Knowledge on tap at Alberta’s first craft-beer conference

Proof of Alberta’s booming craft-beer industry descended on Red Deer this week at the province’s first craft-beer convention.

More than 400 brewers and industry folk from across the province turned out to network, swap stories and talk everything beer.

About half the attendees to the Alberta Craft Brewing Convention have yet to formally start breweries. With a guffaw, one happily joked he’ll be a bootlegger until he opens his doors.

Despite Alberta’s world-class barley, and up to 20 farms that grow hops, the province’s craftbeer scene is, by North American standards, still comparatively small.

Yet it’s expanding at breakneck speed, going to 54 breweries today from 18 breweries three years ago, with no signs of slowing down.

What used to be a blip of an industry has made it onto the radars of equipment manufacturers, keen to tap into the blossoming market.

Alberta Small Brewers Association executive director Terry Rock said the convention was a means to connect brewers with the supply chain and get them thinking about business, brewing excellence and collaboration — particularly those new to the industry.

“We want to create mentorship opportunities and orient people to those they’re going to work with as they build their businesses, because we want them to be successful,” Rock said Wednesday.

It was also a chance to learn about other products.

Convention fees were designed so brewers could partially cover the cost of registration by donating their wares, which made Tuesday night’s kickoff event something of a drinking-age show-and-tell, with beers from all over the province.

“That’s what this industry does — they get together, they like to have a good time,” Rock said. “They’re in it because they’re passionate.”

The conference wasn’t heavily advertised, but eventually word got out, doubling attendance from Rock’s hopeful estimate of 200. Hotels are already calling him to ask if they can host the event in 2018.

Craft beer was a niche scenario before, Rock said, but now “the wave is starting” and consumers are jumping onboard.

Finance Minister Joe Ceci has declared more than once in the legislature that “beer is good,” and was more than happy to sip a Golden Gaetz ale from Troubled Monk Brewery before repeating his catchphrase in a lunchtime address to the convention.

Craft breweries create jobs, benefit local farmers and bring with them the economic diversification Alberta needs, he said.