Startup brewer to serve Columbus, Dayton

A brewing venture called Dérive Brewing Co. is poised to launch in the coming weeks in the Columbus and Dayton areas.

The venture will focus primarily on oak-aged beers, spontaneously fermented and oak-barrel-fermented beers, Saisons and session beers, according to Michael Coates, one of the three founders.

Production will ramp up in November, and some of the brewer’s first beers — a Brett-fermented IPA, Salty Saison, Traditional-Mix fermentation Saison, Session Pale Ale and Baltic Porter — are scheduled to make their debut in Dayton- and Columbus-area taprooms later this fall, Coates said.

Coates, a Kettering resident who has been brewing beer since 2008 and has worked at Dayton Beer Co. since its early days, is joined in the venture by Luke Sherrill, formerly of Dayton and now of Columbus, and Columbus resident Peter Steffes.

Sherrill is completing a master brewer program at the Siebel Institute of Technology in Chicago. Steffes works in research and development at an international food company and has a background in wild yeast and bacteria. Coates has a business degree in addition to his brewing background.

We’ve had an aspiration to do this all along,” Coates said. “Now’s a perfect time. We want to get going.”

The trio will use the space and equipment of various breweries to produce and package their beer, just as other “gypsy brewers” do.

Dérive’s first two public offerings are to debut at this year’s Festival of Barrel Aged Beers in Chicago in November, and at the Big Beers and Barely Wines Beer Fest event in Dayton on Nov. 11, the brewery’s founders said.