Fonda talks brewing & WV beer market

Sam Fonda is one of West Virginia’s premier brewery owners. His work leading Weathered Ground Brewery’s beer production and marketing operations has cemented the brewery among the top echelon of the state’s beer makers. He joins us on this episode of the West Virginia Beer Roads podcast.

Not afraid to brew many less-popular beer styles, the brewery’s strength is its ability to do a wide variety of beer styles very well, including lagers, saisons, milds, imperial stouts, IPAs, traditional sours, and more. The brewery has mastered the current craze of hazy-juicy IPA by producing several popular and highly-rated beers in that style — of both the single- and double-strength varieties.

Podcast posted

At the brewery in Cool Ridge, WV, Charles and Erin recently sat down with Sam to talk about the local craft beer business and get his reaction to many of the things going on in the West Virginia beer industry today. Sam has a way of giving us cool insights into the market — things we may have not thought of ourselves. You can listen in to that conversation by checking out the latest episode of the West Virginia Beer Roads podcast here.

Fonda on the WV Beer Roads podcast

A few of the topics covered on this podcast include:

• observations on the current state of WV beer market
• thoughts on brewing collaboration beers
• discussion of the popular Bearer of Fruit beer series
• seasonal differences in beer sales
• the challenges/benefits of self distribution
• discussion of Yard Sale IPA and Margaret Barleywine

Weathered Ground hires accountant

One bit of recent Weathered Ground Brewing news that didn’t make the podcast is the addition of an accountant to the brewery staff. “We’ve added accountant Jeff Bragg to our team.” Sam Fonda said. “He has been a major factor with helping us make the correct steps going forward as a business, as well as handling our basic accounting needs.”

This step at Weathered Ground underscores the progress our small breweries are making developing all aspects of their businesses so they can grow be around for years to come.

As much as we consumers enjoy just drinking the beer from our local brewers, you can’t forget that they are businesses; and as businesses, they need to make good financial decisions and keep good financial records. It’s not all about making good beer.