Beer Divergency Hits St. Louis

in You Show Me Yours, and I'll... by Jonathan Jones — April 5, 2011 at 1:33 pm | 0 comments

It was last August when word came that an exciting new brewery was opening St. Louis, and the local beer community went all atwitter. Florian Kuplent, Bavarian-trained, rockstar brewmaster teamed up with former AB marketing executive, David Wolfe to launch Urban Chestnut Brewing Company in the City’s burgeoning Midtown Alley neighborhood.

Fast forward to March of this year, Urban Chestnut is open and pouring its tasty ales and lagers. Florian is busy bringing “beer divergency” (more on that later) to St. Louis and David Wolfe is working hard to spread the word about St. Louis’ newest brewery.

David spent years jumping around the country during his time with Anheuser Busch, spending a great deal of time in the country’s strongest craft beer markets: Denver, San Diego, Portland and Seattle. He believes St. Louis has a great rep as a beer town, but our loyalties have often sided with the big guys down on Pestalozzi Street.

“St. Louis loves its institutions. For a long time AB had 80% market share here,” Wolfe explained.  He went on to say that this loyalty was beginning to change, hinting at the acquisition of Anheuser by the Belgian conglomerate, InBev in 2008.

Asked whether he sees the competition heating up in the local market among craft brewers opening, Wolfe stressed his company’s outlook on brewing and beer and community.

He explained that Urban Chestnut has not really crafted their marketing strategy to compete directly with other local craft brewers. “Marketing has developed from who we are,” and who Urban Chestnut is centers on their concept of “beer divergency.”

Wolfe took me through what “Beer Divergency” means. It is a dual commitment to both Florian’s roots as a Bavarian-trained, Old-World focused brewmaster and the revolutionary possibilities that being an American craft brewer in the 21^st Century affords.   Urban Chestnut has two series of beers that embody their brewing philosophy: their old-school Reverence Series of classic European styles, and their Revolution Series of thoroughly modern American craft styles.

As the new brewers in town, Wolfe and Kuplent knew they had an opportunity to become part of St. Louis’ growing beer appreciation community. Social media sites and blogs presented themselves as a great way to touch base with local beer aficionados and potential customers.

“Social media is perfect because beer is a social beverage,” Wolfe said.

He then explained they do not take this community for granted, that Urban Chestnut would have to earn and keep any business, especially the self-professed “beer geeks.”

As for the future, Wolfe says Urban Chestnut would like to do more philanthropic work, such as underwriting KDHX. On the brewing side, Urban Chestnut is moving into bottling and plans to begin distributing in the near future.

For more on this exciting new venture, visit the Urban Chestnut website.

For more on the local beer scene, below are a couple of recommended blogs to get you started.

STL Hops

Hip Hops – Evan Benn, Post-Dispatch

UPDATE: Urban Chestnut has struck a distribution deal with Grey Eagle out of Maryland Heights. Read more at Hip-Hops.

Tags: Craft Brewery David Wolfe Florian Kuplent marketing Urban Chestnut Urban Chestnut Brewing Company