail only?

[natbouman]

310g for $1000 = $3.23 a gallon

500g for $2000 = $4 a gallon

How do you make the economics of this work? Is this tasting room retail only?

I have the same question, though I'd imagine that 310g of imperial IPA is much more expensive to produce than 310g of distiller's wash. Hops and boiling have to add a lot to the price.

[Panoscape]

We just use their grain bill, the cost is pretty much the same because they buy in mass bulk. We grab the mash before the kettle, so no boil or hops. But yeah, not much in the way of profits for it due to living in the second highest taxed state and high COGS. We do mainly because it's a unique distilled product that has a tie-in to beer. Bend, OR is a HUGE beer town and piggy backing on beer gives the papers/people something to talk about. We've already had three write-ups, can't beat free press.

[Silk City Distillers]

Brewers beer

is much too dear

to be put inside a still

Especially when

most of it

will just end up as swill

A nice price

You best be chargin'

'Cuz sure as hell

It won't come back as margin

[Roger]

Other than Panoscapes desire to use beer wash for marketing purposes, which is a good idea for one product, people appear to forget that the huge expense everyone is hung up on, is for the "malt".

Malted barley is 5-10 times more expensive than non malted barley, and all of the other grains that you will normally use in your mash bill. Unless of course all you are going to make is Single Malt Whiskey.

Recalculate your operations by bringing your mash bill down to current prices of various grains, with a per batch cost from a brewer.