Kevin McGee, Healdsburg Beer Company

For all intents and purposes, Kevin McGee is the Healdsburg Beer Company. Healdsburg is one of the smallest tier of operating breweries in the country, a class that has been nicknamed “nanobreweries.” Some might call it a glorified homebrew operation, but it’s much more than that,  as you’ll see below. Healdsburg churns out 1 bbl of beer about every two weeks. Each beer is cask-conditioned, and each keg is personally delivered to its destination. Kevin McGee, founder, brewmaster, cellarman, sales, and delivery, is representative of the very soul of craft brewing.

KYB: When did you start homebrewing?

Kevin: I started homebrewing four to five years ago. Prior to that, I spent about twelve years as one of the most obviously frustrated home winemakers in modern memory. After dumping yet another batch of undrinkable plonk into the toilet (literally), my wife, in a desperate expression of self-preservation, suggested that I try and make beer. I put my first batch together, found a little skill and a lot of passion, and it spiraled way out of control from there. Ironically, the bad-winemaker stage really paid dividends in the long run. I spent a ton of time troubleshooting and trying to figure out what was going wrong with the wine, and that forced me to learn a lot more about fermentation science, sanitation, and the production process than I otherwise would have. By the time I took up brewing beer, I had some substantial battle scars and a lot of useful knowledge. Once I picked up the basic theory of brewing, I was pretty much off to the races. My wife is also an artist and thought beer would be a great creative outlet for me, and although I didn’t understand what she meant at the time, I do now. I find something truly soul satisfying about making beer, and that has been driving me to keep experimenting and keep learning.

KYB: Have you had any formal training in brewing?

Kevin: No formal training, but I’ve gone through most of the modern brewing and winemaking textbooks and I’m a member of the Master Brewers Association of the Americas and have read almost all of their archived papers. Also, I’ve never been shy about admitting when I don’t know something and asking for help. What I know today is a blend of self study and the kindness of strangers.

KYB: What made you want to make the switch up from homebrewing?

Kevin: Things I was learning in my day job, which is in the wine industry. I had became more and more involved in business planning and strategy for different elements of the company, and I had already gone fairly far down the rabbit-hole of brewing geekdom. It was unavoidable that I eventually came home and penciled out a theoretical brewery that paid me to have fun and make beer. Also, the area is almost ideal for a nanobrewer. Sonoma is arguably the birthplace of American craft brewing with Jack McAuliffe at New Albion. In my neck of the woods we have Russian River with Vinnie “Hop-God-Who-Walks-Amongst-Mortals” Cilurzo, Brian Hunt at Moonlight, The Norgroves at Bear Republic, the lovable Lagunitas maniacs, Moylan’s, Anderson Valley, North Coast, Medocino, and a host of other world-class breweries. There’s a lot of love for well-made beer in the area, and the region really pays attention to the artisan, handcrafted, small production family businesses, whether they’re wine, cheese, olive oil, produce, beer or whatever. The communities’ predisposition to embrace these types of things was a big factor. My wife (from whom all good things in my life have come) and I put our heads together and we created the Healdsburg Beer Company.

KYB: How long has Healdsburg Beer Company been in operation?

Kevin: The brewery started taking shape in the fall of 2007. Our licensing and permitting were complete in July of 2008 so we’re coming up on two years of professional brewing, and I’m currently noodling over what to brew for the two year anniversary. Our first year was pretty underground, and I was selling mostly to friends, some chefs and caterers and the odd super-diligent beer hunter. The “public” launch was at our hometown beer festival in the summer of 2009 and its been pretty busy since then. Some time ago, I had a pointed conversation with the spirit of the brewery to explain that I ran it, it doesn’t run me. We’re cool now.

KYB: Can you tell me a little bit about your capacity and how often you brew?

Kevin: I run a custom fabricated 1 barrel brew house and generally brew every other week. Annual production is +/- 25 barrels. When the pipeline is full, I roll out a half dozen 5g kegs every two weeks and I self distribute those.

KYB: What do you think is the greatest strength of being such a small operating brewery?

Kevin: Attention to detail and the luxury of making decisions from the perspective of running an artisan, boutique operation. I firmly believe that, at my size, I have no excuse to cut any corner. I sample and test everything throughout the process. I sample every keg before it goes out the door and if it isn’t showing how I want it to, I don’t release it. I only work with ingredients that I think are top quality and are exactly what I want. Most importantly, I suppose, is that I run my production on my own time line. I cask condition everything because I think it makes the beer taste better, even though it takes more than twice as long, ties up brewery space, and limits production and revenue. I split every brew into two separate primary fermenters and from there rack into separate 5 gallon kegs for conditioning and eventually priming. This lets me experiment broadly with yeast strains, temperatures, dissolved O2 levels, dry hopping schedules, adjuncts, etc. Every batch ends up with at least one experimental keg. At times, I end up with one control keg and half a dozen experimental ones. This pays huge dividends in terms of sharpening production and making tasty beer even tastier, but it multiplies the amount of work I need to do to go from boil kettle to finished keg. I don’t mind the extra work because I can taste it in the beer, but I get to make that choice because of the scale of what I’m doing.

KYB: What’s been the biggest challenge to overcome in the development of your brewery?

Kevin: Time. I’ve got a pretty demanding day job, a wife who I (accurately) refer to as Wonderspouse and the coolest 2-year-old daughter ever. Being a good father and husband is my first priority, then the day job, and then the brewery. My intrepid assistant brewer, Gordie, does what he can to help but since dogs don’t have opposable thumbs his usefulness is a bit limited. I’m pretty much always multitasking.

KYB: Have you taken anything that you’ve learned from working in the wine industry and applied it to making your brewery work? And if so, what?

Kevin: Absolutely. The brewery as a business is a direct manifestation of what I’ve learned in the wine industry. The Healdsburg Beer Company is, for all practical purposes, a small, artisan winery that makes beer (without all the small, artisan winery seriousness and stuff…). The day job has also given me the opportunity to taste thousands of wines and hundreds of olive oils and other artisan products. Among other things, I’ve judged tomato festivals, evaluated Perigord truffle strains, and blended wine, olive oil, verjus and vodka. This background has been an enormously helpful in evaluating and improving my own brewing and recipe development. Basically, without the lessons I’ve taken from my time in wine, the brewery wouldn’t exist.

Come back on Thursday, when Kevin will take us through a typical brew day at Healdsburg and give us the details about their flagship beer (including a homebrew recipe).