A hello to the forum

[Swampwater Brewing]

Just wanted to say hi and introduce myself. My name is Steve and I live in south Louisiana. I have been brewing beer about a year or so and started out all grain. I brew ghetto style with converted coolers, etc. I am also a winemaker and have done that for quite a while longer. I moderate a couple wine forums but my real passion is beer and I am trying to learn all I can. I am currently trying to assess if I can pull off a local home brew shop in my area as there are none here. I look forward to reading through the posts here and meeting some new friends as well as offer advice or suggestions to contribute to the forums in a positive manner as well. Once again, glad to be here and meet y'all.

Here are some pics of some of our Ghetto Equiptment until the loving wife lets me spring for a Sculpture. That's my brew partner Zak in the photo.

[Wild]

Welcome to the board Steve. I'd gladly move into your ghetto with equipment like that. Very nice. I only see three shops in your neck of the woods so a homebrew and wine shop might just be the ticket. Good luck and keep us up to date.

[Swampwater Brewing]

Where would those three shops be? I only know of one. Is there a site that has a search I can look for local shops. Maybe I already have one around here and need to check it out.

[brewersr]

Howdy and welcome,
It is great to have you on the site, that is for sure. You should check out homebrewsupply.brewersroundtable.com. I believe that it has the most up to date list of homebrew supply stores anywhere on the internet. I could be biased a little bit since I compiled it but there's quite a few stores there. Just do a search for your state and you should find what you're looking for. I hope you get a store started by the way, that would be awesome. Take it easy.
Matt

[Swampwater Brewing]

Thanks for the link. I checked it out and shows two in the state. One isn't too far from me but it isn't a comprehensive store. It is a liquor store that sells some brewing supplies and leans toward wine the last time I was there. We have the same store in BR but they don't sell supplies. The other store is a pretty nice shop from what I hear but is like 300 miles from me and in the middle of nowhere.

[brewersr]

If you know of other stores in the state, PM me the details and I'll add them to the database. Thanks a lot.
Matt

[Heavenlyfire]

Welcome to the gang Steve. Very nice set up! Also very nice selection of brews in the fridge. The only one I didn't recognize were the cans on the bottom right, what are they?

[Swampwater Brewing]

The cans on the bottom left are from the "family" brewery LOL That is Murphy's Irish Stout. My last name is Murphy

[Stihler]

I have to add my two cents worth.

First of all, welcome to the forum!

Now for the REAL reason for my message.

Great hat!!!

Is that a chicken?

- Scott

[Swampwater Brewing]

Yeah, it's a chicken. It got thrown on my head last year at Oktoberfest when I was drug out on stage to do the Chicken Dance. I got to keep the hat.

[Wild]

Thanks for the link. I checked it out and shows two in the state. One isn't too far from me but it isn't a comprehensive store. It is a liquor store that sells some brewing supplies and leans toward wine the last time I was there. We have the same store in BR but they don't sell supplies. The other store is a pretty nice shop from what I hear but is like 300 miles from me and in the middle of nowhere.

Is that the one called Marcello's?
I also see a listing for:
BeerSlayer, The
3956 Fire Tower Road
Grand Cane, Louisiana, 71032
phone: (318) 858-2219

The HomeBrew Shop
8611 Florida Blvd.
Denham Springs, Louisiana, 70726
United States
phone: (225) 665-3226

Hope that helps. I agree, you are definately in need of a store. But until then, there's always the world Wide Interweb!

[Swampwater Brewing]

Thanks for the link. I checked it out and shows two in the state. One isn't too far from me but it isn't a comprehensive store. It is a liquor store that sells some brewing supplies and leans toward wine the last time I was there. We have the same store in BR but they don't sell supplies. The other store is a pretty nice shop from what I hear but is like 300 miles from me and in the middle of nowhere.

Is that the one called Marcello's?
I also see a listing for:
BeerSlayer, The
3956 Fire Tower Road
Grand Cane, Louisiana, 71032
phone: (318) 858-2219

The HomeBrew Shop
8611 Florida Blvd.
Denham Springs, Louisiana, 70726
United States
phone: (225) 665-3226

Hope that helps. I agree, you are definately in need of a store. But until then, there's always the world Wide Interweb!

Yep, Marcello's in BR doesn't sell supplies. I guess they do in Lafayette but have limited supplies. The Denham Springs store is very close to me (probably 15 miles taking the back roads) but it is not open very often. I have drove there a few times during the listed hours they are open and no one is ever there. The other one listed is over 200 miles away from me. Closer to 250 miles. I can drive to Houston and have a few times with it being basically the same distance. I have a decent chunk of cash in the bank to do this. Wish I could figure a base line wholesale costs of supplies to figure out if this is feasible to do or not. Maybe some of you that have got started can pass me a little info. I am having the same problem others have stated getting wholesalers to talk to me.

Right now I do most of my shopping online. The problem I have as well as most all grain brewers do is shipping costs for grains. I like to buy my grains by the 50 # sack. Many of the places that have free shipping (which there is no such thing) restrict grains and other heavy items from their shipping policies. The place I do drive to to by my grains gets $70-$80 for a sack of grain. Also I have problems getting decent live liquid yeasts living in the Deep South. I have had to go to using dry yeasts which actually do a fantastic job with the styles I brew but it normally means a 4 hour drive to Houston with a cooler to stock up on White Labs yeasts. I really hope I can make this a reality.

[Wild]

The best thing I can think of is talk to the http://www.thebrewguy.com he has a store I believe.

Good luck.

[jeepguy]

I can have a 12 variety pack of wyeast shipped to you if ever needed!!
Your best bet for grains is to find a microbrewery nearby that will sell you grain. I can also have grain dropshipped to anybody if needed also. I have a wholesaler in atlanta,west port MA, salt lake city, portland & a couple in southern cal.
Most of the places will let me have stuff picked up from them with no fee.

Let me know if you want to find out some prices on stuff. I can tell you though first hand Its hard to compete with some of the really big places(but i can usually beat them).
You would have alot of fun if you could do it though!! I have my stuff that i sell local in a local market down the road. He lets me sell through him for a 10% fee on everything that sells. Most of my stuff is sold online though & thats where i make 95% of my sales(or more).
If you could find a place to work with you to start out you would save a ton in monthly overhead.
My website & all of my online fees & stuff run me about $100 per month not including the fees from sales. So if i didnt sell anything through my site or ebay store i am only loosing that per month.
The wholesalers are another story. If they find a shop anywhere close to you they will not sell to you.
If you find a place to put your stuff to try it out i could always do a wholesale discount & have stuff dropshipped to you from atlanta.
I sell to a shop in Ireland that way but i ship from here after i repackage stuff smaller. I even printed there name on all the stuff.
I think you need like 200.000 people near you to make it break even if i can remember correctly from when i researched before i started. Thats why i went the way i did.

Good luck, Brian

[Swampwater Brewing]

Thanks Brian. I actually have a very good population base to work with. I live right outside Baton Rouge Louisiana which has around 500,000 population in the Parish (county). I live like 15-20 minutes outside BR south toward New Orleans. My parish has a population right around 100,000. My town is close to becoming a connected suburb of Baton Rouge. I am 45 minutes to a hour from New Orleans which has a statistical metro population (city and all suburbs) of right at 1 million. I have been told a shop is opening in New Orleans somewhere. I still think I can cull sales from the N.O. suburb area as it is easier to drive to me than many areas of N.O. from the west suburbs. There is also another small metro area less than an hour away that has at least 150000 population base. We have one local shop in my area that is in a suburban town east of Baton Rouge that is only open 2-3 hours a day 2-3 days a week. Both of the "major" wholesalers have stated they will have no problems supplying us due to local competition and are actually encouraging a store in our area.

I have a B.S. in Business Administration so I have a good grasp on business activities. I have a business partner that is an experienced brewer so we should have the knowledge base. We believe we have more than enough cash in hand to launch without any financing. We will both keep our day jobs that is shift work. One of us will switch shifts so one of us will always be off to run the shop. Since we are keeping our city jobs, at least for a while we will still have our regular income so if the margins are slim in the beginning (I am sure they will be) we will still get by until we can build volume and consider this as our sole source of income. I still have a ton of work to do. Even though we will not seek financing or investors I am still building a Business Plan as a guideline to operate the business. I hope I can pick your mind from time to time as a reference point.