Beer Is a Conversation: Steve Drissell

Hi, James Atkinson here and thanks for listening to our conversation with Steve Drissel of Sydney Staves Brewery. Hidden away in a back alley in Glebe, Staves is one of Sydney's more unique brewery venues, featuring English style pub atmosphere and a live performance space that is well known on the city's music and comedy circuit.

Staves has continually impressed me with its idiosyncratic lineup of beers, which are made on a tiny and somewhat makeshift brewery showing stylistic influences from all over Europe and America. Matt Kierkegaard and I visited the brewery late last year to catch up with Steve. who left his career in the corporate world to follow his dream of opening staves. I hope you enjoy the chat.

Well here we are in the shadow of Broadway Shopping Centre in Glebe. Um Steve Drissel, thanks for having us at Staves Brewery. Thanks for coming to see us. Mate, for people who don't know about staves and I reckon there's actually quite a lot of them out there, um, how long have you been around for? We opened our doors um just over two years ago, um initially as a as a craft beer bar but with uh always the intention of getting our own brewery off the ground.

Um and that took us about a year or so. So we've been brewing our own beer since I think it was uh August last year. Um and so since then we've pretty much Um, just served our own beer. So, um yeah, with a lot of brews came out very quickly. Um and I think I think we've brewed something like twenty, twenty four different beers since since we got going.

Yeah, it feels like things have moved pretty quickly for staves in the last twelve months, but as we know, um it took a very long time for you to get this place off the ground um after you actually found the site? Yeah, the the way that it happened was there's a lot of difficulties with the building. It was never been used as a as a public space before. It was actually an old uh engineering sort of uh steel fabrication workshop so and it had been empty for I think about five years.

So to drag it through all the the regulations, um, both local council, building code of Australia, uh and excise and and and all the other uh things you have to do. Yeah, it just took a took a little longer than I thought. But yeah, so it's uh we we were we actually leased the building um probably two years before we actually opened the doors but um luckily we've negotiated a very low initial rent so it gave us time to to get those things happening.

And what about yourself though Steve? Have you left another career behind to um to run stave's? I have, yeah, I was um I'm a I'm actually a business analyst by trade. Uh most of my time working in the banking sector. Um you know, obviously I d I this is what I wanted to be doing so Um the first year that we opened as a bar I was still doing a day job. Um whilst things were getting off the ground and getting the brewery together.

Um but this year I've I've probably only done about two weeks in an office so um yeah hopefully won't be doing any more next year. How has it um changed the the complexion of the place to be able to actually make your own beers on site? Um, well it's it's what we always intended to do, so for me it's um yeah, it's it's massively rewarding and you know, to have our own beer and and get the feedback that we've had about the beer. اشتركوا في القناة

I didn't actually think we would have so many beers out so quickly. Uh Liam Jackson, you know, he he's uh a brewer who who didn't need to do trial batches and uh and you know, was nailing them right from the start. So We have beers coming out every two or three weeks which was um you know, great. So it

For me it's really um yeah, the dream dream come true to get our own beers and and you know, and drinking your own beer in your own brewery is um quite a quite a thing. Steve, it's fair to say that um it's not a I guess a traditional geographic

sort of location for a a brewery like this. Um how do people find you? Um Yeah, mostly probably through word of mouth. We we do a bit of uh uh promotion on um social media probably probably not enough. But um what people do find is is we are very accessible. So we're we're only like one kilometer from Central Station in Sydney, so

Um, it's very easy for people to get to us, especially people, you know, moving from after work from the city towards Newtown and places like that. So, um we are h hidden down a a back alley but, you know, a lot of transport options re really uh

you know, help people find their way home as well. Now was it Liam who sort of brewed all of the beers that we can still see on tap now or has Zach come in and changed things up, the new brewer? The intention is to keep uh the core range going so we've got uh five Beers on our core range. Um so those will continue. At the moment we we have three rotating specials.

Uh, two of those are beers that um Liam brewed, um and one of those is when I say brewed like uh Zach brews some of these beers, um, but to Liam's recipe. Um the Galaxy Paleo that we brought out last week. It was a beer that um uh Zac Zach put put together. Yeah. Uh Steve, uh what was the inspiration for the brewery and one of the things that I'd picked up on is It's very reminiscent of a French brasserie style, uh where you walk in

The brewery is stuck in the corner. You've even got an Ardennes table beer. feels very much like a rustic little brewery. Uh and w w w was that what you were going for or did you just uh go with what you went with and that's the way you've ended up? Pretty much. I mean I I I was collecting bits and pieces whilst before the uh the brewery was

open, uh, in terms of uh furniture and uh you may have seen the the the old English style taps that we have on the bar. So a lot of that stuff I was just collecting uh a few years ago and uh yeah it's been it's been put together with no sort of

uh artistic direction, shall we say. Um but yeah, it's just kind of the way it's all ended up really. And, you know, and Starwise and the biz, um really it's it's just we bring whatever we think's interesting at the time, you know, we we we kind of have a short list of things we want to do.

and then um depending you know on what what yeast we've got in the house or what hops we you know we pick things off the list and so it'd be a good time to do this particular beer. We've seen over the last few years is the the craft beer um movement has sort of grown and we've seen more players that there has been like a a a certain level of schmickness or you know like a professionalism isn't a word, but that sort of shinier, bigger, cleaner um operation.

Th this is very much a you know, uh a a a brew pub um where you know that the the the beer is very handcrafted, it's very small. I is that a conscious decision uh to go for? Like it it it it it it's quite rustic, um and you know Did you feel that you need to grow or are you just happy d doing what you're doing in the in in the little way you're doing it? I think uh one of the reasons why the brewery is is set up as it is and you know, like some some of the equipment is um

second hand and even it looks like someone made it in their shed to be quite frank. Um but you know that was done out of more of necessity than anything else. So when when I wanted to start a brewery, um obviously you g you can go down the the route of taking on investors and and you know and putting big budgets together.

And and it was just something that I personally didn't want to do if I if I had the option. So it it it comes down to budget constraints and, you know, not being able to afford, you know, big brand new shiny stainless steel uh brew house. So it was um I kinda made a decision to buy a a used brew house at a low cost and then um brand new fermenters um uh for the cold side. So it's it's a bit of a mix of Bits and pieces to be quite frank, yeah.

Steve you touched before on, you know, the issues you had sort of in terms of um particularly I guess development application and and council and that sort of thing. First of all, was Staves Brewery the first um brew pub, um like w were you the first in the in this sort of council area? So was it new to them in in terms of oh you know what what boxes do we need to tick?

Yeah, I think they they w yes, to to be to be frank, I think we're we're actually part of um the City of Sydney Council here, although we're in the inner west, we're we're right on the corner of of the inner west. Um so there were other breweries in

within the City of Sydney Council so you've got places like Red Tape down at um uh King Street Wharf and they used to Which is now All Hands Brewing Company I believe is the new name. Uh and you know and there's also a couple of others as well. Um but those breweries um have been around for probably you know, uh maybe even decades, you know, in some cases. So

So yeah, it it was tricky getting it through cancer'cause they they they have a brewery application arrived on their desk and they don't really know what to do with it. Lots of people listening to this podcast would sort of be in your position now. uh where you were say three or four years ago. What sort of advice would you give them in terms of um I guess dealing with council? Yeah, I I think for for most councils um the biggest issue that they have to deal with are

um, you know, re resentment or or rejection from local neighbours um wanting a brewery or or whatever it is on their doorstep. So I I think picking a the right location is key. Because it just makes their job easier and if it makes their job easier it makes it

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you know, th the the argument is less valid for for not having it. So I I think that's why we're seeing um so many breweries open up in places like Marrickville, um where there's still a fair amount of industrial buildings or even areas. Um and obviously there's several breweries there now and and so the council have a better idea of what what to do when an application arrives. So it must be a nice feeling to know that you've made it easier for the next uh the next brew pub that comes along.

Yeah, yeah, possibly. I mean like the it's but again like if they if they try to uh open um uh a a brewery, you know, a hundred metres up the road they might have a very different story because they may have a neighbour who who doesn't want it there. So yeah, I I think location is just super important.

Is it either anecdotally or or do you know, is the issue um that I guess neighbours uh the objection that neighbours have, is it because of things like, you know, uh waste or noise or amenity, or is it the fact that you're gonna be bringing people here at all hours and and and getting them drunk? Yeah, I I think I think all of the above really. I I think um there there's there are some people who uh who who worry about the smells that are um

a brewery produces, I I like to think of it as an aroma, but you know. Um but you know but but it it could be the same with a a coffee roasters, you know, people might not want it next door to them, you know, it it's

th there's always gonna be someone in that street who who doesn't want it there. So if uh if you know, if you're gonna go down that route then you know you you you you're gonna potentially have a lot of persuading neighbours that it's okay to do and and I'm sure it does happen, but I think it does make it that much more difficult as well.

And do some of those neighbours now I get pop in for a beer and say, you know, look all is forgiven, hope I wasn't out of line with that uh, you know, objection? What happens when you have to put an application is you have to go around all the local businesses and and tell them what you're doing. Um and or anyone within a certain radius and and because we don't have any um

uh residential neighbours then you know that that didn't happen. But certainly some of the businesses around here um pop in uh on a regular basis and uh and we we we're starting to get more and more people from Gleed itself and and other lo um uh suburbs on on the boundary all sort of discovering where we are and that there's a

brew down this hidden lane. So has it been, you know, when you first opened was it more of a beer geek type crowd that knew where to find you and and that that has changed quite significantly? Um yeah, I think this the big crowd, you know, obviously they got their finger on the pulse and know exactly what's going on and you know and they they're some always some of the first to arrive. Um but as time goes on it's um the the the people that come here

Um, you know, it gets just more and more varied, you know, like we'cause we have live entertainment here that brings a whole another crowd in as well. So Um so yeah hopefully we're introducing people to craft beer that wouldn't normally drink it because there's plenty of people here who are here for live music, not not necessarily the craft beer and they're they're quite surprised what they what they discover.

Are you finding that they sort of pop in and they go, Uh, oh, what have you got that's most like, you know, Corona or Carlton draft or or that sort of thing? Or are they sort of saying, Uh w what should I have? Yeah, all sorts. There's plenty of people come in and say, Look, you know, I I I've no idea.

Um I mean we normally start with what you normally drink and then work from there. Um but we always have um two or three beers on that are very approachable um to to anyone really. Um so we try and keep a a menu that has does have something for everyone and and we've always really done that even before we had our own beers on and I believe that's the right thing to do. You you say quite proudly uh on the signage inside proper be it What what's proper beer?

Well for me we we we've actually the sign actually says proper beer, not dog piss. So um Wh where I where I come from in England we I I grew up a l um surrounded by um some very good beer. Um in in a place where there's a lot of real ailes and you know, and just a lot of good variety and and like a lot of actually imported German lagers, you know, uh ones that you wouldn't know.

Yeah, so i it's everything that's not industrial to me. It's it's it's it's beer where people care about what they're doing. That's that's pretty much it. You have had some car scale events here. Um how have they gone? I unfortunately haven't been able to get to one.

We've done a couple, we did a car scale event for Sydney Beer Week and that was um a really good turnout. I was I was a little bit worried at the time'cause when I looked at the uh ticket sales I I I couldn't see that many but then I didn't realise that a lot of those emails had multiple tickets on each email and and so we're uh uh yeah bombarded. But it was great, yeah. We had um beer from three other breweries as well so it was really good to um get those guys involved and hopefully it's uh

It's it's a category that that that grows with time, you know, when it when it's done well it's it's it's such a nice product. Um and you know, I think we're all you know, in the very early stages of car scales in in Australia, um in in the States it's certainly taken off in a in a big way, so hopefully we'll see something similar here.

Do you have car scales on on a regular basis or is it just only for special events like that? We we've in i historically we've just done it for special events, but what I'm looking at doing is maybe putting uh just a monthly car scale Uh

you know, night on and see how it goes, if there's demand for it. Um we we keep doing it and we'll do more of it. But uh car scale is a product that uh once you open the cast you're only really good for a day or two after that so um if it doesn't sell you're tipping a lot of beer away um and you know it's reasonably expensive to produce. Uh with the higher excise rates and and so on.

Sydney Beer Week's like the worst possible time to put an event on like that for me just'cause I've got so many other things to to get to, so I always end up it'll be on a Sunday, I'll be like, No, I better stay in tonight so yeah. Steve obviously uh now we met uh for those who don't know, I'm I'm thinking it was either five or six years ago as uh as humble stewards, uh back a house at the uh Australian International Beer Awards and um was when I first heard about staves and your and your plans.

So fast forward a couple of years and and obviously you've you've been open now and and by the sounds of it, things are onwards and upwards and and and growing. Fast forward again two years time and you've really developed a following and it's really popular, do you are you able to increase your capacity here? And if not

Would you look at, you know, either say outsourcing, contracting, building a production brewery, is it important that every drop of Stave's beer comes out of this particular brewery to you? Or like so what are what are the plans in in a couple of years' time? Uh well this year you know we we've we've produced our beer primarily for this venue. Um so we we have sold wholesale as well but generally when um pubs and bars have come to us asking for beer and then what we found is

We entered four beers into the Royal Sydney beer and cider show to be to be judged and we picked up four medals off the bat. So and since then we've had a lot more inquiries and so we're looking next year to increase in uh capacity here. Um obviously it's still very, very small. You know, we're we're such a I think we're the third smallest brewery in Sydney so and we would probably be the only one that's actually distributing beer wholesale. But Um

I'd like to increase, yeah. You know, if the demand's there we're we're trying to meet it. That's that's pretty much the way I look at things, you know, I'll it there's no real grand plan of, you know, opening a big production brewery and but if i if if the demand's there and and we keep producing good beer then then we would do that too and find a way of doing it, you know. again we you know we're not we're not a um uh are well funded. uh organization. So

we'd have to work out how we can do that and manage the risk at the same time. Obviously a a growing business is a very risky business and it's a risky game to even start with so um it's but it is something that we've Yeah, appeals for me. So organic growth is sort of the plan, just to keep things going sustainably rather than have to go out and I guess, you know, seek funds.

I I think so, yeah. I mean I haven't really thought through it too much but it this but i y we we're definitely looking at increasing capacity and and just see where it goes. There's a lot of competition coming into the market. Um, you know, but if again if there if there's demand demand for our beer we we we'll meet that demand. And and if not we you know we're having a good time doing what we're doing.

You mentioned the um uh beers that picked up metals at Sydney. What were they? We entered four of our core beers, the uh German Pilsner, uh Pale L IPA and Oatmeal Stout. and um wanted to get some feedback on the beers. You know, we we were certainly enjoying them but, you know, it's it's good to get a um an unbiased view I guess. Um and you know, if you can pick up some awards and a bit of publicity then that that's great too.

Um but yeah we uh we got um a bronze, two silvers and a gold. So yeah we were to we were stoked, yeah. What's the gold medal winning beer? Oatmeal stout. Yeah, it's um yeah, it's a fantastic beer. Yeah, totally enjoy it. It's it's yeah, nice chocolate carrot but a lot of um dry roasted sort of character to it as well. So it's just a very nicely balanced beer which I'll pour you on in a moment.

What's the attraction of y you obviously love beer, but what's the attraction in owning a brewery? Um I I I guess you could easily have uh run this venue as a music venue and with the increasing number of craft breweries stocked it with some very good beer. What was the attraction to you in having a brewery and not just a bar? Um well it for me it was always about opening a brewery.

And you know, it obviously makes a lot of sense to have a a bar attached to a to any brewery that you open nowadays. Um but really it was it was um about producing quality beer, you know, I'd I I did my first homebrew when I was very, very young. I I was like sixteen years old, you know, so it's something that I've I've done for a long time. And um Yeah, you it's it's one of those things where you start thinking about it and after um

doing a uh I guess a s a small amount of formal education my it made my mind up for me and it was something I had to do and it was uh a little voice in the back of my head it wouldn't go away. So you have to do something and I thought w perhaps with my business analyst's uh a background it that might help in some way, which i it probably does. So um I thought take a risk and um see see what happens.

Has the business panned out the way that you thought it would? Like have you kind of hit whatever um forecast that you'd made? Yes and no. I I thought we would um be probably have produced less numbers of beers than than we have. Um sales wise Probably roughly about what we were predicting. w live music was always part of the original plan to have in this venue but not to the scale that we've gone to. So um I I kind of imagined uh

uh a guy on an acoustic guitar in the corner and now we've gone full band so it's yeah, it's that wasn't really part of the plan but that's you know, just how it's turned out. So I I I quite like that whole thing of like opportunities come up and and then you make a

decision whether go with it or not. When you um were first planning on opening you were talking about putting a kitchen in upstairs, so is that um that's just evolved into into live entertainment instead? Pretty much. I mean it is The reality is we've got to make a choice between one or the other. with that space that we have. have and music's a lot of fun. I I used to I used to play on a band myself and play the drums so it really appealed to me to get

to to do that as well and like we've we've kind of managed through pizza deliveries and and food trucks and things like that. Um Which which is in some ways good'cause it just allows us a focus on the beer and and entertainment. So um at the moment there's no plans to put a kitchen in. There's a saying if you do something that you love you'll never work a day in your life.

You obviously love what you're doing, but are you working? Is it hard work? It's I mean of course it's tiring because you know y y you do work a lot of hours, um you have to make a lot of decisions, you got a lot of responsibility, but at the same time it's very different to work in um for someone else or working in the corporate world. Well f at least for me i it does feel like I'm, you know, meeting a purpose. It's it's I it feels right for me.

Um and that's something I know I would never have got in in a corporate world. So yes it's hard but it's it's it's it's a good it's a good way of working I think.

As a business analyst, would you recommend somebody else open a a a brewery of this size? Um that's a good question. Um I I would say to anyone, if if that's what you want to do with your life is open a brewery, you should do it. Whatever it is, you should do it. Um, but be prepared for a lot of hard work and do it for the right reasons. Um And and un and I think, you know, it's it's rewarding in many, many ways and and if you if you commit to it, um uh

and and it truly is what you should be doing then then it will work. So yes is is the answer to that, but not not if it's um, you know, trying to jump on the back of a bandwagon or something like that, you know it

it's it's the wrong reason. I I do get quite a lot of people coming in here saying that they want to open a brewery. I went into it in a very naive way as well, but I I I I really hear a lot of people, you know, saying oh we're gonna open a brewery in our shed and whatever and it's like um So that so I think people just really need to Slow down for a moment and think about what they're doing. Perhaps brew some good beer first and then go from there.

Steve, as a business analyst, um you obviously, you know, got your finger on the pulse of of this particular business. If anyone out there from AB InBev or Lion or uh Bickfords or perhaps Amatil are listening, what's the price tag?

For how many zeros? Uh It's I guess it's a bit of a hot topic at the moment, isn't it, with a lot of uh breweries being taken over and like in the my my l my view on it is it's very easy for people to look at business being taken over, um and saying they've sold out or or whatever it might be, but you know it's

You know, that's often said by people who don't run their own breweries or their own business and and it's a very different world I think for a lot of people when when you do. So I don't think it um, you know, necessarily a bad thing, you know. It's really at the end of the day, it's about quality beer, right? So I I think that's n the number one.

Um for me I I mean I I certainly am not looking for investors or or selling. But in all seriousness, is there a a long term plan sort of like have you ev have you considered you know, we put a lot of effort into into the planning stages of things?

and quite often we don't think about, you know, the the buzzword I guess at the minute is exit strategy. But if you thought ahead to sort of, you know, my kids might uh I'd love to see them take over the business, I'd love to see my employees take it over, you know, I I don't want to still be brewing when I'm seventy. Well, you know, when I when I went into this I I was kind of looking at you know, I was probably

halfway through my working life, um, and and do you want to spend the next half of your working life doing what you do? And and the answer for me was no. Um and and obviously this was i something that I I you know, I became mae'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid i'n rhaid.

Um so i for me it's like it's kind of like running a marathon, which I did many years ago. But um and each year is is a is running a mile and I and I feel like I've done the first two years and the first two miles so I've I've got

another twenty whatever that is, twenty four miles left to run and then by then I'm sure I'll be knackered and wanna lie down somewhere. So Uh do you do you guess uh would you like to see staves, you know, um uttered in the same sort of you know, reverent tones as as as say a you know, a Cooper's or a Stone and Wood, you know, in in years to come? Yeah, I mean I I'd I'd like it to

to remain a family brewery. Um I I just recently became a dad, you know, started a bit late in life, but um who knows, you know, he he might want to be involved in it one day, he might not, I don't know. But yeah, I'd I'd certainly like to see it. Um outlast myself. But you know, I I I've got a lot of respect for Coopers and um and and family breweries in general, so um I certainly would love to be, you know, in in the same conversations when people talk about family breweries.

Well mate we might um let you get back about your day and we'll have to try some of these uh these other beers. Yeah, thanks for coming around guys, we really appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks very much for having us. Cheers. That was Steve Drisel. If you enjoy Radio Bruce News and Beer as a conversation, please rate us and leave a review on your favourite podcasting app, like iTunes. We look forward to joining you next time for another conversation about beer.