Radical Road Brewery

[sofakingdrunk]

I really enjoyed the first glass of canny man I had.....by the end of the bottle I realized it was too much to try and tackle alone, in one sitting. It was a bit of a struggle to finish it. Tasty though, as was the wayward son

[northyorksammy]

dont expect high abv beers for a while there

[S. St. Jeb]

Also, the bartender said they're heading back to the LCBO soon, so I suppose it's probably an avenue to make & sell trial batches.

They've had an LCBO listing before? I don't recall.

Two of them actually. Canny Man was a smoked wee heavy in a black paper wrapped 750ml, which was decent, and The Wayward Son was an underrated golden ale aged in pinot barrels and came in a boxed 750ml. I'm pretty confident they brew at Black Oak.

Ah, OK, I remember them. Just didn't connect the brewery name. Thanks.

[Craig]

I've been back a couple of times. The food is pretty good, though they don't spoil you in serving sizes. They ran out of that yuzu pale ale and replaced it with a very respectable IPA.

I also got specifics on the operation. They have 2 200L pots. The fermenters are in the basement and you can see them if you go to the bathroom. They're 500L, so what they end up doing is brewing triple batches in a day to fill 'em up. They're panning on bottling stuff for sale on site, which is a manual process. I pity their brewing assistant.

[atomeyes]

I've been back a couple of times. The food is pretty good, though they don't spoil you in serving sizes. They ran out of that yuzu pale ale and replaced it with a very respectable IPA.

I also got specifics on the operation. They have 2 200L pots. The fermenters are in the basement and you can see them if you go to the bathroom. They're 500L, so what they end up doing is brewing triple batches in a day to fill 'em up. They're panning on bottling stuff for sale on site, which is a manual process. I pity their brewing assistant.

none of our business, i know, but how is this a recipe for profitability?
i feel bad that Ontario's where small town US was brewing-wise 8-10 years ago.

[alsiem]

I stopped by hoping to get some bottles to go but for now it's just a bar/restaurant serving their beer. I was told that a bottle shop would be up and running sometime between the middle to the end of September.

They are planning on making easy drinking/sessionable beers at the beginning to complement food and win over the local neighborhood so don't fear if you didn't like Canny Man.

Did not see the menu but the kitchen space is small, squeezed in with the brewing equipment.

[Craig]

They actually move the mashing vessel out of the kitchen during service, because there's not enough room for both in there. I gather they just pick it up and carry it downstairs.

[skaghevn]

They actually move the mashing vessel out of the kitchen during service, because there's not enough room for both in there. I gather they just pick it up and carry it downstairs.

[atomeyes]

They actually move the mashing vessel out of the kitchen during service, because there's not enough room for both in there. I gather they just pick it up and carry it downstairs.

i use a 55 litre kettle at home. they are literally brewing at 4x the capacity of what i'm doing at home.
*sigh*

[mahcinesquad]

They actually move the mashing vessel out of the kitchen during service, because there's not enough room for both in there. I gather they just pick it up and carry it downstairs.

i use a 55 litre kettle at home. they are literally brewing at 4x the capacity of what i'm doing at home.
*sigh*

Doesn't seem overly big.

But Half Hours on Earth is also brewing on a scale that the brewer joked wasn't much bigger than some home brewers. But their beers are also great.

[northyorksammy]

Half Hours has doubled his capacity, awaiting regulatory approval.

[atomeyes]

They actually move the mashing vessel out of the kitchen during service, because there's not enough room for both in there. I gather they just pick it up and carry it downstairs.

i use a 55 litre kettle at home. they are literally brewing at 4x the capacity of what i'm doing at home.
*sigh*

Doesn't seem overly big.

But Half Hours on Earth is also brewing on a scale that the brewer joked wasn't much bigger than some home brewers. But their beers are also great.

yes. great beer, apparently.
but, for now, there is close to zero correlation between being profitable in Ontario and making great beer. you need to be making beer at a large(r) scale in order to correlate to profitability.

i made a great dinner for myself last night. but doing that won't earn me a living.
HHOE was apparently brewing on a 1 bbl system. that's around 1.5 x what i do at home. i do mine as a hobby and i'd hope that HHOE was also doing it as a hobby.
Radical Road's paying Leslieville rent (probably $25/sq ft/year). pretending that their space is 2000 sq ft, plus $10/sq ft for TMI, that's probably close to $5500/month on rent, or $60 000/year. add in utilities and staff costs (they're running a restaurant, so they're paying staff to cook and serve) and you're looking at expenses being close to $150 000/yr (rounding up). that doesn't include paying the brewers/owners.

food makes you next to nothing, so assume zero profitability on food (trust me). if you do it right, you're making around $10/litre profit. that's 75 batches of beer brewed a year without any lost batches and assuming (incorrectly) that you don't lose any beer/wort in the process. so round up to 80ish batches of beer. again, assume that owners want to get paid, but my calculation isn't accounting for that right now.

each batch takes 14 days (on the higher end) to ferment, chill, carbonate. how many fermentors can they have in that small space?

see why the #s are really, really, really nuts? they need to complete 1 batch every 4 days in order to break even. that means that they need to have 3-4 fermentors there and they're always on the go.

anyways, this is in no way, shape or form a slag on HHOE or RR guys. i don't know their business and i don't know how they're doing, how much they invested, etc etc. I'm just talking about the state of brewing in Toronto and referring to the old discussion in the US brewing scene where it's "7 bbl (800 litres) or bust". you cannot make money off of less than 7 bbl. i mean, you can, but it's ridiculous as to what you have to do. and we're talking about small-town US and not crazy-rent toronto

[El Pinguino]

I have no idea how "big" or "small" most breweries are. I remember being surprised taking a tour at Muskoka and they said they were the Xth largest brewer in Ontario (4th or something like that).

Granite brewery has been around for ages, but they always seemed to have a small setup to me? How would their size compare to say Radical Road? I've been to Half Hours on Earth, and they're in an industrial building, with plenty of space for expansion...so I doubt they have to worry....if they keep selling, they can keep growing...

[Tapsucker]

I have no idea how "big" or "small" most breweries are. I remember being surprised taking a tour at Muskoka and they said they were the Xth largest brewer in Ontario (4th or something like that).

Granite brewery has been around for ages, but they always seemed to have a small setup to me? How would their size compare to say Radical Road? I've been to Half Hours on Earth, and they're in an industrial building, with plenty of space for expansion...so I doubt they have to worry....if they keep selling, they can keep growing...

What you see at the Granite is the tip of the iceberg. You need to go downstairs to see how well they scale. Even then, they are not pretentious about their operation. I can't speak to the economics of the business, but I'm sure it's possible to run a sustainable brewing and restaurant business. "Sustainable" has become misconstrued as an environmental term, but it means more than that. Great businesses last generations without needing to chase absurd growth and returns.

[atomeyes]

I have no idea how "big" or "small" most breweries are. I remember being surprised taking a tour at Muskoka and they said they were the Xth largest brewer in Ontario (4th or something like that).

Granite brewery has been around for ages, but they always seemed to have a small setup to me? How would their size compare to say Radical Road? I've been to Half Hours on Earth, and they're in an industrial building, with plenty of space for expansion...so I doubt they have to worry....if they keep selling, they can keep growing...

What you see at the Granite is the tip of the iceberg. You need to go downstairs to see how well they scale. Even then, they are not pretentious about their operation. I can't speak to the economics of the business, but I'm sure it's possible to run a sustainable brewing and restaurant business. "Sustainable" has become misconstrued as an environmental term, but it means more than that. Great businesses last generations without needing to chase absurd growth and returns.

sure. you don't need to grow infinitely.
but you need to make enough money to pay the bills, your start-up costs and to take money home.
and putting in 60 hr work weeks to take home $30 000 probably doesn't cut it for most.