Know Your Brewer

French Broad

We’re excited to kick off the main feature of Know Your Brewer: the interviews!

Our goal is to get you — yep, you — to ponder one simple question. Do you know who brews your beer? Since only around 1 percent of all beer consumed in North Carolina is brewed here in North Carolina, we’re guessing that most of  you don’t. That’s okay…don’t worry. This isn’t a guilt trip.

It’s just that we’d like to change that. Through these interviews, we’d like for you to discover and appreciate your local North Carolina brewer, just like many in generations past knew their neighborhood baker, fishmonger, florist, and milkman. It shouldn’t be that difficult: around 9 out of 10 North Carolinians live within 10 minutes of a locally-brewed beer.

By interviewing and featuring your neighbors who brew beer for a living, we truly hope that you’ll become a part of that crowd who personally knows a North Carolina craft brewer. Who orders a local North Carolina beer. Who gives a local beer as a gift to a friend or family member…or recommends it to a neighbor.  And, when at a bar or restaurant, who regularly asks, “What local beer do you serve?”

May this be a New Old Era: an age where we get to know the craftsmen and women whose careers depend on your interest in and loyalty toward locally-brewed beer.

Buy local, support your local brewery, and Know Your Brewer. Our first interview is with Drew Barton, head brewer at Asheville’s French Broad Brewing Company.

KYB: How long has French Broad been in business?

Drew: French Broad opened in late 2000, after founding brewer Jonas Rembert left Green Man.

KYB: When did you join the company?

Drew: I joined the company in the fall of 2005. I started at the company as the delivery driver and moved up to head-brewer in 18 months.

KYB: What’s your beer background or training?

Drew: I started homebrewing while I was in engineering school in Michigan. After I brewed my first batch I was hooked and I knew I wanted to be a professional brewer. I quickly dropped out of school and moved back home to Memphis, TN where I finished school at the University of Memphis with a degree in Zymurgy Management. This was through the “Design Your Own Degree Program”. I took courses including microbiology, management, and marketing to get a well round education in running a brewery. Everything else I learned on the job (and there has been a lot of “everything else”).

KYB: So how long have you been brewing craft beer professionally?

Drew: French Broad is my first brewing job. This April (2009), I will have been the head brewer for two years.

KYB: Would you say French Broad has a specialty or focus?

Drew: At French Broad we definitely focus on European beer styles. Our year around list of beers does not include a monstrously hoppy American India Pale Ale. Not that there is anything wrong with a super hoppy IPA…it is just not our thing.

KYB: Does the brewery have a flagship beer?

Drew: Thanks to Pop the Cap, our 7%ABV Wee-Heavy-er Scotch Ale is our best selling beer all year around.

KYB: I’ve seen a shift in your willingness to try seasonal beers and “one-offs.” Has that been a success for you?

Drew: Adding more beer styles to the French Broad family of beers has been a great thing. I see this as a two-fold benefit. First, it makes our beer more accessible to more people. For example, if 90% of the beer you drink is porter and French Broad does not have a porter, well, you’re less likely to ever try a French Broad beer. But if French Broad has a porter as a seasonal and you try it, you’re more likely to try another style we produce. Maybe your next pint will be a Wee-Heavy-er.

Secondly, we have a lot of loyal French Broad fans out there, and brewing more styles helps expand their beer knowledge so they can go out and enjoy even more North Carolina produced beers. It’s really a win-win for us and the community.

KYB: By the way, yesterday I had a delicious Rye Hopper at The Federal here in Durham.

Drew: Thanks. I’ll let (assistant brewer) Chris know. It’s his baby.

KYB: French Broad has a great on-premises tasting room. What type of crowd does it draw? How important is the tavern to brewery operations?

Drew: The crowd tends to be a very neighborhood crowd. We have a lot of regulars who live in Oakley (that’s the neighborhood just up the hill from the brewery) who stop by on their way home from work to have a pint. I think most of our regulars are regulars because we close early (8pm), and they know they can come hang out and not feel like they have to stay out all night. The tasting room is very important to us — I think it is for a lot of people. It defines who we are.

KYB: Asheville is obviously a very beer-savvy city. Is this awareness of craft beer shared among both locals and tourists?

Drew: I think so, but it might just be our location. We’re sandwiched between the wonderful community of Oakley and the tourist destination of Biltmore Village. It really makes it convenient for both locals and tourist to come through our doors.

KYB: Are you seeing more craft beer tourism in the area?

Drew: We see beer tourists daily, just hanging out in the tasting room or coming in for a tour. Speaking of tours, companies like Brews Cruise help highlight the craft beer movement here in Asheville by giving beer tourist (and locals) an easy way to get up close and personal with breweries in the area.

KYB: What new beers are brewing or in the works?

Drew: We’re getting ready to release an Imperial Porter the first week of March and we’re working on a Bock for the Spring. As for the rest of the 2009 seasonals, well, they’ll just have to be a surprise as they are released. But, I can guarantee Wee-Heavy-est will be out again this fall.

KYB: How does Asheville (and North Carolina in general) compare to America’s great beer cities (Philadelphia, Portland)?

Drew: If they would let me out of the brewery every once in a while, maybe I would be able to travel to some of these cities and make a comparison. But as it stands, Asheville is the most beer-centric city I have ever been to and certainly lived in.

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Thanks, Drew, for being our canary in the coal mine! And thank you, KYB reader! Be sure to check out Drew’s beers in throughout Asheville and select North Carolina restaurants…or visit the French Broad tasting room when you’re in the area!

Are you a North Carolina brewery that would like to be interviewed for Know Your Brewer? Let us know — send a quick hello to nc@knowyourbrewer.com.