Denver Beer by Shikes Jonathan;
Author:Shikes, Jonathan;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing Inc.
Published: 2020-08-15T00:00:00+00:00
11
GREAT DIVIDE BREWINGâS BOLD CHARACTERS
When the microbrew market fell through the floor in 1997, Great Divide Brewing was only three years old and hardly in a position to weather the storm. Located in a former dairy building in an industrial neighborhood, it was surrounded by vacant lots and empty warehouses. Homeless people slept on the street out front and in the alley behind. Local bands used part of the space to practice at night. A snowplow company parked its vehicles there.
Founded by Brian Dunn and then-wife Tara, the brewery was the only one in Denver that wasnât attached to or associated with a restaurant. Instead, it opened by selling kegs to bars and restaurants and twenty-two-ounce bomber bottles and half-gallon jugs out the front doorâa door made of steel and with no windows. Things started slowly, with just two beers that Dunn had developed in his kitchen at home, Arapahoe Amber and Whitewater Wheat.
Still, people found their way in, standing around in the taproom, which also served as the employee breakroom, and tentatively asking for toursâ not that there was much to see.
Dunn didnât have time to worry about marketing, though. He was too busy keeping things afloat. While a few breweries went under or sold in 1997 and 1998, Dunn kept his head down. Heâd borrowed money from friends and family to start the business and he refused to disappoint them. âIt was my life,â he says. âAnd I had a willingness and a hardheadedness to make sure it didnât fail.â The head brewer for the first two or three years, Dunn would come in at three oâclock in the morning to make beer before doing paperwork, opening the taproom and then heading out to sell. He worked festivals, managed accounts, cleaned the toilets and asked homeless people to move on.
The reason? Passion.
Dunn grew up in the 1960s and â70s in Vermont in a home where eating and drinking were important. There were five kids, and his mom cooked all the time. His father liked good beer, wine and spirits, and heâd enjoy them all during big family meals. âHe didnât like Bud, Miller and Coors,â Dunn says. âHe liked imports, so thatâs what he always drank.â
So, when Dunn grew up and went to college at Colorado State University, thatâs what he looked for, too, eventually landing a job at an Old Chicago location in Fort Collinsâone of the only restaurants at the time that offered imports and other interesting beers.
After graduating in 1985, Dunn headed overseas and spent five years developing farms in third-world countries, primarily in North Africa. One of his jobs was to buy groceries, so he would take a Range Rover on the ferry to France, where heâd load it up with butter, cheese, coffee, pork and, of course, beerâlots of beerâfrom Belgium, France and Germany. After his time in Africa, Dunn started traveling throughout Europe and Asia, drinking new beers in every country. âI got really into it,â he says. âBy the time I came back to the United States, Iâd been to forty countries.
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