Big Timber celebrates 10 years

From its start-up in 2014, Big Timber Brewing has always been one of West Virginia’s most capable brewers. Now, at the 10-year mark, the brewery can rightly look back and celebrate its accomplishments.

To recognize their decade-long journey, Big Timber proprietors Ashley and Matt Kwasniewski will hold their brewery’s 10th Anniversary celebration on Saturday, May 4, at the brewery in Elkins from noon until closing.

The celebration unfolds

Some highlights of the day will be the offering of 10 special beers — their most popular seasonals from past years. Of course, you’ll be able to enjoy all their current flagship brews too.

The Elkins-based Charm Farm will be selling brats made with Big Timber beer along with other tasty food items.

Music for the anniversary party will be led by Electro Lust (a band from Asheville, NC) and Juice Newsom and the Groove. Fun activities will include a Beer Olympics with cornhole, trivia, keg toss, pallet jack obstacle course, keg race, and stein holding. Brewery tours will also be available.

Congrats on 10 years

Reaching the ten-year mark is a significant one for any small business.

“It went by super fast,” Ashley says of the 10 years, “but it also feels like it’s been our entire lives at the same time.”

Matt chimes in from a similar vane: “At some moments it feels like it’s not been that long ago when we were building out the old place, but then if I try to think of my daily life, it seems like we’ve been doing this forever.”

Ten years pass fast when you’re super busy building up a small brewery to become the state’s largest craft brewery. A big part of the brewery’s progress through the years was the construction of its current production facility and adjoining taproom.

Big Timber taproom is a beauty

“I’m so thankful that we’re in this building now,” says Ashley. “We couldn’t have this size of celebration if we weren’t here.”

She’s proudest of the layout of the new taproom, which opened late last year. She didn’t want to lose the intimacy of their old taproom when they moved into their new, much larger space.

“I think by dividing it into sections we really achieved that,” she says.

“This taproom allows us to do everything we want to. We have four different spaces that people can choose from.” The four include the main barroom, a large outdoor beer garden, a spacious deck, and a separate event room with an entertainment stage.  

She says building the taproom with different sections instead of just having one large beer hall makes it feel like “you can still have a conversation with anyone you’re visiting with that day.”

Nice highlights in the main barroom include the big stone fireplace and the long bar made with local wood. You can’t help but be impressed by the large, open space held up with massive timber posts and beams.

You’ll enjoy the use of locally sourced wood throughout and the soothing natural colors too. The indoor space is complemented by outdoor riverside patios and deck. Overall, it’s a gorgeous place.

A brewery that keeps evolving

As for the brewing operations, it’s also come a long way in 10 years. Big Timber began brewing in a small building several blocks down the street from where it sits today.

For their current brewery space, it took a lot of work to repurpose a large old brick structure into a modern craft brewery, but they did it largely with their own ingenuity and sweat equity.

This move led to Big Timber growing to become the state’s largest craft brewery. But physical size wasn’t the only significant improvement.

“I think the scale has also allowed us to improve our beers,” Matt said.

“At the size we are, we can do things that we used to not be able to do.” He means things like accessing hop selection and bulk grain orders that allow them to specify and obtain the exact characteristics they want in ingredients.

This flexibility is enhanced by running both large-scale and small-scale production operations. Big Timber concurrently produces its broadly distributed flagship series alongside a higher-end series of specialty beer varieties and one-off brews.

“I like the place where we are,” Matt says. “We can put out new beers, do small batches, make adjustments, make improvements.”

Matt says he loves brainstorming with brewers Chris Newsom and Brian Reymiller on changes they’d like to see.

Even with all the progress they’ve made across the decade, they’re not where Matt wants the brewery program to be quite yet. “We’re getting ready for a big upgrade,” he says, explaining that a new canning line is on order, with delivery expected this May.

“Outside of real estate, it’s our largest investment ever,” says Matt. He adds that they will also be adding significantly more fermentation space this summer.

Can’t sleep at the wheel

Big Timber Brewing demonstrates that in the current competitive brewery environment, in both production facilities and taprooms, you cannot rest on your laurels and past accomplishments. You have to be able to move with changing market opportunities.

Over the past 10 years, Big Timber has shown it can do that. We expect its progressive attitude will keep it at the top of the market for the foreseeable future.

While it hasn’t all been easy, the years of hard work have paid off, as Ashely Kwasniewski adeptly explains:  “After 10 years of growing pains, we’re excited about the next 10 years and what that’s going to bring.”

Congratulations on your 10th Anniversary, Big Timber Brewing.

Event announcement link

Past BTB Article & Video Links

Big Timber Medals at World Beer Cup
Big Timber’s Beautiful New Taproom
Big Timber Logs onto Beer Success
Matt Describes Big Timber’s Original Brewery (Video from 2014)
WV Beer Roads interview with Matt from 2022