Parkersburg Brewing cans roll

Cans rolled at Parkersburg Brewing Company as the brewery canned its first beer last Friday. A 28 barrel run of Cell Block 304 Brown Ale, which amounts to over 325 cases of six-packs, was packaged and will begin to hit distribution this week. 

Some of the product is going to Capital Beverage and some to Jo’s Globe Distributing. That means the six packs should soon appear in the southern and north central areas of the state, likely first in the Morgantown, Parkersburg, and Charleston markets. The beer should retail around $11 or $12 per six-pack of 12 oz. cans. One of the first big orders was placed by the Par Mar Stores chain, so its WV stores should definitely have them soon.

“It’s a real big day for us,” said Dan Curtis, one of the brewery’s four partners, as he helped with the first canning run of the medal-winning brown ale. Cell Block 304 won a gold medal in May at the prestigious World Beer Cup competition. World Beer Cup is considered to be among the top one or two beer competitions in the world, so winning a medal there is a big deal.

“I think it will allow us to penetrate some markets that we wouldn’t be able to penetrate without that win,” he said.

With the gold medal wind behind their sails, Curtis said you will soon see Parkersburg Brewing expand its distribution.

“We’re planning to jump the river into Ohio in the next month or two. It’s not that hard. It’s actually easier (to get a beer approved for distribution there) than West Virginia. It’s a pretty straightforward process.”

They will initially seek distribution in the Marietta and Athens areas.

Equipment purchase order in place

Maybe even bigger news than Cell Block 304 in cans is what’s coming next at Parkersburg Brewing. Just before starting the canning run, Curtis and his PBC business partner Jim Hopkins had just returned from the bank where they signed the paperwork for the loan needed to place an order for their own canning equipment. They are purchasing a canning line from Twin Monkeys Canning Systems of Aurora, Colorado. It will include a depalletizer, twist rinser, three-head filler, in-line can label applicator, and will run at 20 cans per minute.

“That’s actually being put on order today,” said Curtis. “So about seven or eight weeks from now, our new canning line should be showing up.”

Until then, he says they will do more mobile canning runs. Parkersburg Brewing is using mobile canning operator Iron Heart Canning Company. The equipment comes out of the Cleveland area. In July, the brewery will use the mobile canner to package its summer seasonal Blonde on Blonde Coffee Blonde Ale.

“The mobile canning thing is nice for us because we can see how the line runs, see some of the different aspects of the line, like the once-through sterilization on the twist rinser.” 

Coming from their many canning runs of experience,  Iron Heart’s equipment operators passed along lots of tips on best practices, such as efficient can loading, mechanical check points, six-pack holder application, and pallet loading. If you haven’t done a canning operation before, there is a lot to learn.

“It’s great experience for us,” said Curtis.  

Cans and six packs provide visibility

Curtis says that while the margin in canning is not as good as it is for kegs, there’s another value to canning you don’t get with kegs.

“In a restaurant you only have a tap handle. When you’re canning the value of having your logo in somebody’s refrigerator, on their back porch, on their boat on the river, out camping with their buddies, is tremendous. The brand recognition alone, in my opinion, overcomes the margin difference between cans and kegs.

“I think it’s a great brand recognition and brand building opportunity for us.”

In part to coincide with the introduction of the new cans, the brewery recently beefed up its outside marketing. They now have two people, Amber Cain and Casey Gosset, on the road doing sales and marketing work. Cain works the territory of Capital Beverage (southern WV) and Gossett works the areas serviced by Joe’s Globe and Martin distributors (northern WV & eastern panhandle).

“What we’ve learned is that you really can’t rely on a distributor to do all your sales work for you, Curtis said. “You have to have people in the field building relationships at accounts, building loyalty, solving problems, and offering value that others don’t offer. Without that, you kind of stagnate in growth.

“We learned that the hard way, so now we’re getting more presence in the field with the customers.”

Brewery’s longer range plans impressive

The longer range plans for the brewery are impressive. The plan is first to maximize the production they can get out of their current seven barrel system, bank some money, and then expand to develop a larger production brewery at another site in Parkersburg.

“This is the beginning,” said Curtis. “I’m hoping that a year from now we’re installing a 30-plus barrel system off-site.”

 Parkersburg Brewing options for summer

Parkersburg Brewing maintains a book of eight or more beers in distribution. Two seasonals to look for this summer are the Blackberry Sage Saison and Blonde on Blonde Coffee Ale. Initial sales of both were very strong and sort of caught the brewery off guard. They quickly produced more of each to satisfy the strong market demand.

Other good Parkersburg Brewing options for summer include the excellent flagships Bushwa Berliner Weisse and Hop Hef Hefeweizen-style wheat ale.

The brewery calls Cell Block 304 a unique American Brown Ale that overtly breaks the laws of style. American malts are combined with British specialty malts to build the backbone of this brown ale. Hopped with English bittering hops, this beer balances bitter earthiness with dark toasty malts and orange blossom honey.

Brewery website link