September 7, 2020 • 20 mins
Christophe Gagne, brewmaster at Hermit Thrush Brewery of Brattleboro, VT shares his wisdom of wild yeast and sustainable living. www.hermitthrushbrewery.com
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Intro Voice (00:05):
Welcome to a place where we're thinking together
and thinking deeper about who weare.
Female intro Voice (00:12):
Welcome to the Billosophy podcast.
William Forchion (00:19):
We'll start again. Welcome to the Billosophy
podcast. Today my guest is
Christophe Gagne (00:27):
I am Christophe Gagne of Hermit
Thrush brewery. We are a sourbrewery, we only make sour beer,
which is tart and thereforeweird for most people. And it's,
it's it's gaining acceptance alittle bit more lately, which is
fun. But I've loved tart beerfor decades, at this point,
William Forchion (00:51):
wow. So this is the point where we're just
starting this interview. And Ican go in multiple directions. I
can even talk all about beer, orI can talk about you. And I had
asked you earlier about thewhole the term of brew master.
Because I remember from mychildhood, and hearing, or
(01:14):
watching a television commercialand one of the large brew
breweries was talking abouttheir Brewmaster. And I've
always just had this image ofthe Brewmaster with a large
stick and I guess that stick wasfor staring something or
whatever. I don't know.
Christophe Gagne (01:27):
Yeah. And I do have a beard. So and that's
associated frequently,
William Forchion (01:31):
you do have a very
good causal factor, but it'scommon. A prominent beard.
Christophe Gagne (01:37):
Yeah. At least Brewmaster for hermit thrushes
is sort of just the the creativedirector more than anything, you
know, we've got a team of fivebrewers now we're very excited.
And I'm, I'm just sort of the asthe Brewmaster. I am the guy who
has done sour beer, innovationin production the longest. And
(01:58):
so I started get the final sayon recipes, but plenty of
innovation comes from ourawesome folks. But I was I was
studying wild yeast in when Iwas living in West Philly about
12 years ago at this point. So
William Forchion (02:14):
Wow, there's a bunch of things there. There's
wild yeast. There's West Philly,have growing up having grown up
in South Jersey, there's aconnection there. We could talk
about a bunch of differentthings. You're a Brewmaster,
you've got you know, themicrobreweries popped up in the
90s and spread. Once again,going back to that whole brew
master thing I'm thinking ofsomebody may be late 60s, early
(02:35):
70s you're not that guy. You'repretty young.
Christophe Gagne (02:40):
Yeah, I think I think young people have taken
a good chunk of the craft beermovement into themselves.
There's a lot ofI think there's a lot of
creativity and there's a lot ofdiscontent in common office jobs
that and and I know of manystories where people received
(03:01):
educations and all of a suddenweren't happy in their fields
and then needed to change it upa bit. It's It's fun. I mean,
you know, it's I've I've reallyenjoyed it. The markets getting
very interesting lately, butyeah.
William Forchion (03:21):
So how did you come to do a craft beer? Did you
go to school for breweries?
Christophe Gagne (03:28):
I was I started out as a social worker.
And I was home brewing all alongthe way. And while I was in
school, I was I was working inbreweries part time, sort of,
you know, pay the bills andenjoy my hobby fuller and so I
buy a couple days a week by dayI brew regular beers and then in
my basement in West Philly Iexperimented with coal ships and
(03:53):
kettle sours and wild wild beerproduction.
William Forchion (03:57):
Just wild beer production.
Christophe Gagne (04:00):
hobby gone.
Wild knows. Yeah, it's it's uh,it's fun Beer Beer wants to be
made, you know, it's a, whetherit's East that's fermenting and
or bacteria that's fermenting itor both are at different times.
Beer is a, an easy to make safe,selective media that that you
(04:21):
can ferment any number of waysthat you know, it's, it's
fascinating in terms of the wildside because I think terroir can
come into beer in a way thathasn't before.
William Forchion (04:35):
No, you have mentioned wild yeast a couple
times. And there's something inmy head that said one of the
reasons why you're in this areain Brattleboro, Vermont is the
yeast can Is that true? I mean,what what, what is the story
behind that?
Christophe Gagne (04:55):
Yeah, yeah, we I mean, we looked
around for good yeast in NewEngland, and ultimate They
settled on Vermont andessentially looking for good
yeast is is very similar tomaking a sourdough culture you
make you make a beer and youleave the sterile beer out in
the beautiful winds of themountains and generally it
starts fermenting, you know,you're collecting spores of
(05:19):
yeast from the air, sometimesyou're trying to culture some
lactobacillus or P caucus.
Potassium icees is definitelyone of the one of the lovely
wild yeasts sort of a funky kindof straw character. And, and
ultimately, Brandon burrowsprofiles, sort of like, like,
stone fruit and a bit of citrusand, you know, the hay side of
(05:44):
hay side of funk rather than thehorse blanket side, which is a
term that is used,
William Forchion (05:49):
and it's kind of funny, you lost me there,
hey. Okay.
Christophe Gagne (05:54):
Yeah, it's, it's a, it's a,
it's a smoother and, and, andhas plenty of subtleties and
kind of fruity character.
Biology here, and it's, it'squite consistent. It's
William Forchion (06:08):
so with the yeast, you don't collect yeast,
you leave stuff out and nice,just shows up.
Christophe Gagne (06:15):
Yeah, I mean, it's kind of it's that is
basically how it works. Youknow, we, in our production and
the brewery, we definitelypropagate yeast, that's, that's
from the wild. So we'll brew abatch and leave it on our cool
ships, which is what what thesepans are called the wide shallow
pans that you put hot, sterilebeer in, and then it collects
(06:36):
the yeast. And, but you know, soyou'll have leftover biology
from that. And you can propagatethat up and brew other regular
beers with it as well. And sowe're pretty happy to have never
bought yeast, it's, it's, it'sall we've ever done here is
every single can that we've everproduced is wild fermented.
William Forchion (06:58):
Does that. So with that, is there's a bit of
uncertainty there. So you'regonna get a different flavor
throughout. I mean, one of thethings that we have we as
Americans, I want to say Ithink, around the world, folks
have, you know, we buy we go tofranchises, because we know what
we're going to get we know it'sgoing to be the same if you're
(07:18):
doing that wild, wild collectingand wild east, and do you get
variants and variations that are
Christophe Gagne (07:26):
for sure, for sure. I mean, all of life has
risk. And the ebb and flow ofcharacteristics are, are lovely.
I mean, I think our year to yearis, is somewhat varied, but also
wonderfully, so our vintagesare, are really weather related,
(07:49):
they're related to when we brewand how we brew and it's, it's
really satisfying to makerelatively simple beer, and to
see it blossom into somethingthat's way more complex that I
could then I could write arecipe for it's one thing to add
these hops that are kind ofreally interesting and blended
(08:09):
together and this kind ofgrains, stuff like that. But the
the, there's a vast array ofchemical compounds that yeast
and bacteria can produce byfermentation, I mean, you know,
1000s and I, I can't approximatethe complexity we get with with
the wild yeast, so it'sdefinitely a different I mean,
(08:32):
it's a whole different brewerythat most breweries that are our
art goal is to always be a greatsour and to make the best beer
possible rather than the samebeer we made last time.
William Forchion (08:45):
Wow. I didn't see that one coming. Just and
there's a passion to what youdo. What is the what is the
passion behind it? Is it toshare the beard with beers with
the world or is it I think
Christophe Gagne (09:01):
it's I think it's sort of an intersection of
like the local food movement andappreciating you know, what we
have around us rather than justtrying to get the imported
whatever and and kind ofcombining that with with I have
a passion for trying to fixclimate change a bit and I
(09:21):
haven't done that much yet. Butat least wood fired local wood
fired instead of fossil fuels.
But the the fact that beer wantsto be made and that sour beer
takes less energy are are prettykey. Kind of ethical concerns on
my side. But also I like reallyget into the food and flavors,
(09:44):
you know, complexity ofexperience stuff in it. I just
feel very lucky that the two candovetail
William Forchion (09:53):
No, I'm going to ask a question. That's good.
This lady goes off topic here.
There are you have a veryprominent beard I mentioned
before, and I've seen a fewprominent beards in here. Is
that a requirement for thebeard?
Christophe Gagne (10:11):
No, if you can't grow a beard, that's okay.
You just have to not shave. No,just kidding. It now that I'm
really curious about why beardsare so common in our industry? I
don't really. I don't really, Idon't really know socially why
that is. But, you know, I thinkthere's a fair amount of brewers
who are free thinkers, and Idon't
William Forchion (10:30):
know, maybe that's got something. You could
spend more time thinking thanshaving. Okay. Yeah,
Christophe Gagne (10:34):
yeah, kind of just like a little eye roll at
the at the falsehoods thatsociety imposes on you. And
then, you know, you only have tosign up for what you want to
sign up for?
William Forchion (10:45):
No, going back to the brewery and being here,
did you? Did you run into anyresistance? That's your coffee
cups? Did you run into anyresistance with opening a
brewery and and I guess there'sa couple of questions. Did you
run into any resistance? How didyou connect with the partners
(11:06):
that you have in hermit thrush?
Those are?
Christophe Gagne (11:10):
Yeah, yeah. We I don't think we have a lot of
resistance. To starting abrewery, we had a lot of
confusion, because in 2014,starting in August, our brewery
was a little more out there thanit is right now. So, you know,
we'll have a good told you sobut the we every and I hooked up
(11:36):
actually in college, we had aradio show together, called
intelligent music, tasty fish.
And it was a phenomenal musicand cooking show. And just in
general, we've we've been goodfriends since and he was very
involved helping me to homebrewand you know, stuff like that.
So we just we have a greatworking relationship and kind of
(11:58):
go way back.
William Forchion (12:01):
And where did you go to college?
Christophe Gagne (12:03):
Swarthmore just outside Philly.
William Forchion (12:06):
If you could go back to your younger self,
say that guy who graduated highschool was about to take off and
go to college. Do you have anywords of wisdom for that guy to
get you to hear or anycautionary tales?
Christophe Gagne (12:25):
In general, don't worry too much about being
a weirdo. I mean, I don't thinkI was really worried about at
that time anyway, but, you know,don't undervalue unique with
thorough follow through. Yeah,it's all it's all possible. You
just have to make it happen.
William Forchion (12:48):
Okay. Wow, that's, that's right there.
That's a tag right there. And Iwas gonna say, do you have any
words of wisdom to offer toanyone who was in that
situation? And I think you justdid it right there. Oh, I was
gonna, you mentioned the wholethe climate emergency that's out
there. And I have one of mythree children, my 13 year old
(13:11):
is just stricken with anxietyover the planet that he's going
to inherit. And, and you're, youknow, a generation or two ahead
of him? What are you? What areyou doing to offset or stop or
stem the climate emergency? Andor what do you see as a possible
(13:34):
possibility for what we can doas a, as a community or as a
nation?
Christophe Gagne (13:40):
On the personal level, I'm glad to be
burning biomass fuels,predominantly in my life, you
know, we've got a wood stove,and you know, it's definitely
cozy and it's nice, but it'salso, you know, we only go
through like 200 gallons of oilin the winter. And so I think
there's some amount ofremembering good, simple things
(14:05):
of the past, you know, that thethe closed carbon loop of the
stuff that's above ground isbetter than the stuff that's
below the ground. But you know,that that I feel like is just
sort of a marginal improvement.
And what we really need is, ismassive shift. You know, I
think, I also think that craftbeer has the potential to, to
(14:26):
reduce just general distributedmarkets, you know, that the
excitement of craft beer andlocal food ism, and all that
stuff is, is I think, gonnaprove very important to reinvest
in reinventing our food systemto have to have less transit,
but and then, you know, I guesson the on the business side, I
(14:47):
try to have a decent scaledpresence in the world. We only
use cans because they'redramatically less energy for the
environment, both on recyclingand shipping. No, we don't have
a massive walk in cooler at ourpackaging facility because we
make beer that's really designedto have phenomenal shelf life.
(15:08):
You know, a lot of our barrelaged sours get better with time
rather than, you know, worse.
And so I hope people like ourbeer, but I also hope people
like our ethics and you know,business has to take the first
step legislators are alwaysgoing to be too slow.
William Forchion (15:28):
Do you ever do you have a your business has
grown greatly since you started?
Very well, since you started. Doyou ever have any concerns about
growing too big? Because youhave to? You're just popularity
you're shipping all over theworld now and you have a
presence and a following allover the world. Does that bother
(15:50):
you? I mean, success.
Christophe Gagne (15:55):
Yeah, it kind of does. I really, I think that
there's a there's a radius ofshipping that I'm willing to
tolerate. And then and then sortof beyond that. I think we're
just gonna stop growing. At apoint we were hoping to develop
plans for netzero brewhousethat, essentially, I'm looking
(16:16):
to do zero emissions or not growthe business much more, you
know, because because we have toimprove how we do things, not
just how much we do. So, so Ihoped to put a a smaller than
usually possible, off grid brewhouse online. And then stop
(16:42):
growing after that.
William Forchion (16:44):
Would and this is I mean, not that I want to
get into your business deeply.
Would it be a possibility foranother hermit thrush to? So
that it has a different districtdistribution radius, so that you
share the idea? I mean, it wouldbe very different beer because
it would be based on the east,right for that location was?
Christophe Gagne (17:06):
Yeah, I've definitely studied wild yeast
and other areas. You know, Idon't, I don't know that I plan
on starting another hermitthrush elsewhere. But, you know,
given the right team andpartners, I definitely consider
it, you know, I do think thatdistributed production is
ultimately you're going to giveus a better quality of life with
(17:27):
a lower atmospheric impact thancentralized production with
distribution, as long as we areable to realign our priorities
of experience and, andassessment of life quality, to
let go of some of the pithystuff that we just sort of have
(17:48):
done on a whim.
William Forchion (17:49):
Wow.
Christophe Gagne (17:51):
Have you? Have you gotten any common themes of
wisdom in your, in your talkswith others?
Unknown (17:58):
I haven't, and I guess maybe I have. It's okay to be
weird. It's, uh, you know,unique is important. Following
your passions, regardless of howunique and weird they are. So
yeah, I guess maybe I havegotten a common theme. And maybe
(18:20):
that's a common theme, becausethose are the people that
inspire me, is folks who havewho get to wave their freak flag
high, you know, do their thingfor sure, and have grown
comfortable or mature enough toeither tune out the naysayers,
(18:41):
or just do their thing enough toshow the naysayers that doesn't
matter what they have to say. Imean, there's the I'm attracted
to, I get drawn to people whojust have a uniqueness about
them who just are, you know,they're, they're doing their
thing, and they're doing itproudly, not necessarily to be
on the front page of papers.
And, you know, that's that powerto power. And positivity is
(19:04):
something I want to share. Andthat's why I do this podcast, I
want to share that with others,because I know that there are
kids, and there are some olderfolks who have been too afraid
to step into their selves, theirtrue self and, and take a risk
at being uniquely who they are.
(19:27):
Well, thank you very much. Iappreciate this. And we'll start
we'll oh and by novia and thisis a bit of the Billosophy
podcast. If you like what youhear, please tune in for some
more find out when we'redropping new podcast and
remember, move forward withpassion and purpose and
Christophe Gagne (19:49):
don't undervalue unique with thorough
follow through. Yeah, it's allit's all possible. You just have
to make it happen.
Intro Voice (20:05):
Thank you for listening to the Billosophy
podcast. Keep checking in as wewill be regularly releasing new
episodes.
Welcome to a place where we're thinking together
and thinking deeper about who weare.
Female intro Voice (00:12):
Welcome to the Billosophy podcast.
William Forchion (00:19):
We'll start again. Welcome to the Billosophy
podcast. Today my guest is
Christophe Gagne (00:27):
I am Christophe Gagne of Hermit
Thrush brewery. We are a sourbrewery, we only make sour beer,
which is tart and thereforeweird for most people. And it's,
it's it's gaining acceptance alittle bit more lately, which is
fun. But I've loved tart beerfor decades, at this point,
William Forchion (00:51):
wow. So this is the point where we're just
starting this interview. And Ican go in multiple directions. I
can even talk all about beer, orI can talk about you. And I had
asked you earlier about thewhole the term of brew master.
Because I remember from mychildhood, and hearing, or
(01:14):
watching a television commercialand one of the large brew
breweries was talking abouttheir Brewmaster. And I've
always just had this image ofthe Brewmaster with a large
stick and I guess that stick wasfor staring something or
whatever. I don't know.
Christophe Gagne (01:27):
Yeah. And I do have a beard. So and that's
associated frequently,
William Forchion (01:31):
you do have a very
good causal factor, but it'scommon. A prominent beard.
Christophe Gagne (01:37):
Yeah. At least Brewmaster for hermit thrushes
is sort of just the the creativedirector more than anything, you
know, we've got a team of fivebrewers now we're very excited.
And I'm, I'm just sort of the asthe Brewmaster. I am the guy who
has done sour beer, innovationin production the longest. And
(01:58):
so I started get the final sayon recipes, but plenty of
innovation comes from ourawesome folks. But I was I was
studying wild yeast in when Iwas living in West Philly about
12 years ago at this point. So
William Forchion (02:14):
Wow, there's a bunch of things there. There's
wild yeast. There's West Philly,have growing up having grown up
in South Jersey, there's aconnection there. We could talk
about a bunch of differentthings. You're a Brewmaster,
you've got you know, themicrobreweries popped up in the
90s and spread. Once again,going back to that whole brew
master thing I'm thinking ofsomebody may be late 60s, early
(02:35):
70s you're not that guy. You'repretty young.
Christophe Gagne (02:40):
Yeah, I think I think young people have taken
a good chunk of the craft beermovement into themselves.
There's a lot ofI think there's a lot of
creativity and there's a lot ofdiscontent in common office jobs
that and and I know of manystories where people received
(03:01):
educations and all of a suddenweren't happy in their fields
and then needed to change it upa bit. It's It's fun. I mean,
you know, it's I've I've reallyenjoyed it. The markets getting
very interesting lately, butyeah.
William Forchion (03:21):
So how did you come to do a craft beer? Did you
go to school for breweries?
Christophe Gagne (03:28):
I was I started out as a social worker.
And I was home brewing all alongthe way. And while I was in
school, I was I was working inbreweries part time, sort of,
you know, pay the bills andenjoy my hobby fuller and so I
buy a couple days a week by dayI brew regular beers and then in
my basement in West Philly Iexperimented with coal ships and
(03:53):
kettle sours and wild wild beerproduction.
William Forchion (03:57):
Just wild beer production.
Christophe Gagne (04:00):
hobby gone.
Wild knows. Yeah, it's it's uh,it's fun Beer Beer wants to be
made, you know, it's a, whetherit's East that's fermenting and
or bacteria that's fermenting itor both are at different times.
Beer is a, an easy to make safe,selective media that that you
(04:21):
can ferment any number of waysthat you know, it's, it's
fascinating in terms of the wildside because I think terroir can
come into beer in a way thathasn't before.
William Forchion (04:35):
No, you have mentioned wild yeast a couple
times. And there's something inmy head that said one of the
reasons why you're in this areain Brattleboro, Vermont is the
yeast can Is that true? I mean,what what, what is the story
behind that?
Christophe Gagne (04:55):
Yeah, yeah, we I mean, we looked
around for good yeast in NewEngland, and ultimate They
settled on Vermont andessentially looking for good
yeast is is very similar tomaking a sourdough culture you
make you make a beer and youleave the sterile beer out in
the beautiful winds of themountains and generally it
starts fermenting, you know,you're collecting spores of
(05:19):
yeast from the air, sometimesyou're trying to culture some
lactobacillus or P caucus.
Potassium icees is definitelyone of the one of the lovely
wild yeasts sort of a funky kindof straw character. And, and
ultimately, Brandon burrowsprofiles, sort of like, like,
stone fruit and a bit of citrusand, you know, the hay side of
(05:44):
hay side of funk rather than thehorse blanket side, which is a
term that is used,
William Forchion (05:49):
and it's kind of funny, you lost me there,
hey. Okay.
Christophe Gagne (05:54):
Yeah, it's, it's a, it's a,
it's a smoother and, and, andhas plenty of subtleties and
kind of fruity character.
Biology here, and it's, it'squite consistent. It's
William Forchion (06:08):
so with the yeast, you don't collect yeast,
you leave stuff out and nice,just shows up.
Christophe Gagne (06:15):
Yeah, I mean, it's kind of it's that is
basically how it works. Youknow, we, in our production and
the brewery, we definitelypropagate yeast, that's, that's
from the wild. So we'll brew abatch and leave it on our cool
ships, which is what what thesepans are called the wide shallow
pans that you put hot, sterilebeer in, and then it collects
(06:36):
the yeast. And, but you know, soyou'll have leftover biology
from that. And you can propagatethat up and brew other regular
beers with it as well. And sowe're pretty happy to have never
bought yeast, it's, it's, it'sall we've ever done here is
every single can that we've everproduced is wild fermented.
William Forchion (06:58):
Does that. So with that, is there's a bit of
uncertainty there. So you'regonna get a different flavor
throughout. I mean, one of thethings that we have we as
Americans, I want to say Ithink, around the world, folks
have, you know, we buy we go tofranchises, because we know what
we're going to get we know it'sgoing to be the same if you're
(07:18):
doing that wild, wild collectingand wild east, and do you get
variants and variations that are
Christophe Gagne (07:26):
for sure, for sure. I mean, all of life has
risk. And the ebb and flow ofcharacteristics are, are lovely.
I mean, I think our year to yearis, is somewhat varied, but also
wonderfully, so our vintagesare, are really weather related,
(07:49):
they're related to when we brewand how we brew and it's, it's
really satisfying to makerelatively simple beer, and to
see it blossom into somethingthat's way more complex that I
could then I could write arecipe for it's one thing to add
these hops that are kind ofreally interesting and blended
(08:09):
together and this kind ofgrains, stuff like that. But the
the, there's a vast array ofchemical compounds that yeast
and bacteria can produce byfermentation, I mean, you know,
1000s and I, I can't approximatethe complexity we get with with
the wild yeast, so it'sdefinitely a different I mean,
(08:32):
it's a whole different brewerythat most breweries that are our
art goal is to always be a greatsour and to make the best beer
possible rather than the samebeer we made last time.
William Forchion (08:45):
Wow. I didn't see that one coming. Just and
there's a passion to what youdo. What is the what is the
passion behind it? Is it toshare the beard with beers with
the world or is it I think
Christophe Gagne (09:01):
it's I think it's sort of an intersection of
like the local food movement andappreciating you know, what we
have around us rather than justtrying to get the imported
whatever and and kind ofcombining that with with I have
a passion for trying to fixclimate change a bit and I
(09:21):
haven't done that much yet. Butat least wood fired local wood
fired instead of fossil fuels.
But the the fact that beer wantsto be made and that sour beer
takes less energy are are prettykey. Kind of ethical concerns on
my side. But also I like reallyget into the food and flavors,
(09:44):
you know, complexity ofexperience stuff in it. I just
feel very lucky that the two candovetail
William Forchion (09:53):
No, I'm going to ask a question. That's good.
This lady goes off topic here.
There are you have a veryprominent beard I mentioned
before, and I've seen a fewprominent beards in here. Is
that a requirement for thebeard?
Christophe Gagne (10:11):
No, if you can't grow a beard, that's okay.
You just have to not shave. No,just kidding. It now that I'm
really curious about why beardsare so common in our industry? I
don't really. I don't really, Idon't really know socially why
that is. But, you know, I thinkthere's a fair amount of brewers
who are free thinkers, and Idon't
William Forchion (10:30):
know, maybe that's got something. You could
spend more time thinking thanshaving. Okay. Yeah,
Christophe Gagne (10:34):
yeah, kind of just like a little eye roll at
the at the falsehoods thatsociety imposes on you. And
then, you know, you only have tosign up for what you want to
sign up for?
William Forchion (10:45):
No, going back to the brewery and being here,
did you? Did you run into anyresistance? That's your coffee
cups? Did you run into anyresistance with opening a
brewery and and I guess there'sa couple of questions. Did you
run into any resistance? How didyou connect with the partners
(11:06):
that you have in hermit thrush?
Those are?
Christophe Gagne (11:10):
Yeah, yeah. We I don't think we have a lot of
resistance. To starting abrewery, we had a lot of
confusion, because in 2014,starting in August, our brewery
was a little more out there thanit is right now. So, you know,
we'll have a good told you sobut the we every and I hooked up
(11:36):
actually in college, we had aradio show together, called
intelligent music, tasty fish.
And it was a phenomenal musicand cooking show. And just in
general, we've we've been goodfriends since and he was very
involved helping me to homebrewand you know, stuff like that.
So we just we have a greatworking relationship and kind of
(11:58):
go way back.
William Forchion (12:01):
And where did you go to college?
Christophe Gagne (12:03):
Swarthmore just outside Philly.
William Forchion (12:06):
If you could go back to your younger self,
say that guy who graduated highschool was about to take off and
go to college. Do you have anywords of wisdom for that guy to
get you to hear or anycautionary tales?
Christophe Gagne (12:25):
In general, don't worry too much about being
a weirdo. I mean, I don't thinkI was really worried about at
that time anyway, but, you know,don't undervalue unique with
thorough follow through. Yeah,it's all it's all possible. You
just have to make it happen.
William Forchion (12:48):
Okay. Wow, that's, that's right there.
That's a tag right there. And Iwas gonna say, do you have any
words of wisdom to offer toanyone who was in that
situation? And I think you justdid it right there. Oh, I was
gonna, you mentioned the wholethe climate emergency that's out
there. And I have one of mythree children, my 13 year old
(13:11):
is just stricken with anxietyover the planet that he's going
to inherit. And, and you're, youknow, a generation or two ahead
of him? What are you? What areyou doing to offset or stop or
stem the climate emergency? Andor what do you see as a possible
(13:34):
possibility for what we can doas a, as a community or as a
nation?
Christophe Gagne (13:40):
On the personal level, I'm glad to be
burning biomass fuels,predominantly in my life, you
know, we've got a wood stove,and you know, it's definitely
cozy and it's nice, but it'salso, you know, we only go
through like 200 gallons of oilin the winter. And so I think
there's some amount ofremembering good, simple things
(14:05):
of the past, you know, that thethe closed carbon loop of the
stuff that's above ground isbetter than the stuff that's
below the ground. But you know,that that I feel like is just
sort of a marginal improvement.
And what we really need is, ismassive shift. You know, I
think, I also think that craftbeer has the potential to, to
(14:26):
reduce just general distributedmarkets, you know, that the
excitement of craft beer andlocal food ism, and all that
stuff is, is I think, gonnaprove very important to reinvest
in reinventing our food systemto have to have less transit,
but and then, you know, I guesson the on the business side, I
(14:47):
try to have a decent scaledpresence in the world. We only
use cans because they'redramatically less energy for the
environment, both on recyclingand shipping. No, we don't have
a massive walk in cooler at ourpackaging facility because we
make beer that's really designedto have phenomenal shelf life.
(15:08):
You know, a lot of our barrelaged sours get better with time
rather than, you know, worse.
And so I hope people like ourbeer, but I also hope people
like our ethics and you know,business has to take the first
step legislators are alwaysgoing to be too slow.
William Forchion (15:28):
Do you ever do you have a your business has
grown greatly since you started?
Very well, since you started. Doyou ever have any concerns about
growing too big? Because youhave to? You're just popularity
you're shipping all over theworld now and you have a
presence and a following allover the world. Does that bother
(15:50):
you? I mean, success.
Christophe Gagne (15:55):
Yeah, it kind of does. I really, I think that
there's a there's a radius ofshipping that I'm willing to
tolerate. And then and then sortof beyond that. I think we're
just gonna stop growing. At apoint we were hoping to develop
plans for netzero brewhousethat, essentially, I'm looking
(16:16):
to do zero emissions or not growthe business much more, you
know, because because we have toimprove how we do things, not
just how much we do. So, so Ihoped to put a a smaller than
usually possible, off grid brewhouse online. And then stop
(16:42):
growing after that.
William Forchion (16:44):
Would and this is I mean, not that I want to
get into your business deeply.
Would it be a possibility foranother hermit thrush to? So
that it has a different districtdistribution radius, so that you
share the idea? I mean, it wouldbe very different beer because
it would be based on the east,right for that location was?
Christophe Gagne (17:06):
Yeah, I've definitely studied wild yeast
and other areas. You know, Idon't, I don't know that I plan
on starting another hermitthrush elsewhere. But, you know,
given the right team andpartners, I definitely consider
it, you know, I do think thatdistributed production is
ultimately you're going to giveus a better quality of life with
(17:27):
a lower atmospheric impact thancentralized production with
distribution, as long as we areable to realign our priorities
of experience and, andassessment of life quality, to
let go of some of the pithystuff that we just sort of have
(17:48):
done on a whim.
William Forchion (17:49):
Wow.
Christophe Gagne (17:51):
Have you? Have you gotten any common themes of
wisdom in your, in your talkswith others?
Unknown (17:58):
I haven't, and I guess maybe I have. It's okay to be
weird. It's, uh, you know,unique is important. Following
your passions, regardless of howunique and weird they are. So
yeah, I guess maybe I havegotten a common theme. And maybe
(18:20):
that's a common theme, becausethose are the people that
inspire me, is folks who havewho get to wave their freak flag
high, you know, do their thingfor sure, and have grown
comfortable or mature enough toeither tune out the naysayers,
(18:41):
or just do their thing enough toshow the naysayers that doesn't
matter what they have to say. Imean, there's the I'm attracted
to, I get drawn to people whojust have a uniqueness about
them who just are, you know,they're, they're doing their
thing, and they're doing itproudly, not necessarily to be
on the front page of papers.
And, you know, that's that powerto power. And positivity is
(19:04):
something I want to share. Andthat's why I do this podcast, I
want to share that with others,because I know that there are
kids, and there are some olderfolks who have been too afraid
to step into their selves, theirtrue self and, and take a risk
at being uniquely who they are.
(19:27):
Well, thank you very much. Iappreciate this. And we'll start
we'll oh and by novia and thisis a bit of the Billosophy
podcast. If you like what youhear, please tune in for some
more find out when we'redropping new podcast and
remember, move forward withpassion and purpose and
Christophe Gagne (19:49):
don't undervalue unique with thorough
follow through. Yeah, it's allit's all possible. You just have
to make it happen.
Intro Voice (20:05):
Thank you for listening to the Billosophy
podcast. Keep checking in as wewill be regularly releasing new
episodes.
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