Bottles ➡️ Cans: A Purposeful Transition
In Hardywood’s almost 12 years, we’ve seen a lot of different package types: 750ml corked and caged bottles, 22oz bombers, 500ml “tall boys,” 12oz long neck bottles, 16oz cans, 12oz cans, 19.2oz cans, and our signature 12oz stubby bottles. While all have held a special place in our hearts, we’ve decided to shift all of our bottled beers exclusively to cans, primarily to align with our core values of sustainability and quality, though the consideration behind this decision stems back many years.
In the early 2000s, Hardywood’s other co-founder, Patrick Murtaugh, and I worked in business development for Union Beer Distributors in New York City, which distributed some of the world’s finest beers from the likes of international producers Chimay, Orval, Duvel, Dupont, Baladin, BFM, Schlenkerla, Schneider, Hitachino, and Samuel Smith, and burgeoning American craft brewers, including Sierra Nevada, Allagash, Victory, Lagunitas, and Ommegang. Aside from kegs, bottles were the only package format utilized by these breweries, with several offering ornate corked and caged bottles. The glass bottle had firmly established itself as the package of elegance, and in the eyes of the American craft beer consumer, the only vessel worthy of truly world class beer.
Circa 2005, our sales team introduced America to the Gose style of beer, with the NYC launch of the first commercial example of the tart, salty ale produced in over 30 years, from an artisanal brewer in Leipzig, Germany. Leipziger Gose was packaged in ornate 750 ml silk-screened genie-style bottles, and sealed with a ceramic flip-top. It was the pinnacle of bottled beer sophistication and elegance, and it sold for around $25 a bottle, a steep price for beer at the time. Just a few weeks later, we worked with Dale Katechis on the east coast launch of a beer that turned the notion of bottled beer superiority completely on its head: Dale’s Pale Ale, from Oskar Blues out of Colorado, which was packaged exclusively in cans. I clearly recall the sensory epiphany I felt in our Brooklyn sales office the first time I cracked open a can of Dale’s Pale Ale, while hearing Dale’s inspiring story, and experiencing the novel combination of icy aluminum at my lips, wave after wave of dank, citrusy, piny hop aromatics, and a balanced, toasty malt character in the finish. To me, something felt so very right about a delicious, full flavored beer in such an unconventional, yet incredibly accessible package.
Ironically, Dale’s initial move to cans was less about environmental or quality benefits, and more about there being a new, cost effective machine designed to fill, then seam one can at a time, making it the lowest barrier entry into packaged beer, albeit a wildly inefficient one. It quickly became apparent that Dale’s Pale Ale not only stood out on the shelf among a sea of long neck bottles, but its package format was lighter and stacked more space-efficiently, making it less resource-intensive to ship, warehouse, and display in stores. Cans are less susceptible to breakage during transit, and aluminum can be recycled indefinitely, and with relatively low energy use. From a quality perspective, cans also offer some inherent benefits.
💡Did you know…?
Oskar Blues likened cans to “mini kegs,” as they prevent any exposure to ultraviolet light, which reacts with hop-derived alpha acids and riboflavin in beer to form 3-methyl-2-butene-1-thiol, more commonly referred to as “lightstruck” character in beer. This is perceived as “skunkiness” or a sulfury aroma, and is most common in green and clear glass bottles, but extended exposure to sunlight or fluorescent light can cause any bottled beer to become lightstruck.
Without question, Oskar Blues perpetuated an international movement toward canning craft beer, though they weren’t the first to sell full flavored beer in cans. That distinction goes to the Gottfried Krueger Brewing Company, which chose Richmond, Virginia as a test market for the global debut of canned beer, delivering 2,000 cans of Krueger’s Cream Ale and Krueger’s Finest Beer on January 24, 1935. In our view, credit surely belongs to beer loving Richmonders, whose widespread approval of the world’s first beer cans revolutionized the beer industry forever.
Fast forward 76 years, when Hardywood opened in October, 2011, becoming one of two breweries in the City of Richmond, and about 35 statewide in Virginia. Among high end beer brands, bottles were still the package format of choice, making up the vast majority of craft beer sold in grocery and convenience stores throughout Virginia. Hardywood had stretched its pennies as far as possible to build out its production facility, and could only afford a small, manual, 4-head counter-pressure bottle filler. Without the legal ability (yet) to sell beer for on-site consumption, we felt we needed a premium package that could fetch a higher price per bottle to help offset our high degree of inefficiency. We managed to track down a source for 750ml bottles more commonly used for high end Belgian beers, and for our first three years, we pursued the laborious task of hand-labeling, hand-filling, and hand-corking and caging bottles of our flagship beer, Singel, a Belgian-style Blond Ale. We also hand-bottled a seasonal range of beers showcasing the terroir of central Virginia with ingredients from local farms comprising our “Virginia Roots Series,” including our now famous Gingerbread Stout (the original!), and a lineup of barrel-aged beers in our “Barrel Series.” On a good day, with the help of a few generous volunteers, Patrick, Brian (Hardywood’s first full-time team member and its present day Brewmaster), and I could fill 60 bottles per hour.
Eric, Patrick, Brian, Nick, and Rachael hand filling 750ml bottles of Singel, one by one, November, 2011
In late 2013, we were able to upgrade to a rotary counter-pressure filler, which could fill about 2,000 12-ounce bottles per hour, enabling our foray into 6-packs for the first time, which were still, by far, the preferred package format for craft beer throughout Virginia. We started delving into canning when the first mobile canning service opened in our region, introducing “Hardywood Cream Ale,” a tribute to the original canned beer from Kreuger’s. As we planned the construction of our purpose-built brewery facility in West Creek, we took the safer path of investing in what had proven successful for us. In 2017, as we completed construction of Hardywood West Creek, we installed a faster bottling line capable of filling up to 8,000 bottles per hour, with improved quality control, and the hope to invest in canning capacity down the road.
For several years, we leased an atmospheric can filler, which is a relatively cost effective machine, making it the most common type of canning machine utilized by small craft breweries. But it has an inherent flaw of exposing beer to oxygen prior to seaming the lid, leaving the beer more susceptible to flavor and aroma damaging oxidation. In 2022, we were able to obtain financing for the 7-figure purchase of a counter-pressure rotary can filler. While it was a challenging investment to coordinate in the wake of the pandemic, the machine’s ability to minimize dissolved oxygen levels has proven superior to the already impressively low D.O. levels Hardywood achieves with its bottling equipment. The machine’s new capabilities, combined with our incredibly talented packaging team’s steadfast commitment to quality, has enabled a significant improvement in product integrity, shelf stability, and our customers’ enjoyment of brewery-fresh beer, whether we’re shipping to a market up the street, or to a retailer in South Korea (where Richmond Lager was BTS megastar Jungkook’s beer of choice at his 25th birthday celebration!).
Ultimately, Hardywood’s leadership team has decided that shifting all of its packaging to aluminum cans will:
Optimize quality for customers by minimizing dissolved oxygen levels and blocking harmful UV rays.
Protect the environment by offering infinite recyclability and reducing the use of natural resources in transport and storage.
Provide a new level of flexibility and accessibility for our customers to enjoy Hardywood anywhere they want. Bring cans to the beach, on a hike, down the river, or to a backyard cookout.
Between now and the end of 2023, Hardywood will be transitioning all of its bottled beers over to cans. The various bottles we have utilized have all played a meaningful role in our evolution of the Hardywood brand. But as we listen closely to what our customers want, and what best aligns with our core values, we couldn’t be more excited about the shift to cans. We hope you will appreciate this transition as much as we do, and that this will enable you to enjoy Hardywood beer on more occasions, and in more places, than ever before.
Cheers!
Eric
CEO & Co-Founder
Hardywood Park Craft Brewery