Hi everyone, Neil and Mark here....
We're really rolling now and we're in the home stretch! The gauntlet of final inspections has begun and we're inching closer to brewing the first batch of Varitage beer on Washington St.
It's been an incredible journey to get to this point. It's really the perfect time to share something with everyone. We're beyond excited to release the latest episode in our "Building Varitage" series. Episode 3, "Light at the End of the Tunnel", is available now!
It's been about a year since we released Episode 2. A lot and we mean A LOT has happened in between episodes. Why the long wait you ask? Well, for those of you who have been following us know all about the delays that we hit on the road to opening this brewery. In Episode 2 we covered a really exciting chapter in Varitage. We had just completed our first public appearance as a brand and started to sell some of the first ever Varitage merchandise. Varitage was starting to become very real. We were gearing up to file for construction permits with then town. Then everything kind of just went dark. We were stopped dead in our tracks as our building was sold to another company along with a huge tangled mess. We were left with a bunch of trench drains dug into the floor. It was a really uneasy chapter for us. There were days where we honestly didn't know if this was going to work out. We had already made financial investment .
Once the dam finally broke. We just put our heads down and went right to work. The team of tradesmen who worked on Varitage did a fantastic job. We kept the cameras rolling and cumulated quite a bit of footage. The producer of the Building Varitage series, Brett Miller of BKM Video is responsible for bringing everything to life.
He has become part of the Varitage family and helps with our storytelling. We sat down with Brett and candidly spoke about our experiences over the past year. The end result is Episode 3, "Light at the End of the Tunnel". This episode is incredibly important to us. It really captures the ups and downs, the big wins, the gut wrenching loses and the life changes that happened inside the Varitage camp.
Combing through a year's worth of footage opened some old wounds, but at the same time provided us all with great pride. We came so far. We're so happy that we documented it all and get to share it with you. We talk about this in the episode, but going through these challenges and learning experience is almost a right of passage. It wouldn't be the same if these particular things didn't play out. It strengthened us. It put real soul behind the brand.
The Building Varitage series is not over just yet! In the next episode we plan on documenting and sharing the first brew days at the brewery along with opening day. We love putting these together and sharing this journey with you.
If you haven't already, get caught up with the series and start with Episode one. Feel the excitement of the launch of the brand then see the steps we take to start bringing the brand to life and then feel the emotional rollercoaster that is Episode 3 as we finally see a light at the end of the tunnel and watch our little brewery in North Jersey take shape.
So outside of launching Episode 3 of Building Varitage it's crazy to say, but we're really at the end of our build-out. We have a few final plumbing touches to complete and get our dishwasher installed. Once that's all set it's onto the gauntlet of final inspections. The good news is, our electrical final inspection is already complete! As soon as we are through our inspections with the town, then it's onto the State ABC for licensing. It's our hope to be brewing come August. We'll absolutely keep you all posted on that!