The Brewers Association notes that in 2012 the Craft Brewing world surpassed another milestone when 2,075 breweries were up and running.  That’s 326 more than just two years ago!  It’s not just the number of operations, but their size and output that is growing.  You have likely seen this in the demand for your brews, both in the number of batches and offerings.  On the equipment side of the equation, W.M. Sprinkman has seen a steady climb in two areas:  Demand for custom-engineered Brewhouses, and Cellars in sizes that are greater than ever before.

An example of the latter is a 220 BBL Brew Kettle that W.M. Sprinkman is finishing for Point Brewery. This vessel represents the largest brewkettle W.M. Sprinkman has built to date, and was designed to work within the confines of the Stevens Point, WI-based brewer.  According to Gabe Hopkins, Brewmaster for Point Brewing Company, “In order to meet an increase in demand for our Point products, we needed to dramatically improve the efficiency and throughput of our brewing process.  A key part of our solution was a rather large, customized, 220-Barrel Brew Kettle from Sprinkman as we reconfigured our operations.”

W.M. Sprinkman is seeing a surge in orders for complete brewhouses.  “Over the last five years, we have built a few brewhouses, but cellar expansions from 30 to 500 barrel is really what was filling our production facility,” according to Brian Sprinkman, Vice-President. “However, since last year there has been an incredible surge in demand for customized, multi-vessel brewhouse, in a variety of sizes from 10-100 barrel.  We really enjoying the challenges this brings to Sprinkman to design and build some incredible brewing operations.”

Brewhouses can be highly customized operations, which has its benefits and challenges when the time comes to plan for one.  The size of the brewhouse is a careful dance between today’s needs and the future goals you have set for your brewery.  How many turns per day do you need to get out of your brewhouse?  Do you design the control panels to handle today’s operations or design them to handle future componentry?  The funds you have will obviously play a key role in what are “must have” and what are “nice to have” features, but bringing in a partner like W.M. Sprinkman can make this a manageable task and in most cases, help you realize a more efficient and profitable brewhouse.  After all, brewing more beer better is the true quest of all craft brewers!

Customize Your Own Barware and glassware