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Rocky Mountain District Meeting
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Our technical speaker for the night was Steve Rockhold (MillerCoors). Steve's presentation was titled "Barley is to Beer as Grapes are to Wine; Procuring High Quality Brewing Materials for High Quality Beers". One of Steve's opening comments: "If you focus solely on raw material cost, your overall cost will increase". If you buy the 'cheapest', you get cheap raw materials and subsequently a cheap finished product due to production issues. "You can't make good beer out of bad barley". You must work with your suppliers and focus on maintaining and improving the quality of your raw materials to ensure a high quality finished product. Your suppliers are essential to adding value to the raw materials and therefore your beer. Start it out right; get close to your suppliers (farmers). For example, MillerCoors has a barley program; they work with 800 growers in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. Through the Legacy Coors Barley Program, MillerCoors works with agronomists and farmers to develop their own barley varieties. The suppliers feel like they're part of MillerCoors brewing. "Work with the growers and they will work with you". Members of the Coors family still make visits to farmers to personally let them know how important they are to the process and to show them their appreciation of their efforts. The Coors Hops Program works in a similar fashion as the barley program. MillerCoors works with direct grower contracts and grower market associations to hand pick hops for their family of beers. They recognize top growers individually for their contributions to the corporation. In summary, Steve mentioned that, "Great ingredients, great facilities, great processes and great people make great beer!" Cheers, Steve, the MBAA-RMD agrees! Ein prosit! The business portion of the evening was conducted by Scholarship Chair Steve Presley (Anheuser-Busch InBev Ret). Steve again thanked Kevin Fahrenkrog and Todd Hansen (both of Anheuser-Busch InBev) for hosting the event at the tour center. He congratulated the district for being one of the largest, most active and vibrant districts in the United States. Our membership is approaching 200! Steve also mentioned that there are scholarships available and that members need to take advantage of the program. He then presented a scholarship for $100.00 to Michael Demers who attended the Rocky Mountain Microbrewing Symposium in Colorado Springs this past February. Sue Pawlak (Anheuser-Busch InBev Ret) was next up for the evening. She reminded the group that the local IBPA district is merging with MBAA RMD. The merger is a win-win situation for all our members. IBPA has a scholarship fund of approximately $15,000.00 that can only be used for packaging related scholarships. This is great news for all members looking to improve their knowledge and skills and help their companies thrive by learning more about the critical aspects of packaging technology and techniques. Sue then presented Bryan Kittle (New Belgium Brewing Company) with a $300.00 scholarship for attending the "MBAA Brewery Packaging Technology Course" in Madison WI. Jim Canary (Anheuser-Busch InBev Ret) gave a quick Treasurer's report. He mentioned that the district has approximately $10,000.00 between the checking and savings accounts. "Between IBPA and MBAA RMD, we have a substantial amount of funds to spend on our members and should keep our district active and interesting for some time to come". Final note of business: The next function sponsored by District Rocky Mountain is the Brewing Technical Summit on Friday, June 25, 2010 from 08:00-17:30. Hosted by New Belgium Brewing Company, the summit will be held at the Aztlan Northside Community Center at 112 E. Willow Street, Fort Collins, 80524. (Directions: www.fcgov.com/recreation/north-aztlan.php) The price for early registration, by June 1st, is $25 for members ($50 for non-members). Late registration fees jump to $40 for members and $65 for non-members. So, join if you are not a member, and register early to save money! Check out the website for details and for the rest of the calendar for 2010. James (Jim) Canary
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