There was enough beer to drown a fish, but as so often happens in Jasper, hordes of people came out to show their support for Valemount's Three Ranges Brewing Company, running the taps dry, May 5.
There were so many people in fact, that the Jasper Royal Canadian Legion ran out of kegs well before midnight, forcing people to switch to cans.
During the event, the locally owned and operated brewing company announced the legion will now carry its Sacrifice Red Ale, the first bar in Jasper to carry the company's suds.
In homage to the legion and military veterans, three per cent of all sales will be donated to veteran organizations in both Canada and the United States on a rotating monthly basis.
For co-owners Michael Lewis and his wife Rundi Anderson, donating money to veterans was a no-brainer.
Lewis is a former U.S. military helicopter pilot and Anderson, who was born and raised in Jasper, worked for Parks Canada as a park warden for 17 years on the west coast.
The initial idea to open a craft brewery began in 2010 during a drive home to Victoria after a thanksgiving weekend in Valemount, where Anderson's parents live.
Full of turkey and aspirations, the couple laid out a 10 to 15 year game plan to start a brewery. It was also during that trip that they came up with the name of their future company.
The following week Lewis, who had recently finished a 20-year career with the U.S. military, bought his first home brewery kit.
As fate would have it, Anderson lost her job two years later when the Conservative government cut Parks Canada's funding in 2012.
“The day she came off her maternity leave she got her pink slip, three weeks after that we found out the whole scope of what was happening and then we found out she was pregnant with our second child, so we kind of just went through all of our options,” explained Lewis, who was a stay at home dad at the time.
After debating various ideas they decided to take the leap from the public sector to the private sector and moved to Valemount in 2012 to open up a brewery.
“There's not really a lot of work in Valemount, you have to make your own work, so I said to him 'you drink enough beer why don't you brew it,'” said Anderson.
And with that it was decided.
The company first opened its doors in Valemount in December 2013 and has since struggled to keep up with demand.
“We're probably one of the 10 smallest breweries in the province, but we've just continually been expanding our production capacity because as much as we say no to new accounts and people we just keep getting more demand,” said Lewis, who describes his company's beer as “approachable.”
“Our beers are what we call northwest style ale, so they're kind of hop driven.”
Last year the company produced 420 hectolitres and will likely hit 700 hectolitres by the end of 2016, with plans to produce 1,200 hectolitres by 2017.
The company currently employees seven people and has five regular beers as well as six seasonal beers that rotate every two months.
The company has also teamed up with the Jasper Brewing Company on two different occasions creating a beer that is aptly called Across the Divide.
“Brewing became a passion for me and it still is, but there is this slow transition I'm learning about, which is going from my passion of brewing and being really freaked out about running a business to being passionate about running the business and passionate about the beer,” said Lewis.
During the event money was also collected for the Red Cross to support those who have been displaced by the Fort McMurray wildfire.
Paul Clarke [email protected]
