From 'Opening' to 'Open'

Guys, we did it! We opened a cidery and it only took us 2.5 years!

Now that we’re open, our focus has changed from fundraising, seeking legal counsel, location hunting, permitting, and general contracting to managing daily operations. These are the things we’re focusing our energy on these days:

1.       Staffing. Up until May of this year, we were a pretty lean operation of me (Andrea) keeping everything moving and Aaron helping out with production and overall business decisions on nights and weekends. In May we hired our first employee, Joseph, as an Assistant Cider Maker. He put in long hours leading up to our opening to make sure we had cider ready, kegs were cleaned of all the little tiny rust spots that settled in from unloading them in the rain and not wiping them off (my bad), and improving the efficiency of the production process. Then we hired Melissa to run our tasting room and kitchen, who helped create our menu, made sure we had everything we needed to run a retail storefront, and taught me about standard serving practices. Finally, we hired Wes to make sure every customer is treated well in the tasting room and to turn visitors into regulars.

My job has changed from creating job descriptions and making hiring decisions to worrying about whether our employees like their jobs, are getting enough hours, and are as excited about the future of Ash & Elm as we are. For the record, I’m pretty sure we lucked out with each of them, but I still spend a lot of time thinking about how to make sure they are all getting out of Ash & Elm what they hoped to when they signed on to this crazy ride.

The whole team! From left to right: Joseph, Wes, Aaron, Andrea, and Melissa

The whole team! From left to right: Joseph, Wes, Aaron, Andrea, and Melissa

2.       Distribution. A lot of folks have asked when they can get our cider from bars and restaurants. Of course, there’s a short and a long answer. The short: ‘Soon, hopefully!’ The long: The state alcohol permit we need to make and sell cider (a Farm Winery permit, for those interested) doesn’t allow self-distribution. Which means I could have bars and restaurants with checks in hand waiting to put our cider on tap, but legally I can’t sell it to them. Instead, I have to sell the cider to a distributor, who would then sell it to the bar.

Fun fact! Our tasting room is on the ground floor of a three story building, and our Farm Winery permit only covers the first floor. If one of the businesses operating on the top two floors wanted cider, we would have to sell it to a distributor, who would then have to drive 10 miles away to their warehouse, who would then have to load it back up and bring it back to our building to sell to the top floor. Silly laws.

We have had meetings with multiple distributors, and our goal is to have that relationship lined up and going by the end of summer. Hang tight, we’ll get there, and we’ll make sure you all know about it!

3.       Getting the word out. Our tasting room has been open for three weeks now. A lot of my focus is shifting to marketing, sales, and promotions. In the short term, that will happen via events in the tasting room and participation in festivals throughout the city. Longer term, that means pounding the pavement to get bars and restaurants to buy into our product (see #2 on why that hasn’t happened yet). New menu options, seasonal ciders, consistency, and sponsorships/partnerships are always on my mind as avenues to explore as we grow our business.

Our first big event is Ciderside Chats! Head over to the event page by clicking on the photo.

Our first big event is Ciderside Chats! Head over to the event page by clicking on the photo.

4.       Data Crunching. If you know Aaron and me, you know that we both LOOOOOVVVEEE data and Excel. Fun fact #2! Aaron is an electrical engineer, and I have a Master’s in Public Health with a concentration in epidemiology, so using data to predict the future gets us more excited than it really should. Anyway, now that we actually have tasting room sales and numbers, we can start crunching data. How much on average does a person spend in the tasting room? How many ounces of cider does the average customer drink, and how much does that increase if the customer also orders food? Which ciders are selling the best, and given sales in our first month, can we predict what our annual sales might be? When does it make sense to add another employee?

Truly, it is so nice to be open after such a long time. Transitioning from ‘starting’ to ‘managing’ has been invigorating. Thanks for joining us for the start-up phase of the business, and I hope you continue to enjoy the ride!

What's Happening in the World of Craft Cider

Aaron and I have spent almost three years now living, breathing, thinking, and drinking cider. We’ve been to CiderCON twice and both have Google alerts set up for Hard Cider, along with a growing library of books to use as resources for every part of our business.

There's a growing library of information online, too, by way of blogs, newspapers, and online journals. If you’re new to the world of craft cider and want to learn more about what’s happening out there, here are some great articles that have come out over the last few months:

1.       Everything You Need to Know About Cider (And Why You Should Stop Calling it “Hard”) – This is a great overview about the latest trends in the cider world. Use it to learn why people in the industry don’t like the term ‘hard’ cider, how ciders differ from region to region, and why cider should fall more in line with the wine than the beer category. 

2.       Is Chicago Ripe for A Cider Boom? – This article outlines the growth of cider in Chicago since 2012 and likens it to the craft beer boom that we’ve all gotten familiar with. It addresses some of the barriers to entry for cider-makers, such as the all-too-common ‘cider stigma’ and how craft cideries are adapting their methods in order to enter a market dominated by craft beer. Plus, with Chicago just being a hop, skip, and a jump away, this might be helpful if you’re a cider fan that’s headed up north any time soon.

3.       Raising the Bar on the Cider Trend - A little different than the rest, this article focuses on two cideries in the Chicago region: Virtue Cider and Uncle John’s Cider Mill. Both Greg Hall and Mike Beck make really great ciders that you can find at some specialty liquor stores in Indianapolis. We’re particularly fond of Mike Beck and Uncle John’s Cider Mill because he’s one of our orchard partners that provides us with juice. Once we open, you all may be fans of Uncle John's as well if you like what you get!

4.       Critical Drinking – Are Craft Brewers Cutting Craft Cider to its Core? – This is a really thoughtful and challenging article from the folks at Good Beer Hunting (a great podcast to listen to if you’re into craft beer). The premise is that the trend of craft breweries jumping onto the cider bandwagon is doing harm to the craft cider world, since the craft cider movement is still in its infancy. Since both the market and some producers are ignorant about the history and tradition of cider, ‘bad’ ciders are turning people off of the industry before ‘good’ cider can turn them on. Choice quote: “In many cases, brewers are making all of these compromises at once in the pursuit of profit, or in their ignorance of another person’s craft, and hitting the gas peddle on production hoping they can cash in on another exponential growth trend adjacent to craft beer. In other words, craft brewers are co-opting craft cider the way craft brewers claim macro brewers are co-opting craft beer.” Oof!

Hopefully these articles have been enlightening to both current and future cider nerds. If you want to learn more about cider and the growth of the industry, give us a shout and we’ll connect you with some of our favorite resources. Happy drinking!

Five Things We've Been Working On

Hey cider fans! Things have gotten really busy for us over the last month, and they will only continue to be so. Now, we have great intentions of a few blogs related to the cider-making process, but before we delve in, we’re going to ease back into blogging with a snappy Top Five list so that we can all get on the same page with each other. Deal?

Here are five things we’ve been working on over the last two months:

5. Permits – Truly, ‘permits’ will probably be in every top five list we ever write about our progress. Since the last blog a month and a half ago, we’ve applied for and been granted a sign permit, an encroachment license, a construction permit, and some sort of elusive ‘electrical upgrade certificate’. As of today, we actually HAVE all of these permits!

4. Production Space – Our production space is 90% finished! Right now, most of what we’re waiting on is simple and not totally necessary for the production of cider. For example, we still need to put in a couple of sinks, wire the walk-in coolers, etc. But, our tanks are set, the coolers are built, the floor has been epoxied (twice!), so we’re almost ready to show the space off to visitors.

Look at those pretty fermentation tanks and unfinished floor drain!

Look at those pretty fermentation tanks and unfinished floor drain!

3. Tasting Room Décor – Finally, the fun part of a build-out! We’ve been scouring websites and taking weekend trips to Ikea to get light fixtures, plan out the bar, get the right draft system, and build tables. Our bar and tables are being built by Matthew Osborn (check out his website – he’s awesome!), and seeing them built has been a blast.

Parsons table for the tasting room.

Parsons table for the tasting room.

2. Paint Parties – We have some good friends and family in town who have graciously showed up several times to help us paint our space. It’s amazing what a fresh coat of paint will do for a dingy old warehouse, not to mention that it’s really nice to share our business with the people who care about us.

Wes is good with a roller and a ladder.

Wes is good with a roller and a ladder.

1. Test Batches – While we’ve been not-so-patiently waiting for our electrical upgrades that will allow us to use all of our fancy equipment, we’ve been doing some recipe tweaking. Aaron will have a full blog about yeast trails in the next few weeks to outline the process.

Aaron's ideal evening - doing science-y things mixed with alcohol-y things.

Aaron's ideal evening - doing science-y things mixed with alcohol-y things.

0. Merchandise – Woohoo, we have some merchandise! Tasting room glassware, shirts, coasters, and stickers are here and ready for the sharing. Thanks to Amy McAdams for her awesome designs.

Heyyyy...A&E Shirt Selfie!

Heyyyy...A&E Shirt Selfie!

Alright! We're caught up with each other! Stay tuned for some blogs about the actual cider-making process and news about our grand opening!

Confessions of a Cider Agnostic - Guest Blog by Nicole Cesare

As a 20-year-old studying abroad in Seville, Spain, I found myself enchanted by the flamenco music, the cobble-stoned streets, and the hand-poured café con leche available even in gas stations. However, when it came time to order a drink at a bar, I was overwhelmed, having never done so at home because of my underage status. After a few thoroughly misguided attempts at urbane sophistication (cloying, 80s-era cocktails like Grasshoppers and Piña Coladas), I finally settled on a go-to order: cider.

Spanish cider was crisp, dry, and refreshing, the perfect post-siesta libation. And while sangria gets all the press, cider is something of a Spanish institution, with the sidrerias (cider houses) offering cider straight from the barrel much like you might get wine at a more rustic venue.

Spanish cidra is often poured from a distance to aerate the cider on its way into the glass.

Spanish cidra is often poured from a distance to aerate the cider on its way into the glass.

When I took a spring break trip to Oxford, I discovered Strongbow, an English cider that hit similarly clean notes. Somehow, the beverage that worked so well in the Spanish heat also worked in the British damp.

However, after returning to the U.S. (and turning 21), I wasn’t able to find cider that worked so well. Most of the mass-marketed brands I tried were sweet and faintly chemical tasting, closer to soft drinks than wine. I stopped ordering cider, preferring instead to check out craft beers and work on developing a palate for wine. This continued for years; having lost my taste for the drink, I described myself as a cider agnostic.

Recently, though, I’ve been excited to hear about the craft cideries springing up around the country. Having had the opportunity to taste some of their offerings, both from cider-exclusive operations like Commonwealth Ciders to well-known brewing companies that also produce ciders, like Cigar City Brewing Company, I’m learning that there’s a whole world of quality cider out there. There are champagne-like, slightly sweet offerings to full-bodied, apple-forward brands. I’m eager to try them all.

Should the opportunity present itself, I’d love to return to Spain or England and really immerse myself in the cider culture that stretches back centuries. In the meantime, however, I’m glad to know that craft American cider is on the rise. Slowly but surely, I’m becoming a believer.

Everything is Happening!

It’s about time for an update on our progress, wouldn’t you say? I’ve been meaning to write a blog about what we’re working on for a while now, but so much happens in a day that that update is old news after just a few hours. But you know what, the people deserve to know! So, here’s an update on a few key areas:

1.       Construction – We are majorly, deeply in the thick of construction on our production facility right now. Concrete floors are being excavated, re-poured, grinded (ground?), and epoxied. Internal walls are getting put up and wired so we can have an office, kitchen, and bathrooms. Electrical work is being patched in so that we can run great big machines and tiny little laptops. And, we’re digging a moat around our building, too, just for kicks (just kidding, that's electrical work too).

You're looking at what will be two bathrooms, a lab, a commercial kitchen, and a walk-in cooler.

You're looking at what will be two bathrooms, a lab, a commercial kitchen, and a walk-in cooler.

Still to come on the construction side of things is the tasting room next door, which will get moving as soon as the production space is finished.

2.       Production – All of our permits have been granted, and we’re starting our first test batches of cider in the space. We started with a small batch (330 gallons) of our flagship Semi-Sweet cider to make sure everything runs smoothly before we size up.  As of this morning, things are fermenting away and creating a nice apple-y smell underneath the drywall dust and dirt smell.

Aaron pitching the yeast in our test batch. 

Aaron pitching the yeast in our test batch. 

We also have some nice heirloom apple juice bubbling away that we’ll age and release sometime in the fall, and some juice from our friends at Tuttle Orchards in Greenfield as part of our local orchard partner lineup. Altogether we have about 415 gallons of cider in process right now.

3.       Marketing – In addition to the brass-tacks of getting our production going and construction managed, we’re trying to spread the word that we’re coming for Indy in a matter of months. We’ve had a bit of media buzz already, which we really appreciate! The Indianapolis Star featured us as a business to watch in 2016, and Indianapolis Monthly had a nice little article about us too! We love that the word is getting out there and would love YOU, our FANS to continue that good work. Retweet us on Twitter, come to events we’re pouring at (Indy Pies and Pints and Corks and Forks are your next opportunities!), like us on Facebook, and gather up your cider-drinking pals and let them know that we’re on our way!

4.       Grand Opening – So…we’ve keyed in on a date for our GRAND OPENING! Of course, we can’t share it with you yet because it’s just a little bit too touch-and-go with construction at the moment, but know that we’re planning a killer party, at least four cider flavors, giveaways, and tasty food. Go ahead and black out your calendar for May, because it’s probably going to be sometime in that month, and if we’re all lucky, you’ll be able to drink some of our cider on tap at your favorite downtown bars and restaurants well before that.

Stay tuned! Like I mentioned, as soon as I post this, something will change, but we're circling the end of our 'startup' phase and moving toward our 'operational' phase really soon. Cheers!

Five Things We Learned at CiderCON

Last week, we headed out to Portland, Oregon for the week of breakout sessions (example: ‘Hydrogen Sulfide Production by Yeast’), trade shows, and sensory analysis training that is CiderCON. This was our second year at CiderCON – last year, since we were in such early stages of our business planning, every moment was eye-opening. It was like we had stepped into an alternate universe where suddenly, people nodded knowingly when we mentioned ‘keeving’ instead of staring at us blankly.

This year, as we’re mere months away from launching our full operations, CiderCON couldn’t have come at a better time. Here are the five things we learned at CiderCON:

Gotta represent Indiana! We were the only ones from the state.

Gotta represent Indiana! We were the only ones from the state.

5. The cider crowd is really diverse (in some ways) - Cider-makers are a mixed bag. Some come from the craft beer world and fit that demographic (beards, cutoff black denim shorts, hoodies, rock music). Others come from the wine industry and are fresh off of a stint in Napa Valley. There are orchard families that sell cider next to fresh apple pies and cider donuts. There are farmers who have cultivated amazing heirloom apple trees for decades. There are purists who don’t add a single ingredient (including yeast!) to their ciders, and large-scale production cideries that operate like craft breweries, with rotating seasonals featuring hops, chilies, or herbs. In other words, cider pulls from a diverse sect. I’d love to see some other kinds of diversity increase, but for now, it feels good to be a part of a group of people that are united by their love of the beverage.

4. Cidermakers still like beer – There was a lot of cider to consume during CiderCON. There were events each night with rare ciders on tap. We drank each other’s cider all week. But we were also in Portland, often called the beer capital of the world. You can bet I was thrilled to find awesome beers on tap that I don’t get at home – and I wasn’t the only one! Look, just because we make cider doesn’t mean we don’t like beer or wine. CONVERSELY, just because you might like beer or wine doesn’t mean you shouldn’t indulge in a nice craft cider from time to time either.

3. The Cider Act is a game changer. Somehow, in a gridlocked political climate, the fine folks that lead the cider industry were able to get the Cider Act passed last year. The laws are complicated, but basically, there were levels for alcohol percentage and carbonation level that, if crossed, your tax rates jumped. People in the industry felt like these levels were too low and kept cider-makers from being able to experiment with and diversify their products. This Cider Act upped both of those levels, allowing cider makers to create strong, more bubbly ciders without having to pay through the nose. These laws go in effect on January 1, 2017. HOORAY!

2. There are so many things we should’ve done a long time ago! There’s nothing like a week to think and talk about your business to help you realized that OOPS! We should’ve probably done that months ago. For example, the lead time on kegs is longer than we thought; we have a pump picked out but we don’t have any of the fittings so it’s basically useless; we may want to think about our tap handle situation if we want to get our cider on tap in the next month…etc. There’s nothing like a good jolt of fear and panic to get you into the mood to spend a ton of money in a very short amount of time.

1. Cider makers are super-generous. There really isn’t such a thing as a ‘trade secret’ in the cider industry. I went to one panel where the presenter opened up his recipe-maker tool so that we could all see how it worked (and thus see how they make their most popular product). He also showed us his personal password in that session, but I think that was actually an accident. Bottom line, though, is that everyone in the craft cider industry wants craft cider to be good. None of us benefit from a bad cider making the rounds, and all of us benefit from more people getting into craft cider. In-depth tours of production facilities, open-ended discussions about the best yeasts to use and fermentation temperatures to shoot for – across the board it’s a generous group of people who make up the cider industry in the States and we’re really thankful to be a part of it.

0. Bonus! Pigs like bitter apples. 

This little guy loved the apples that we couldn't eat at EZ Orchards.

This little guy loved the apples that we couldn't eat at EZ Orchards.


Starting a Business = Being a Circus Performer

You know the guy at the circus who somehow manages to spin multiple different plates on his fingers, nose, kneecap, and elbow all at the same time? That might be the best metaphor for small business startups that I can imagine. I’ve realized that, though my previous jobs have been in some ways multi-faceted, the scope of those job descriptions are nowhere near as varied as what we’re dealing with now as we get our business off the ground. Luckily, I spent two years in clown college, so everything is going okay. Here are our current spinning plates (cue Radiohead soundtrack):

The Law – Not a plate you want to drop. Federally speaking, we finally received our Federal Alcohol Permit from the TTB at the beginning of December. That was an awesome day, and I think we celebrated by sending a series of emoji-laden texts back and forth for several hours. Our state Alcohol and Tobacco Commission permit is under review at the moment, and once we receive that, we can actually produce and sell cider legally! As soon as that paper comes back, we start our first large(r)-scale test batch on-site.

The Finances – Closing on loans, securing the last bit of private investor money, making sure our budget is on track, trying to anticipate money-pits in advance…fincances are another set of plates that can’t be dropped. The reality is that there are probably about 20 finance plates going at once, and we already know some will drop, but which ones, and when, and can we maybe catch them before they hit the ground? This keeps me up at night.

The Product – The product keeps Aaron up at night. We have our suppliers, we know what equipment we’re going to use, we have great recipes that we’ve made dozens of times on a small scale, but will it all come together when we’re using new equipment in a new environment? We’ve had great reception when we’ve shared our ciders at events over the last year, but everyone loves free alcohol! Will people actually leave their house, drive to our tasting room or to a bar with dozens of beverage options, choose ours, and pay for it?

The Facility – Some pieces of equipment have a six-month lead time. Others you can go buy at Lowes. The rest fall somewhere in the middle. We don’t need all of our equipment to get started, but will need it eventually, so when should we order it, and in what order? Plus, the building is under construction. What if the tanks we ordered in July ship before the new concrete floor has been poured? Where will we put them? Does it really matter if our cinder-block walls are cleaned and painted? Does it $4,000 matter? Should the ADA bathroom go here or there? What grade of insulation do we need, and what grit of epoxy should we put on the floor? Stainless steel floor drains, right? How do we get a sign on the door? Should we get barstools with backs or without? And where will we put the purse hooks (purse hooks matter a lot to women at bars)?! Honestly I could go on forever with the kinds of minute decisions that need to be made Every. Single. Day. I have a whole new respect for anyone who opens a brick and mortar anything.

The Nameless Plate – “I KNOW I’M FORGETTING SOMETHING HUGE BUT WHAT IS IT?!” – me, almost every minute of every day.

So there’s a bit of insight into our lives at the moment. It sounds fear-laden, but it isn’t. It’s invigorating, with a tiny bit of fear and a pretty large dash of manic energy mixed in. And neither of us could be happier.

PS, I didn’t actually go to clown college.

How do you Finance a Craft Cidery?

Finances are a tricky thing. Talking about money is generally considered poor manners, and asking other people to give you money is straight uncomfortable, but if you want to start a business, you’re going to need some cash. There are a few ways to finance your business, including funding it yourself, bringing in investors, or taking out loans, and there are plusses and minuses to each option. Here’s a brief rundown of our thoughts and experiences with each of them.

Self-Funded - If you fund a business yourself, you have to either be wealthy, or you have to start on a small scale. This is especially true in the brewing/fermenting industry. While it’s possible to start on a shoe-string budget, you’d still need upwards of a couple hundred thousand dollars to be on the safe side. The amount of capital equipment you need to get started is expensive, and for the permitting process to even begin, you have to have a signed lease, meaning fronting at least 6 months of rent before you can make your first sale (unless you have a real estate agent who makes some good negotiations on your behalf). If you can manage to fund your business yourself, your growth can only occur by reinvesting your profits into the business. But one of the down sides of starting small is that you can only sell what you can make, and with small equipment, you probably won’t be able to make enough to grow quickly.

Pros: You own 100% of the business, and it’s a much less risky venture than the other options – in some ways! It might not feel less risky to put your life savings into a business, but at least if things go south, no creditors will come looking for you.

Cons: You’ll only be able to start as big as you can afford, and in this industry, that won’t be very big. Growth will be slow and there’s no room for error.

Investor-Funded – If you can’t finance the whole thing yourself, another option is to bring in investors who get a percentage of ownership of your business for the funds they give you. If you’re well-connected to people with both wealth and an entrepreneurial spirit, raising your funds this way can be relatively quick. If you aren’t, it may take a while to reach your target. Luckily, with the rise of successful craft breweries in Indianapolis, investors around here are familiar with the model and in some cases, are itching to get involved.

Pros: You’ll have more funds to get started, and it takes money to make money. You may also benefit from the networks of business contacts, accounting, legal services, etc. your investors bring to the table. In some cases, they can even act as a board of advisors.

Cons: You own less of your company, and someday when you hit it big, you only get a percentage of your earnings. If you don’t maintain majority ownership you could also run into conflict, or in the worst case, be cut out of the management of your company by the other owners.

Debt-Funded – Getting a loan to start your business is a feasible way to raise money, but in today’s climate, small-business loans are fewer and farther between than they have been in the past. Plus, with debt comes interest and repayment terms. One the plus side, the equipment needed for your business has a great re-sale value, which makes a loan a lot less risky from a bank’s perspective. If things go bad and you have to go out of business, you can sell all of your equipment for close to what you paid for it and may be able to walk away cleanly.

Pros: You don’t give away any equity in your business when you take out a loan, so you still own 100%. Banks can also be good partners for the future of your business, so establishing this relationship will help when you want to fund future expansion or get a line of credit opened.

Cons: Making debt repayments early-on, especially as you’re just getting started, can be a tough pill to swallow if you aren’t meeting your sales projections, and defaulting on a loan is scary business.

So what are we doing? Well…all three of course! We put a chunk of our own savings into the business to get things off the ground at the very beginning. We were able to cover the costs of hiring a graphic designer, a legal team, some expanded equipment for testing our recipes, and a fair amount of research and development (traveling to visit cideries and attend conferences). We have some investors on board who believe in our business and also see an opportunity to get a good return on their investment. Finally, we are working with lenders who think we’ll be a good addition to their portfolio.

We’re about 85% of the way funded now, which is happening at just the right time to take this show on the road.

The business side of small business ownership may not be as fascinating to everyone else as it is to us, but we’ve found it to be a constant and rewarding learning experience. If you enjoy learning about business startups, here are a few of the resources we've found valuable:

  •  StartUp Podcast -  This podcast follows the ups and downs of starting a business.
  • SCORE - A branch of the Small Business Association pairs retired former business executives with new business owners. Our SCORE mentor has been a huge help to us.
  • Indy Chamber - The Indianapolis chapter of the Chamber of Commerce provides business support as well as networking opportunities with other business owners in the city. 

Here’s to getting fully-funded in the near future and to entrepreneurship!

Getting to Know Our Future Home

In case you missed the excited announcement a few weeks back, we finally signed a lease for our production space and tasting room on the near-Eastside of Indy. Nothing could make us happier than being in this area of town, and here is why:

1.       We live here. Aaron has lived on the near Eastside since 2008, and I moved into the neighborhood in 2011. We know and love our neighborhood and have fierce near-Eastside pride. We go to the Legacy Center for our gym. We shop at Pogue’s Run Grocer. Aaron preceded both Flat 12 and Smoking Goose, and we were thrilled when they came to our neighborhood. We considered a place on Michigan Street at one point during our location hunt, and also looked at the Circle City Industrial Complex on E. 10th street. All in all, our ideal location was anywhere on the near-Eastside, even though we were willing to take anything that would work.  When we finally found the site that’s less than a mile from our house and checks every other box on our list, we were thrilled.

2.       It's perfect for what we need. We are actually leasing two separate addresses, both owned by the same landlord, Joel. One of the buildings, 2112 E. Washington St., is the former location of Bob’s ‘Your Favorite’ Thrift Store. It had an overhead door, a floor drain, tall ceilings, concrete floors, and a huge, open floorplan when we found it, which is everything we need to both start and grow our production facility. It was also stuffed to the gills with hoarder's-level junk, but that's beside the point. We plan to follow a business model that focuses on production, which means we won't just produce cider for our tasting room, we'll focus on getting our cider to bars, restaurants, and, eventually, liquor stores. The production facility is about 7,500 sq. ft. and based off our initial equipment orders, we have ROOM TO GROW if you love our cider. The second space is a beautiful historic building that will be perfect for our tasting room. 

3.       It has history. East Washington Street is part of historic US 40, which used to cross the entire United States and still reaches from Colorado to New Jersey. In fact, it used to be called the National Road, and was the first federally funded highway project created by a Congressional Act in 1806. In addition to being on an historic road, the building where our tasting room will be is also full of history.

Our trusty cidery can withstand a tornado!

Our trusty cidery can withstand a tornado!

It survived a tornado and a freak thunderstorm and has housed dozens of businesses, many of them taverns. And now it’s ready to be a … tavern again, kinda. A cider tavern! Given the American Cider Tradition, having a cider tasting room only seems fitting. Check out this awesome post on Historic Indianapolis to find out more about the history of our tasting room.

4.       It can be a catalyst for development. Aaron and I believe in investing in our communities.  East Washington Street is targeted to be one of the Great Places 2020. We love the idea of bringing a business to a neighborhood that is primed for redevelopment. Given that our business in Willard Park is right next door to our home in Holy Cross means that we’ll get to improve our own neighborhood through our business and show off our corner of Indianapolis to Ash & Elm’s visitors. We can’t wait to share our space and our cider (of course) with you in the next few months. 

We Have a Space!

If you’re connected with us on Facebook or Twitter, you may have heard snippets of these updates already, but we wanted to give you a more thorough status update on Ash & Elm. So much of our progress occurs behind the scenes and isn’t necessarily that interesting (submitting multiple tax documents, anyone?), but today, we have some big progress updates to share.

We have a location! I (Andrea) quit my job a year ago because I thought we’d find a location within three months and then get going, but finding our location turned out to be one of the most frustrating parts of our fledgling business to date. We looked many places, talked to many realtors, community development organizations, architects, and business owners, but finally found a spot that is better than we imagined. It’s on the Near-Eastside of Indianapolis, which is where we live and has always been our ideal scenario (Aaron’s commute will someday be a 15 minute walk, as opposed to his 1 hour commute that he’s been doing for TEN YEARS now). We have more space than we need for now, and a beautiful historic building to have a stellar tasting room in.  Lastly, we get to be a part of revitalizing an up-and-coming neighborhood, which is something we care a lot about.

Future tasting room greatness to happen here.

Future tasting room greatness to happen here.

We got the attention of the Indianapolis Business Journal in their Property Lines Roundup, which was exciting, and we had a successful rezoning hearing, getting approval to sell alcohol, food, and have a parking lot. Those in the know about city planning know this was a big hurdle, and kudos go to our landlord and his real estate agent for leading the rezoning charge successfully.

A Word on Alcohol Laws As I’m sure most of you know, starting a business includes a lot of paperwork. especially a business that sells alcohol. We’ve mentioned before that we needed to submit our Federal Tobacco and Trade Bureau (TTB) application, which takes about 3.5 months to process. We got that taken care of exactly two and a half months ago, so we’re hopeful we’ll be approved by the TTB sometime in November.

After that, it’s time to file our State application to the Alcohol and Trade Commission (ATC), which will take about three weeks to be approved. That means, in our ideal scenario, we could be licensed to sell our product by the first of the year. Wow! If you know either of us, you’ll know that – of course – we already have the ATC permit application completed and are just waiting to send it in the second we hear that our TTB permit is approved. We should be able to hit the ground running as soon as we get ourselves legal.

So…when are you opening?  GREAT QUESTION! I wish we knew the answer. If everything goes smoothly, March. If it doesn’t, which is more likely, sometime before June. The best way to stay up to date on our progress is to like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter, or drive by our location at 2112 E. Washington St and poke your head in the door. :)

We appreciate all of the interest and excitement we’ve been getting from you all, and are excited to share a cider together soon.

Working for the Weekend: Our Visit to Blake's Hard Cider

Since we started this business, Aaron and I have been itching to spend some time in a large-scale cidery to get our hands dirty and have a bit more exposure to the day-to-day operations. We’ve visited countless cideries around the States, but finally got our chance to work a couple weeks ago when we visited Blake’s Hard Cider in Armada, Michigan.

Blake’s Hard Cider is a really great place – a family-owned orchard for decades, one of the sons, Andrew, decided to add hard cider their already bustling business. Not surprisingly, the cider part of the company has grown by leaps and bounds in the first couple of years, and now they’re neck and neck for the largest cidery in Michigan. We reached out to them to see if they might be interested in some weekend day-laborers, and they responded with great interest and warmth. Our trip was planned!

The night before we left, we decided that, instead of getting a hotel nearby, we’d camp out at a local park. It was beautiful, relatively serene, and the price was right ($25/night). We’d definitely do that again – for a weekend spent working, it was nice to also feel like we were on vacation for a few hours each evening.

Campfire

On Saturday morning, we met up with Rob, their production manager, to learn about the processes involved in running a large-scale cidery. We saw their tanks, canning line, coolers, concrete pads, loading docks, and their expansion plans. After the tour and lots of questions, Rob put us to work labeling and filling bottles.

Intense focus while labeling bottles of cider.

Intense focus while labeling bottles of cider.

Aaron taking care of business.

Aaron taking care of business.

We did a pretty good job, and cut down the amount of work Rob had to do on a Saturday. They treated us to lunch in their tasting room and let us try a sampling of their house and seasonal ciders (tasting notes: YUM). Spending time in the tasting room was great – it gave us a lot of ideas about the design and function of our soon-to-be tasting room.

Some good ciders in the tasting room at Blake's Hard Cider.

Some good ciders in the tasting room at Blake's Hard Cider.

We spent Sunday morning talking with Robert, the cidermaker, who cut his teeth in Napa Valley and New Zealand working in wineries. He and Aaron hit it off, and spoke about all things fermentation/yeast/clarity while I chatted with Andrew about the business side of things: staffing, HR compliance, pricing, and distribution.

We headed back to Indy on Sunday afternoon, tired, buzzing with new ideas, and grateful for the generosity of our new friends at Blake’s. If you are in Michigan, seek out some of their cider – it’s great!

Brew-Ha-Ha Festival

Last month, we had the opportunity to share our cider at the 20th annual Brew-Ha-Ha Festival. Tied with the Indiana Microbrewer’s Festival for the longest-running beer festival in the state, Brew-Ha-Ha is a fundraiser put on every year to support the programming at the Phoenix Theater. We were really thankful that they let us be a part of their event before we were even open!

One of the benefits of having a name that starts with an 'A'.

One of the benefits of having a name that starts with an 'A'.

We had done several events prior to Brew-Ha-Ha, including another fundraiser, an opening gala, and a few weddings, but this was by far the largest (and most knowledgeable!) audience our cider had ever had. It was important to us that we came off well especially since so many other great breweries would be mere steps away.

After spending some time thinking about what ciders would be the best to bring to a beer festival, we settled on bringing six!

BHH Lineup 1
BHH Lineup2

On the day of the festival, we loaded up our compact car to the gills with cider, signage, our jockey box, a CO2 tank, and a couple coolers and drove the mile to the festival.

Overall, we had a great time and were able to talk with so many people who were excited to hear about a new cidery coming to Indianapolis. Some of the highlights included convincing die-hard beer fans to try a craft cider for the first time and hearing them say, “Hey, this is actually pretty good.” On the other range of the spectrum, it was also great to find out just how many people have been looking for a way to get more cider and who loved ours. We had a woman from France who said she’d been looking for a good cider to drink in the States for years and had finally found it in our Dry cider, and we had other people who came back multiple times in an effort to get a taste of the pumpkin cider, which we didn’t tap until halfway through the day. Another great part of the day was sharing cider with several bar and restaurant managers who expressed interest in carrying our ciders at their location in the future.

Aaron BHH

Thanks to the handful of a friends and family who helped us serve that day, and thanks to the Phoenix Theater for a great event. We hope to be a part of it next year and for many years moving forward.

The American Cider Tradition

The growth of the hard cider market in the US has gotten a lot of buzz lately. So much so that a lot of folks are requesting and drinking cider that hadn’t even heard of it a few years back. Surprisingly though, cider is often considered America’s first beverage and the favorite beverage of our founding fathers! What we’re experience now is a resurgence in popularity, not the creation of a new product.

The earliest colonists brought European apple trees with them, which they quickly planted and began crossing with some of America’s native crabapple trees. Because of the lack of infrastructure and resources, safe drinking water was a luxury that most couldn’t afford. One way to keep beverages safe was to ferment them because alcohol kills most waterborne bacteria. Given that there were plenty of apples but no access to grapes, barley, or hops, making cider was the most accessible way to stay safely hydrated (if not a little bit tipsy). In fact, rumor has it that John Adams had a tankard of cider each morning for breakfast!

A tidbit for our local friends in Indiana – William Henry Harrison, our 9th president (and maybe not a great president, to be honest) ran his campaign with a claim that he was a man of “log cabins and hard cider”, meaning he was one of the people, not a fancy aristocrat. Think of how presidents these days may talk about how they drink Bud Light or have Coke with dinner to endear themselves to Middle America, and that’s what Harrison was trying to do. How times have changed!

One of President Harrison's campaign cartoons

One of President Harrison's campaign cartoons

 

By 1850 over 1,000 cultivated varieties could be found in the US. (Let’s see if we can list them…Granny Smith, Honeycrisp, Gala, Fuji…ummm, maybe not). And unlike today, very few of these apples were edible without being processed first. They were tart, bitter, and sharp, not sweet and juicy like today’s eating apples.

When Prohibition hit in 1920 and didn’t seem to be going anywhere, people cut down huge swaths of orchards because they were pretty much useless to farmers compared to the other crops they could grow since they weren’t edible for the most part. By the time Prohibition was lifted more than ten years later, it was much easier to plant wheat and barley for beer, which can yield a crop the next year, instead of replanting apple trees, which take about five years to reach maturity.

Of course, apple trees did get planted again, but the majority were ‘eating apples’, not cider apples. To this day, as cider grows in popularity, there aren’t enough traditional cider apples to keep up with demand. Many orchardists are beginning to plant heirloom varieties again, and many cider makers are using eating apples for their hard cider, which still produces quite a tasty – if not completely traditional – version of America’s first beverage.

For more information about the history of cider in the United States and the world, check out the excellent book, World's Best Ciders by Pete Brown and Bill Bradshaw.

What's the Hold Up?

 Things have been a little quiet around here lately. Every time we talk to friends and family who are interested in our business, they ask us what we’re doing all the time. It’s a good question. Here’s what we’re working on, and what we need to get done before we can open.

Priority Number 1 – Location

We’ve been looking for a location pretty much non-stop since November. It’s hard to find a space that’s perfect. We've fallen in love with locations only to find out they won't work over and over again. Often, we feel like we’re on a never-ending episode of HGTV's “House Hunters”.

<Insert narrator’s voice>

“Aaron and Andrea have been looking for a location for their new cidery. Location #1 is on an accessible road with downtown views, plenty of space, and falls well below their budget, but can they handle a building that’s needs so much work? Location #2 offers room to expand in a convenient location in an up-and-coming neighborhood. But the lack of a private entrance and signage opportunities could cost them. Location #3 has everything they’re looking for – rustic character, functional space, and a busy street, but it’s a short-sale. Are they willing to risk their business future by letting the other locations go in their pursuit of this risky venture? Stay tuned to find out!”

<Fade to black>

It would be funnier if it weren’t so accurate.

So anyway, the location is a big issue. We think we’re close to having our location figured out and a lease signed, but until the paperwork has been finalized, we can’t move forward in any of the other areas.

Priority Number 2 – Permitting

Once we have a lease signed, we’ll be allowed to apply for our Federal Tobacco and Trade Bureau (TTB) permit. The application is comprehensive, and once it’s been submitted, it takes roughly 110 days (that’s 3.5 months!) to get our permit granted. Only after we have the TTB permit can we file for our state alcohol permit, and then after we’ve received that, we can apply for our city permit. All in all, the permitting process will take about 6 months if things go smoothly, and remember, we can’t start that process until the lease is signed.

Priority Number 3 – Build Out

Another item dependent on the lease. Once we have a lease and have our permit applications going through the Federal rigmarole, it’ll be time to start building out the space. Some of it will be un-sexy build-out, like getting the HVAC systems up and running, the plumbing and electrical requirements covered, etc. After that, the fun stuff will start and the cidery will really start to take shape. It’s hard to estimate how long this will take because we don’t have access to the building yet to see just what all needs to get done, but it will take at least several months to go from beginning construction to being able to open our doors to customers.

In the Meantime…

So a lot of the above issues are outside of our control. But, we’re still making gobs of cider and would love to share it with anyone who is interested! If you have an event coming up or if you’d like to throw a cider party at your house or business, send us an email and we can talk! So far we’ve provided cider to a nonprofit fundraiser, a wedding, and a medical office grand opening gala.

We also continue to make connections and contacts with people in the industry in Indianapolis so that we’ll be able to hit the ground running when we open.

So if you’re anxiously awaiting updates on our progress, please know that we’re awaiting those updates right along there with you, and probably more anxiously. :) 

Thanks for hanging in there with us and we’ll see you soon!

The Many Styles of Cider

Think of some of your favorite beverages: Wine. Beer. Juice. Soda.

One thing that all of these beverages have in common is that they are general categories. You can drill down into each of them and come up with wildly different styles: Merlot versus Chardonnay; a hoppy IPA versus a rich Stout. Coke versus Ginger Ale. Strawberry Kiwi or fresh-squeezed orange juice. I could go on and on, but I trust you get the point.

Cider is no different. It represents a general category – a beverage made with fermented apple juice, in the most traditional sense. Right now, as we experience the rebirth of the cider tradition in the States, we’ve just scratched the surface of the cider styles that exist. Generally speaking, the majority of cider consumption in the States comes from one style of cider – the very sweet, carbonated, controlled-yeast type. The exciting thing about the growing craft cider movement is that there are just as many styles of cider as there are of wine and beer, and we have much to discover! Here’s a little tutorial on some of the more common cider styles found around the world:

Scrumpy (English Style) – English-style ciders are usually fermented to quite dry and have a bit of funk to them (sometimes called ‘farmy’ because it can smell like hay or horses.) They tend to be carbonated, and if you’ve done much traveling in England, this is the cider you would have tried.

French Style – French ciders also have some farmy notes, but they’re more champagne-like than Scrumpy ciders, meaning they have a lot of tiny bubbles. The French don’t force-carbonate their ciders, and instead bottle condition them to achieve the champagne-like quality and a natural sweetness. These ciders are traditionally served with savory buckwheat crepes, often for breakfast!

Spanish Style – These ciders are super-tart and acidic. If you’ve never tried one, you may think it’s a bit off, but give it a chance! They’re like sour beers – a little funky, a little tart, and an acquired taste.

New England Style – New England style ciders are usually fermented to dryness and have a higher alcohol content than most other ciders because of the amount of sugar in the apples used.

Wild (Spontaneous) – Ciders that are ‘wild’ or ‘spontaneous’ mean that no yeast is added to the juice. Instead, the juice is pressed and left to ferment based on whatever wild yeast strains happen to be in the juice. These ciders take longer to ferment and can be a bit unpredictable – either the yeast offers a complex flavor that really works, or it doesn’t, in which case…cider vinegar!

Ice Cider – Similar to ice wines, ice ciders are made from freezing the juice and removing the water, leaving a highly concentrated, very sweet dessert cider. They’re labor intensive, and very much worth the effort!

These ciders are all made with few additional ingredients outside of apples, yeast, and sometimes a bit extra sugar. The variety comes from the way the blend of apples used from the start and the way the cider is fermented, stored, and aged. Variety also comes from the vintage of the apples as well, just like wine - some years are great growing years, others aren't, and the soil and ecological conditions where apples and grapes are grown affect the flavor of the cider or wine from year to year.

Ash &amp; Elm cider lineup for a recent event.&nbsp;

Ash & Elm cider lineup for a recent event. 

Then, there’s a whole new world of cider styles coming from the craft beer movement. These styles are nearly limitless, but a few categories are starting to settle into their own:

Hopped Ciders – Like hoppy beers? Try a dry-hopped cider if you get a chance! The aroma is hoppy and there’s a bit of that bitter aftertaste, but the sweetness of the cider mixed with the hops gives a totally different flavor than a standard IPA.

Barrel Aged Ciders – Cider aged in bourbon barrels have that same vanilla and alcohol-y finish that a bourbon barrel aged beer has. A variety of different barrels can be used with ciders: white wine, bourbon, rum, and more!

Fruity and Herbal Ciders – Ever had a jalapeno or bell pepper cider? They exist and they’re good! Ginger Cider, Blackberry Cider, Lemongrass and Basil Cider, Pumpkin Cider, the list can go on and on.

We’re excited to bring some of these styles of cider to Indy when we open. We have our standard semi-sweet and dry ciders that will be available all the time, but we’ll also have a rotating selection of seasonal and limited release ciders. Sure to be in the mix are hopped ciders, herbal ciders, barrel-aged ciders, and plenty more. We’d love to know what cider styles sound good to you, so feel free to drop us a line or leave a comment!

Where Will We Get Our Apples?

A lot of people ask us where we’ll get our apples from. When we started working on this project a year ago, our plan was to work with local orchards to source apples for our cider. We met with an old friend whose family owns an apple orchard, and she dropped some wisdom on us that was a bit surprising: Indiana sells all the apples they grow, and in fact, we have to import apples from Washington state and China just to supply everyone with enough apples to eat! In other words, while we have several orchards sprinkled throughout the state, we don’t come close to having enough extras laying around to fuel a large cider company.

Another issue: the great majority of apples grown in Indiana are considered dessert apples - the kind you can pick up and eat or use to make an apple pie. Historically, those aren’t the kinds of apples that are used in traditional cider-making. Now, lots of cideries in the States use dessert apples to make their cider. We plan to, too, for a lot of our products. But having traditional cider apples available can bring a complexity to cider that is hard to get with dessert apples alone. Can’t we have both?

Luckily, our friendly neighbor to the north, Michigan, is an apple powerhouse. They are usually tied for second place in the nation with New York (behind Washington) in apple production in the States, and they also have the infrastructure to package, store, and ship their apples. They have a seemingly endless supply of dessert apples, but they also have a lot of folks growing traditional cider apples as well plenty of apples that are good for cider-making as well as eating, like Northern Spy, Jonagold and Gold Rush.

So, what’s our plan? For the majority of our ciders, we’ll ship juice down from Michigan. We can get different blends to fit with the style of cider we’re making and get a good mix of sweet, tart, and bitter to make a flavorful cider with a lot of complexity.

We’ll also work with those Indiana orchards as much as possible. The busy season for apple orchards usually runs from Labor Day weekend through Thanksgiving, but come December 1st, people aren’t thinking about apples anymore. Unfortunately, plenty of apples are still on trees in December, so orchards end up pressing the juice to stock their shelves throughout the winter or having an excess of apples that they can’t sell. This is where we hope to come in and help them extend their growing season by buying up those late winter apples so that we can showcase the orchards around the state and make a truly local cider. We can’t wait to share it with you!

Deciding to Start a Cidery

A lot of people ask us why we decided to start a business focused on cider. It’s off the beaten path just enough to assume there’s a reason other than, ‘We like it.’ To be honest, it’s true. Here’s how we came to the idea of starting Indianapolis’ first dedicated hard-cider company.

Like a lot of other cider-makers around the States, Aaron found his way to cider via the craft beer world. He went to grad school in the mid-2000s near San Francisco. While the craft beer boom hadn’t really hit in Indianapolis at that time, it was big business on the West Coast, and Aaron jumped in full-force, seeking out different beers and starting to homebrew. He moved back to Indianapolis in 2006 with a couple years of brewing under his belt and a desire to open a brewery. But, like a lot of other people, he had student loans and bills to worry about, so it wasn’t an option. A few years later, when craft beer started to pick up steam in Indy, he again had fantasies of opening a brewery, but wasn’t able to convince himself to take the risk.

Around that time,  Aaron and I got together. Aaron realized that, while he loved craft beer, his interest in exploring other beverages had grown. I was game for an adventure, and we brainstormed what skills we each had, what would be a good business idea, and what we were interested in. A few years before, we'd traveled to Ireland and had a cider unlike anything we'd ever had in the States, opening our eyes to the possibilities of different styles. We’d already been making wine, and added cider to the mix too. As we brainstormed about their business ideas in the spring of 2014, cider quickly rose to the top. The growth in the industry over the last couple years around the US was incredible, the skills from brewing beer and making wine transferred well to making cider, and, important to both of us, apple trees grow well in Indiana, meaning not only could we make a truly local product, we could support farmers in our community through the business. And of course, the fact that cider is delicious and we still had so much more to learn about it got us excited about the challenge ahead.

What followed were months of research: drinking as many ciders from around the world we could get their hands on and making batch after batch to perfect our recipes. We took trip to cider hotspots like Portland, Seattle, and Michigan. We visited local orchards to talk with farmers about their perspectives. We conducted market research. Each step along the way, all signs pointed to this being the right business idea at the right time.

It’s been a whirlwind trip already, and we haven’t even opened yet. We hope you’ll join us on the next phase of our journey!

Why Ash & Elm?

As we meet people and tell them about our business, we always get asked why we chose Ash & Elm Cider as our name. It’s a great question, with a bit of a long answer.

Originally, we formed the LLC for the company with a different name. We registered a website, got our email addresses set up, and had our graphic designer start working on our logo and branding guide. Everything was running smoothly.

One morning, I got a text from a friend. It was a picture of a sign of a new brewery opening near her neighborhood that had the exact. same. name. We thought our name was pretty unique, so we were extremely surprised and disappointed. After going back and forth with our lawyers, we came to the sad conclusion that we’d have to change our name and come up with a new one.

For a few weeks, we were hung up on the idea that our new name had to be similar enough to the old one that we’d at least be able to keep our logo and branding, because it was awesome and we’d grown very fond of it. We shot ideas back and forth around the same theme, sent contenders to the lawyers who were helping us verify the ability of the names, and got shot down over and over again. Womp womp – it was going to be time to say goodbye to our beautiful logo and branding.

We rallied, though, and started thinking about names that weren't related to our first one. We listed things that are important to us and our family, and immediately knew that something relating to trees, nature, and the outdoors would be our answer. Aaron’s dad is a botanist in Indiana and could identify nearly any plant or tree that he stumbles across within the whole state. My parents live near to a state park where they spend hours every week, hiking and bird watching. Because of this, both of us are pretty passionate about the outdoors. Ash and elm trees are both species native to Indiana, but because of recent pests, they’re endangered. We love the idea of having a business that isn’t necessarily centered around conservation efforts, but uses its platform to support the businesses and nonprofits that are engaged in that work.

It works in another way, too: cider is a natural product that wouldn’t be possible to make if the earth isn’t cared for– apples grow on trees, in orchards, and they grow well in Indiana and Michigan. We’d love to see them continue to grow, and for more apple trees to be planted.

The link between these ideas and our name makes a lot of sense to us, and we’re excited to see how our love for the outdoors can translate into our business. Cheers!

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