James says to his childhood friend, Eric, “What could we use that
space for?” Mike, who lives across the street from James, sits down at the table and says, “I have always wanted to be in business for myself, let’s all figure it out and do it.” Eric had home-brewed back in the 90’s but hadn’t in recent years. After touring a few of the other craft breweries in Minnesota, a text was sent to James:
“LET’S BREW BEER.” We decided we could make our own craft brewery—beer the way we thought it should be done. That night, a meeting was called to discuss the idea over a few cold ones. James had been a manager of people and projects for 20 years. Mike had been is sales and marketing for about the same, and Eric had been in automation engineering for 24 years. At that meeting, a dream was born. After that, old equipment was cleaned up and the first batch was brewed on May 4th, 2013. Eager to help and learn, Mike and James found out cool nights are great for brewing. The aromas wafting off the brew kettle got us all excited. Red skies that night added to the up-north feeling we all wanted in our beers and our name. We started to think about what beers to make. What’s the best name? We had brewed some all-grain five-gallon batches, and they were okay, but not great. We wanted great. After many Sunday-afternoon meetings, Friday-night campfires, a few mid-week napkin talks, we set out to find a Brewmaster to make the job a little easier. Suddenly, we graduated to a ten-gallon system. With a new mash tun, hot liquor tank and 15-gallon brew kettle, one Saturday in June it all seemed to come together. The brown was brewed, followed by the IPA; it was one very long day of brewing. Then the wait… were they going to be any good? Could they be great? Luckily, we split all of our ten-gallon batches into two five-gallon fermenters so we’d have two very different variations to try. Dry hops, different yeasts, and specialty ingredients were added to see what made the best combination of flavors. We brewed the light American and then it all seemed to flow. The IPA took less time in the secondary, so it was our first taste. It was good, and with a little tweaking it could be great. Then we tasted the brown, just needed a little more body… “We might be on to something.” One of the five-gallon batches of American ale was near great from the start. Then it was time to see what other people thought. We had friends over, LOTS of friends over. Why not? Afterall, it was “free” beer for them. “Damn, all these beers are good drinkable beers,” one guy said. The feedback got our morale up, but we still were striving for great. A mash tun paddle was carved, more equipment and kegs were bought, and a lot of hard work followed. After almost a year of trial and error, learning about all the processes, and perfecting our taste buds, we found great. Three guys with a dream of doing business together was realized. Lifelong friendships now turned into a business partnership with the goal of
making great beer. Thus, Lupine Brewing Company was born.
