Hugh Sisson, Founder of Heavy Seas has had yet another successful year. In 2011, the brewery added 10,000 square feet to the brewery, and expanded into a new brewhouse. 2011 saw the addition of 4 new fermenters and 31,000 barrels of beer produced in their home of Baltimore, Maryland. (That’s 961,000 gallons or beer! Or, 123,008,000 pints, or 10,250,666 bottles.) New releases included Black Cannon (Black IPA), Dubbel Cannon (Belgian IPA), Plank I, Arrsh Red, & Hop Harvest.
Heavy Seas announced the addition of the Heavy Seas Alehouse, opening in 2012. Going forward, the brewery will redefining the focus the brewery in 2012. (The setback of growing pains.) Hugh writes:
…2011 was also a very hard year. The growth we experienced was certainly accompanied by growing pains. We need to catch our breath a bit and make sure that we’re running the race for distance, not for speed. We’re preparing to improve not only the infrastructure of our physical plant (the bottling line, the brewhouse, etc.), but also our personnel and IT infrastructure. We’re redefining the mission of the company to make sure we stick to doing the things that make us special.
That said, in 2012, we’ll continue to focus on our cask conditioned real ale program. Our cellarman, Stephen Marsh, has collaborated with restauranteurs and bar managers up and down the East Coast on firkins, and we are going to pursue this project with even more energy.
Hugh hinted during Atlanta Beer Week this year that there will be some changes to their offerings in 2012. The first changes will be announced in January. Just a side note. I got to spend a few evenings have beers with Hugh Sisson. He’s quite entertaining, extremely nice, and very involved in what he does. If you get a change to have beer with him in 2012, be sure to do so. (Thank goes for southeastern rep Kevin Fox too, lol. Happy New Year bro!) [HeavySeas]
