MBiz

25 MBiz | november 2016 "Clearly hundreds of years ago there were concepts like ours, farmers who grew their own grain and made their own beer. Now we've come full circle." "It's possible we could make a beer called Dirty Thirties and make it from the kind of barley they grew in the 1930s," he says, explaining that research in the industry indicates that the flavour of a beer can be more influenced by the variety of barley than by the minerals in the water used in brewing. They have their barley malted for them in Winnipeg by Malt Europe, which processes Farmery barley in separate batches, so that only Farmery-grown barley ends up in the company's beer. It's been a long journey to get the company to this point. The brothers began in business with their Luxesole restaurant and Luxalune pub in Winnipeg as a way of saving the family farm. But they always wanted to return to their Western Manitoba roots and the brewery provided that opportunity. They pitched their idea on CBC's Dragon's Den a few years back and came close to making a deal with the show's investors. Ultimately, though, they chose to keep control of their idea and do it themselves. Despite not making a deal, they recently had a crew from Dragon's Den shoot a follow-up segment on their business, which will air early in 2017. The growing agritourism and eat locally trends are part of the appeal of the brewery. To appeal to travellers on the Yellowhead, they offer tours of the farm, the hop yard and the brewery. Visitors can see different varieties of barley and see how the grain has been changed by a century of breeding. Those looking to take home a taste of the farm can also pick up packages of pancake, beer bread and cake mix made with the same malted barley as the company's beer. "We wanted to go back to farming and we wanted to showcase what rural Manitoba has to offer," Chris says. "We could have located the brewery in Winnipeg or Brandon or Portage, but we wanted to be in rural Manitoba." When you think about it, he notes, it only makes sense to make beer on the Canadian prairies, since so much of the brew we drink originates there. "Canada sends shiploads of barley to Europe only for us to buy it back as beer," he says. With its location in Neepawa, the brewery has room to expand as sales take off. There's also a local labour pool with plenty of experience in food production plants. At the moment, the brewery has seven or eight full-time staff and takes on extra part-time workers on canning days. Both numbers could grow if drinkers are as inspired by the estate-brewery concept as the brothers expect. ■

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