Mayhew Junction looks to future with new regulations
A Starkville brewery is hoping that a change in Mississippi beer laws will offer a new connection to its customers and a new opportunity for business.
On Saturday, new laws went into effect allowing Mississippi craft breweries to sell 10 percent of their output on premises. Previously, breweries could only charge for tours and offer samples afterward.
To celebrate the change, Mayhew Junction Brewing Company in Starkville held its first annual Brouhaha Saturday, offering samples of a wide range of beers and selling crowlers, or 32-ounce cans, which hold the same amount as a traditional growler bottle. Mayhew Junction also brewed a special beer to mark the occasion, a strawberry Berliner Weisse, using strawberries grown in West Point.
“The law change really allows the breweries to connect with our customers,” said Jean Mohammadi-Aragh Irby, one of the brewery's owners. “We get to talk to the people who are drinking our beer, gauge their reaction. It helps us adjust our recipes, adjust what we're doing as a brewery. and we're
not hearing it third-hand. We're hearing it directly from our customers”
Irby also said it would be helpful to younger breweries like Mayhew Junction, which has not yet begun distributing cans or bottles.
Irby and the brewery's other three owners: her husband Derek Irby, Chris Edwards and his
wife Katy Edwards all said they hoped the onsite sales would also help improve the brewery's bottom line, but that it was too early to see.
“If we're draft-only and somebody comes from out of town, they can try our beer in restaurants, which is wonderful, but if they want to take it back and share it with anyone, they're not able to do that,” Jean Mohammadi-Aragh Irby said. “Now the laws changed, so they can get beer to go from here, fill a
crowler and take it with them.”
She added that Mississippi craft brewers had been working for the law change for several years, and that it had died in committee more than once.
Mayhew Junction opened its doors in January 2016 following a discussion among the four owners about taking their homebrewing to the next step. After more than a year of preparation, Mayhew Junction opened its doors.
The brewery now distributes to several restaurants and bars in the Golden Triangle and beyond.
Chris Edwards said the brewing community in Mississippi was very much a camaraderie.
“When we go to the different festivals and pour, it's a good time for everybody to get together and talk and chitchat, share beers, you know,” Chris Edwards said. “Honestly, we're friends with all of them.