Hop Chronicles- Yakima Edition

Video Transcript:

Rebecca

One thing we really try to do when we bring brewers over here is create a community and create a connection to the products that they’re going to be using at their breweries. So touring around to the different farms and seeing the different ways that things are done and seeing the different approaches is an extremely important part of what we’re trying to do with supply chain information sharing.

Rich

It’s important as well, looking at why people are picking certain things, why people aren’t picking certain things, what characteristics they’re looking for. So that’s useful information as well. And, I think being able to see the relationships that Paul Corbett has managed to create over the last 20 years of working with these growers is incredible. And these guys get to see that, and we are treated like family. We eat with them, we eat with their family, we sit down together, and we’re given everything really put on a plate for us. And it’s incredible.

Rebecca

The Faram team, we go from UK Harvest, which is a few weeks earlier, and then go right into the US Harvest. And the differences in climate, in how the hops are grown and how the hops are processed is really marketed. It’s a very different environment to what our original growing environment is for the company. So, whereas you’ve got wet environments generally most of the time.

Rich

Yeah, wet and cold.

Rebecca

Yes, wet, and cold over in the UK, the US is a desert environment, so generally really warm. It wasn’t as warm this year, but generally warm. And it requires irrigation. They don’t get enough rainfall. Whereas I would say in the UK we have the problem of too much rainfall.

Rich

Maybe a bit, yeah. But also it’s just the scale of it as mean, you know, from our perspective, if you’ve never been outside of the UK harvest you know, you wouldn’t have any kind of know. The hops just turn up at the front door and you use your Citra® and Mosaic®. But when you actually come and see it here and they’re talking about acreage that could cover the entire city of Birmingham and probably Warwickshire as well, is just ridiculous. The entire size of it. That gives you a completely different perspective, just how advanced everything is here and just how big the industry is overall.

Rebecca

The trip has many purposes, so hop selection is number one, but we do use it as an educational tool. So creating connections between the brewers, the hops, the farms is really important. The relationships within the groups that we bring, we try to foster. So, we brought over a group of brewers from the UK, and we travel together for the whole week. But outside of that, those brewers are also able to meet brewers from around the world. So, lots of Canadians, lots of US brewers and breweries are coming over for selection as well. And Yakima is always great in creating a community where brewers from different countries that have never met are able to have discussions and share information, which we’ve had a lot of our European brewers and UK brewers, that’s been an integral part of the trip. So not only getting those connections to the actual hops and the farms, but some have even made lasting connections where we hear about collabs that are happening. Cross national cross Atlantic collaborations, which is an important part at Charles Faram. We strive to just help brewers make better beer in whatever way we can. So, to be able to get a bunch of them together and facilitate discussion and generate excitement is the best part of my job.

Rich

Yeah, and looking into the future as well. When you get to meet people know like Kane who went to Washington State University to look at that facility there as well. You know, and also the growing program they’ve got out there with the ADHA that we’ve been seeing today and being able to rub and sniff some of those new varieties and see where things are going in terms of the cross collaboration between ourselves, Charles Faram and the American growers is essential as well, because it gives us an idea of where things are going in the future and it gives us something to talk about when we get home in terms of, look, yes, we’ve got these, but this is what coming down the line a little bit later on. And that’s been fascinating as well. Today, doing the batch selections, there’s some fantastic Centennial. The Chinook, all the batches of Chinook are really clean and bright and zesty.

Rebecca

I had some standout Amarillo®. Standout Amarillo®. We had multiple batches that could have topped brewers list in a different year, but every batch of our Amarillo® that was coming out this year was just phenomenal.