Operations Manual

In 1989 I was hired into my second paid brewing position, as Head Brewer at a 7-barrel brewpub in Berkeley, California. I was thrilled to be taught commercial size brewing after the disaster experience I'd had at Golden Gate Brewing Company.

When I gave one-month notice in 1990 to leave and move to Eugene, Oregon to open the yet-unnamed Steelhead Brewery & Cafe, I was asked to find and interview my own replacement, then train that person once hired. I knew a month wasn't enough time to adequately train a new Head Brewer, so I began documenting the procedures I'd learned running this brewpub brewery.

Click here to download the 99-page brewery operations manual.

Of course I have to tell you an anecdote about this manual...

About ten years after writing this manual, a former brewer of this brewpub told me he'd heard a rumor I'd written that well-worn brewery operations manual, and asked me if that was true. I said yes, I was the author. Then he told me, "I learned everything I know about running a brewery from that manual."

I felt pretty proud that day.