Old Standby's Wild Idea for 2022
At the end of 2021, I was trying to think of new ways to raise money for local charities. There is only so much I can do with my little 1/2bbl system, so I approached Bine Valley Brewing in Salem, OR to see if they would be interested in brewing a charity collaboration beer to support Breast Cancer Research. Right away they were on-board, so we started working up a recipe. I decided to reach out to the amazing people at Yakima Valley Hops, who have supported me many times over the years, to see if they would donate the hops for our charity collab. They responded with a resounding "Yes!" This was a great way to offset some of the production costs during these unpredictable times in the food and beverage industry.
Donny from Bine Valley, and I decided on a single-hop IPA that would showcase the Idaho Gem hops, selected by YVH to benefit their 1 in 8 breast cancer awareness campaign. We brewed the beer in October, and the Salem community rallied behind the cause consuming the 2bbl batch in record time. This is where my "wild idea for 2022" began.
In December, still buzzing with the excitement of the Bine collab, I started thinking about how much more Old Standby could do for local charities by partnering with even more breweries, but I needed some incentive for these breweries to agree to collaborate with me. So, once again, I reached out to YVH to see if they would be willing to support me with the hops for 6 more charity collabs in 2022 (wild right?!). Well, they responded within minutes, and I was blown away to hear that I could count on YVH for all the hops for these charity beers. This really got the idea in motion!
Next, I figured I could try to get other ingredients donated too. So I reached out to my pals at Imperial Yeast in Portland, OR to "pitch" my wild idea and see if they would want to donate yeast for these charity beers. And once again, I was blown away with how supportive the beer industry is in the PNW, because Imperial agreed to provide all the yeast for the collabs.
Then, through an introduction made by YVH, I was explaining my wild idea to LINC Malt in Spokane Valley, WA and well, you guessed it....they agreed to supply all the grain for the charity beers! Mind Blown!!
So, in early January, armed with all the ingredients to brew massive amounts of beer to benefit local charities, I started reaching out to breweries to see if they were interested in participating. I approached the breweries with this basic plan:
The brewery chooses a charity they are passionate about and they handle the donations (I felt this was important as I didn't want to place added pressure on the brewery during these unpredictable times in the food/bev industry).
We collaborate on a recipe and brew the beer with the supplied ingredients from YVH, Imperial, and LINC Malt.
Everyone promotes the beer on their social media outlets tagging the companies involved and the charity that will benefit from the proceeds.
I document the process in words/photos and do write-ups on each collaboration. I also will be scaling down the recipe to a 5 gallon batch and providing the brewing details so that homebrewers can brew the same beer at their house. All this will be on my site: www.oldstandbybrewing.com
Everyone feels good about the work they've done to benefit a local charity!
After just a few phone calls, emails and discussions over pints, I now have 4 charity collabs scheduled over the next 4 months and I'm still amazed how this wild idea has taken shape.
The first collaboration will be in mid-February with my pal Matt, head brewer and co-owner at Xicha Brewing in Salem, OR. I'll be posting regular updates on the progress of each beer, the charities chosen, and where you can find the beer to support the causes, so stay tuned!
Cheers,
Ryan
Old Standby Brewing