Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau

Welp, we pretty much got all of our TTB paperwork in line. They ask us about everything from our environmental impact, water quality and sources, trash disposal methods, how we intend to protect our delicious beers from beer thieves and all sorts of stuff you wouldn't think that the Tax & Trade Bureau would care about. Well, I guess in the event someone comes and steals our beer we wouldn't have to pay taxes on it... and that would be a huge bummer for the IRS. This was probably my favorite piece of paperwork that we are submitting to them. I love Google Maps.

After this all we have left to deal with is the Department of Environmental Health. DEH!!! I am really hoping that dealing with them is easier than trying to navigate their website which consists of hundreds of broken links. Although, their Facebook page is pretty fun and informative. Watch out for West Nile Virus Mosquitos and Hantavirus Mice! Hantavirus AKA the "English Sweate" is something you probably do not want. Unless you are a certain Korean dictator looking for a good weaponizable virus. Then you might really like the stuff.

If you ever want to apply with the TTB you can find all the paperwork here or click on the items below:

1. The Brewer's Notice - this tells the TTB you intend to become a brewery. You need to attach a diagram of the premise, a description of the security, a legal description of the brewery, and all your corporate by-laws and articles of incorporation, and your SS-4 Employer ID number.

2. Brewer's Collateral Bond - a bond for $1,000 for the first 4,000 barrels of beer you produce. If you produce more than that you will need to obtain a strengthening bond.

3. Personnel Questionnaire - includes everything you've ever done ever, as well as how much you plan on spending to open the brewery.

4. Water Quality Considerations - you need to tell them if you are going to be poisoning any rivers near by.

5. Environmental Information - you need to let them know how much polution you plan on generating, hopefully zero.

6. Signing Authority - only in the even you are a corporation or LLC.

7. Pay.gov User Agreement - whereby you agree to use their website to pay taxes on the beer ($7.00 per barrel, which is really what all this paperwork comes down to in the end.)

Experimental Brewing Session #1

This is our first of many "Experimental Brewing Sessions."
Saturday brewing started at the crack of dawn today. 5:30AM and we had plans to brew an IPA split it into two batches and test two different yeast strands on it. In about three weeks we will be able to have a blind tasting of the two and see how they hold up against each other. We also wanted to brew a very BIG beer, we decided on a Rye Imperial Stout.
Pictued Above: IPA split in two batches, one with 1450 & the other 1968. Our second batch was a Rye Imperial Ale. This is going to be a heavy beer. Starting gravity of 1086, it should ferment down to about 10% ABV.
Pictured Above: The Mash Tun full of TONS of malts. 7 Different types!Mike trying an erlenmeyer flask full of the Rye Imperial Stout.

I can tell you that it is going to be a very full flavored beer. It has seven types of grains from Chocolate to Pale. This will be a beer that we are going to want to age. We'll likely put away 10 gallons and save it for our one or two year anniversary.

I'll be sure to update you on their progress.

Fictitious Business Name

I was just working on some TTB (Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau) paper work and realized I never looked into whether our Fictitious Business Name made it through the old bureaucratic machine or not. Turns out that it did and we are ready to start doing business as Hess Brewing Company. *electric guitar shread* SWEET ASS SWEET!

It's pretty cool being able to see our business name up on the old internet machine. Just one step closer to actually being in business.

Today we also finished installing some copper piping, if you are ever installing copper pipes check out GatorBite or SharkBite, they are weld-less copper pipe fittings that make your life so much easier.

One thing I never realized was that concrete is one tough SOB. I'm pretty sure that our warehouse will survive the nuclear Armageddon. We went through four drill bits just putting in fourteen holes into the concrete walls.


p.s. get stoked for the the new season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia! September 17th!

The Shining of the Sink.

This is just me cleaning a sink. Nothing special.