May 31, 2025 • 54 mins
From skateboarding around Sugar House as a kid to brewing award-winning beer in the same neighborhood, Chad Hopkins' journey epitomizes the heart of Salt Lake City's local business renaissance.
Growing up in Sugar House during the 80s and 90s when it was "kind of rough," Chad developed a deep connection to this eclectic neighborhood. His first job at Einstein's Bagels sparked what would become a lifelong career in hospitality. While exploring various roles in the restaurant industry, corporate life never quite satisfied his entrepreneurial spirit. "The corporate thing is boring to me," he explains. "There's no real vision there. They're not doing anything to make the world better."
Everything changed when Chad discovered craft beer and the transformative experience of trying his first Red Hook ESB. "It blew my fucking mind," he recalls. Frustrated by Utah's limited beer selection, he began homebrewing in his basement, eventually installing epoxy floors, stainless steel sinks, and multiple brewing systems to perfect his craft.
The opportunity to open Hopkins Brewing came unexpectedly. While initially scouting locations on State Street, Chad learned that a space in his beloved Sugar House was available. With just six weeks to secure a bar license, he and his team worked tirelessly, brewing during the day and developing the menu at night. That hustle paid off, creating what has become a community hub known for exceptional beer, locally-sourced food, and a welcoming atmosphere.
Chad's philosophy centers on empowering his team with creative freedom and supporting the local community. From featuring local artists without taking commission to hosting live music several nights a week, Hopkins exemplifies how businesses can strengthen neighborhoods. The hyper-local approach extends to ingredients too, with malt from Logan and grass-fed beef raised in Utah.
Despite offers to expand, Chad remains committed to maintaining Hopkins' authenticity through owner presence and personal connection. "I didn't do this to make money," he says. "I love what I'm doing." That passion shines through in every aspect of the brewery, where even employees choose to spend their days off.
Stop by Hopkins Brewing at 1048 East 2100 South to experience a true Salt Lake City success story in a pint glass. Follow them on Instagram for daily updates and to learn about their upcoming events and beer releases.
Head to www.smalllakepod.com/merchandise for Small Lake City Gear!
Join Erik as he supports Fork Cancer, a night of food, drinks, and live music—all for a great cause. Grab your tickets at utah.acscanforkcancer.org and enter Erik Nilsson to help him hit his $12,000 fundraising goal!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'd probably say it was high school is when I
discovered craft beer.
Just had this like idea, likewow, I want to open my own
brewery.
I did all this discovery of allthese beers.
I'm like fuck, we can't.
Nobody's brewing all the stuffI want to drink.
I have hit root myself.
Sugar House is like that's.
My dream is to have a brew pubin Sugar House, but I didn't
think that was ever going tohappen.
(00:21):
If we wanted the bar license,we had six weeks to open,
because here in Utah we all needeach other.
We all need all the breweries.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
What is up everybody and welcome back to another
episode of the Small Lake CityPodcast.
I'm your host, eric Nilsson,and this week's guest is someone
that I've been really excitedto talk about.
His name is Chad Hopkins and incase you recognize the last
name, then about His name isChad Hopkins, and in case you
recognize the last name, thenyou probably know that he's the
founder of Hopkins Brewing.
Now, hopkins Brewing is one ofmy favorite breweries to go to
(00:51):
for a few reasons One great beer, two, great food menu and three
great programming.
We talk about how Chad grew up,around the corner from where
Hopkins is today, his passionfor food and beverage and the
energy of working in restaurantswhere he got his passion for
brewing beer, starting to brewhis own and then taking the leap
to truly start his own brewery,thanks to some help from his
(01:13):
friends.
But let's jump into it.
It's a great conversation withme and Chad that you're going to
enjoy.
It was fun because we actuallyrecorded right in the brewery
itself, so enjoy and I'll seeyou on the other side.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
The theater and everything was built over there
where the Barnes Noble.
There were little local shopsall around there and it was just
a big, wide-open parking lotand so we used to skate there.
That was our hangout.
We'd go skate and then, overhere, you had, I mean, you had
Bronx Records, where Whole Foodsis, but you had another record
shop over here.
(01:46):
You had, I mean, you had BronxRecords, where Whole Foods is,
but you had another record shopover here, a hip hop shop, a
skate shop, like you had allsorts of small businesses all
around here.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
And then when the Olympics came here and Barnes
Noble's built, it just kind ofkicked out a lot of the locals
and it got really corporate andit just kind of sure how sausage
feel for a minute there.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
I agree.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
And you know I'm so grateful to be in here.
I feel like I've kind of takenit back, taking back the local,
and more and more localbusinesses are popping up around
here and it's great.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
It's like that's what sugar house is built on, like
we need to keep it local exactly, and I love that it's kind of
become this blueprint because,like, when you think about like
salt lake in its development,sugar house was kind of the
first spot where it's like, okay, cool, we're gonna actually
develop this, we're gonna bringin a lot of new opportunities
not all good ones, not all badones but then we've kind of seen
how, like central ninth isstarting to get developed and
(02:36):
like the post district, allthese other places that feel I
feel like the things we've thathappened here are being learned
onth.
I mean it's all local placesand some of those like badass
businesses, it's all Lake andthe same with, I mean, like post
districts.
I mean it's I don't can't thinkof a completely like corporate
thing in there and they've donereally good about curating that.
So I'm glad that we've gonefrom like all right, listen, we
don't need this anymore.
(02:57):
But we I do.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I know what we, these local people that actually care
about where they're at oh, yeah, I think the Olympics brought a
big wave of corporatebusinesses here Totally that are
now starting to go away.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Not mad about it.
I'll always support localpeople, so I mean so you're born
and raised in Sugar House,you're, I mean, used to seeing
all the local businessesskateboarding around here.
I mean especially like the,like what I call the Shopko
parking lot, even though Shopkois obviously not there anymore.
Oh yeah, like the.
My last memory of it was so inthe early 2010s.
I found out about this app thatpeople were doing to make a
(03:32):
bunch of money whenever theywanted to, and I was like, well,
that sounds like a great idea.
So I applied to become a Lyftdriver Nice and so I was like
one of the first ones here andthen I got invited to do.
They used to have this thingcalled the mentor program, where
anybody who's been a driver fora while has a really good
rating.
They'll be like, hey, you'regoing to kind of be the last
line of defense.
You'll meet with people, answerquestions, go on a drive with
them, and if it's like the vibesare off, like Caesar thumbs
(03:54):
down, and if it's likeeverything's fine and like good
to go, so I would just like linewait in shopko and just do them
over and over again, andessentially I only have to work
for like four hours a week andthen go back to school.
Uh, it's like that.
I spent a lot of time in thatparking lot just sitting there
and I'm sure there's someonewho's like, is this guy selling
drugs?
Yeah, but no, just just gettingpeople rideshare drivers, but
(04:16):
so so border raising here likevery local to I mean both sugar
house and ninth and ninth area,but I know that so much of your
career in history is based on, Imean restaurant, hospitality,
food and Bev.
I mean, when did that story allstart or where did the journey
begin?
Speaker 1 (04:31):
You know, I my first job in um in restaurants was the
Einsteins on 15th and 15th.
Heck, yeah, so um.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, I started there in like 98, I think so that's
when I look at him, like how areyou still here, like I wouldn't
mind if it was something else,because again the local stuff
and just that area, but yeah, soI mean starts with einstein's
yeah, yeah and it's.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
You know, back then utah was salt lake was just kind
of a weird, kind of weird placeand it just cousin it was.
This area was just kind ofoutcast, it was sugar house was
a shithole, yeah, in the 80s and90s.
And you know people like, oh,you're living sugar house, oh
it's kind of rough, and I'm likewhatever, it's not my hat, like
it's still what I know in myhome.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Yeah, it's like, what do you think?
Speaker 1 (05:13):
but I like it like you know, I wouldn't as a kid
like if I left my skateboard outfront and be gone.
You know, like I live in sandynow.
Like you leave your bikes out,you leave anything out there.
Nobody, nobody gives a shityeah, someone will probably put
in your garage for you yeah soit's, it's a lot different.
So and still, you know it's it'sstill kind of the city here,
(05:33):
you know so.
But yeah, so I worked ateinstein's for a bit and uh
really liked the energy ofrestaurants because there's
you're not going to be bored.
You know there's alwayssomething to do, so you're
always on your feet movingaround and and I liked that a
lot, so I did uh.
Shortly after that I went tothe military for a little bit.
Didn't really love it, but I.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
I get dubious of people who are like I love the
side tangent.
I was golfing with this guyonce at bonneville and I was
playing alone and all of asudden this guy almost like pops
out of the woods walking hiscar's, like, hey, you got room
for one more.
I was like nice, yeah.
And this guy was probably theweirdest person I've ever golfed
with on a golf course.
And so he goes on to be like,oh, what do you do?
I'm like I work in tech and dothis.
And he's like, oh, I'm likewhat did you do?
(06:16):
He's like I'm a retired pilot,like, oh, cool, sweet.
He's like I was at NAMM and Iwas like, oh, I mean, that must
have been tough.
He's like, yeah, unless youlike killing people.
And I was like, okay, like.
And then he goes on to be like,yeah, but then I ended up
getting two women pregnant thereand then found out both of them
within the last years Don'tcare for one of them, but the
other one's pretty nice.
And I was like you, yeah, I waslike you are someone I don't
(06:38):
necessarily know if I want to inthe middle of a golf course, in
the middle of nowhere, but inyour military.
Were you mostly domestic or didyou get to travel anywhere fun?
Speaker 1 (06:46):
No, I just did the reserves and just stayed here.
I you know kind of morepressure from my parents.
Yeah in a sense, and I'm justlike this is not, this is not my
thing, so which?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
is good because you have an experience.
You're like, oh, I like thisenergy, I like doing this and
then being like, not that, let'scontinue to refine what we want
to do.
So you do the reserves and thenI assume you go back to some
sort of food and bed hospitality.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Yeah, I mean, came back here and, you know,
actually went back to Einstein's, worked at a different one for
a little bit and then juststarted working a bunch of
chains around here, cool, helpedopen like all the noodles and
company and payways and just allthese like fast, casual chains.
Um, actually helped open thethe noodles over here.
Yeah, so I worked at the paywaythat used to be here that's now
(07:33):
.
I don't even know it's overthere anymore.
I think it's like a dentistoffice, yeah.
So, um, which is kind of funnyCause when that restaurant we'll
side tangent on that.
When I was, I had a great teamover there.
That was years ago.
I worked there but they wereclosing down as I was opening.
So some of my old cooks werewalking over here and they're
like, hey, you're like you'reopening your own business.
(07:55):
I'm like, yeah, it was perfect,so got a couple of my old cooks
that worked for me at Paywayforever ago.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
I was, I went to that payway a lot like that was one
of my mom's favorite like,because my mom was a
pediatrician before she retired,it's like didn't have a ton of
time.
So she, like I recognized myown adhd hyper fixations in her
old behavior and one of them waslike meals that we would eat.
Like she would go like one,like she got this like a ricotta
and cheese from costco multipletimes a week for like a month
or two and then we wouldn't haveit again.
And then like all of these,just like deep dives.
And then there was one whereshe's like yeah, payway, send me
(08:30):
your order, I'm picking it up.
We're like, we're going topayways.
Like I mean, I don't like don'tget me wrong like I love a good
, uh, what I call like a sugaryfried chicken and rice, but
always a classic.
But that's fun that you could,hey guys, like just walk up here
half a block and come cook overhere.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah, it was interesting doing the the
corporate thing for a while.
I just didn't really love thateither.
I loved the restaurant thingbut didn't like the corporate
thing.
So so I bounced around a fewdifferent places and then tried
to take a break from, break fromit, went to uh, went to Whole
Foods for a little bit and I Iloved working at Whole Foods, um
, because it was a lot of people, like-minded people.
(09:06):
Yeah, you know we all careabout, um, the environment,
sustainability, and a lot ofpeople love good beer and there
are a lot of homebrewers, so wewould all share beer with each
other and and beer wasn't one ofmy departments, so I got to
choose, like a lot of stuff webrought in.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Cool.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
So that was.
That was a lot of fun Did thatfor a couple years and then I
just kind of missed therestaurant chaos so went back to
it um, but started working umwith a consultant and learned a
lot about the back end ofopening restaurants and and so
kind of followed him around alittle bit.
Um turned out he wasn't a verygood dude and so a lot of drama.
(09:45):
He has a lot of people money.
He owes me money but you knowwe're just gonna not worry about
that anymore.
Sometimes you gotta cut yourlosses and move on.
Yeah, it was a.
It was a really good experience.
Um, and then after that went onmy own and just I helped um,
this little small pizza place upin Camas Summit and Pizza
they're in like 200 plus yearold hotel, like I lived above it
(10:09):
, yep.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
I've.
I spent how long was that?
Probably four months living inOakley.
Oh, yes, and like cause.
I mean when you're up in Oakley, like it's beautiful, like that
whole area is gorgeous, amazing, but if you need to get
anywhere, pain in the ass.
Oh yeah, and so I would alwaysbe like it's the end of the day,
I've done so much.
Maybe friday, saturday, weekend, I just want food and there's
(10:30):
only so many restaurants thatare out because you have that
like, unless I want to go justlike ken's cash and grab like a
bunch of random snacks butthere's always some at pizza and
I knew I just went straightdown the road for like two miles
get my pizza and it was good.
Pizza too, that was great wasgreat, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
So yeah, I got to drive up there for a little bit
and kind of it was fun it was.
You know, a lot of my career incorporate restaurants was going
and taking over restaurantsthat were just not really
well-run and kind of flippingthem, yeah, you know, turn them
around, make them successful andthen kind of go on to the next
thing.
So you know, these guys wereestablished.
I think they ready to opensomething new, so so it's cool.
(11:09):
So I got to help design the newstore and get them set up and I
was planning to stick aroundand open more stores for them.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
But do you, did you feel like you enjoyed more of
like that opening and gettingthings started side, or did you
just love the humdrum ofoperating a restaurant, just
kind of the chaos that goesalong with it?
Speaker 1 (11:24):
You know the opening was really fun because I did a
lot of that with the corporatestuff and you know I got to do
that a little bit with theconsultant.
Just, you know, help design andset up restaurants and I really
enjoyed that.
Um, you know, you just kind of,with corporate restaurants,
just kind of get bored doing theday-to-day stuff because it's
like anything extra I'm doinghere is just supporting some
(11:45):
corporation and it's not reallydoing me any good.
So, um, so I got fired a lotfor my corporate jobs.
So you know they want you towork 50 hours and I'm like you
know I create successful storesand a good team environment and
people love the jobs and we, youknow we hit all our numbers and
people like, why aren't youworking 50 hours?
Speaker 2 (12:02):
I'm like I don't need to yeah, everything's happening
the way it should like.
I'm not going to be here forthe sake of being here, no.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
So I'm like you know.
So I went to college, then Ididn't start at the U until I
was 28.
And so I kind of had itcushioned, some of my
restaurants I was running andlike, ran a good operation.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
So if you don't need it, why go spend money to make
money when you're already makingmoney without spending money?
Yeah, so I'm like, no, I, Ithink I'm gonna go to college
now, which is like I think morepeople should take that into
account.
Like I was talking to umsomeone semi recently and like,
oh, I like took to you, like no,it's actually one of my friends
.
She uh has a daughter that Imean, it was the typical kid of
like oh, when I graduate, I'mgetting out of here, I'm gonna
(12:44):
do my own thing.
Blah, blah, you can't keep melike.
All right, whatever, cool, likegraduate from high school.
If you want to live here 500bucks a month in rent, unless
you want to go to school, thenwe'll cover your rent.
Um, choices yours.
She's like, no, screw you, I'mmoving out of here.
So ends up moving in with likethree or four of her friends in
a two bedroom apartment andthey're all working.
I think she was working atcostco, which is like pretty
good side of things, and shekind of looked at what like I
(13:08):
mean just like the trajectory ofher life and like what I was
looking at, and she's like, hey,mom, I'm gonna come move in and
go back to school, it's like,okay, cool, like because, like I
always like when people I meanany time in life where you can
voluntarily make a decision,instead of someone saying here's
the next step, or go do this,or go do that, it makes it more
impactful, it makes it moremeaningful.
You're gonna try so much morebecause you actually care about
it, compared to here's the nextthing that, like, I have to do,
(13:29):
that, I don't want to do.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
This is just what you do, yes, what you do with your
life.
No, I would.
I.
There's no way I could havedone well in college when, like
right out of high school, likeI'm surprised.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
I like I made it work , knowing myself.
Now I was like maybe to go dosomething else for a minute,
come back to it oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah, I was.
I was ready when I was 20.
I'm like, all right, let'scheck this out.
And I did great.
I loved it.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
I'm like I wouldn't have loved it before you gotta
appreciate it for what it'sworth and if you, sometimes it
takes a little bit of time, likea fine wine.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you go to school.
I mean, like what did that playin your decision-making process
?
I mean, were you still justlike hey, I kind of want to use
this to be more on this food andbed and restaurant side, or did
you have different plans fromthere?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
you know, kind of my goal has always been on my own
business.
Um, you know, my, my parentsowned their own business and you
know I always told them theyowned a body shop like paint and
body shop and so, um, so I grewup working there a lot too, uh,
working on cars, and I I lovethat.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Um, so I do as a hobby I was gonna say if anybody
that follows you on instagramknows that you enjoy cars, oh
yeah my third toys.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
You know they're fun for me.
So I but I grew up around thata lot and grew around, grew
around, uh, uh, my parents own,you know, a business and and
they had a couple um businessesgoing to and so they're always
busy, Um, but I but I love that,like it's.
It was just really cool to see,like bear in charge of their
lives and what they were doing.
And yeah, they worked a lot but, um, but it was awesome and I
(14:57):
was like Mike, I want to.
Can I buy this business fromyou?
Like, can we like worksomething out here?
And they're like no, you don'twant to do this shit.
Like this sucks.
Yeah, I'm like, well, I'm tiredof working for other people.
So that was off the plate.
You know I was pretty bummedabout that.
But going to the?
U I just wanted to go, just togo.
Yeah, just, you know, gone tocollege and you know I just I
(15:20):
went into business management,entrepreneurship, and you know I
learned some things, but a lotof it I had mostly learned on my
, you know, on my journeythrough working on restaurants
and corporate stuff.
You get so much training withwith corporate jobs, which is
one bonus to it, um, but it wasjust a good experience it was.
I had a lot of fun doing it, so, um, it was pretty easy for me
(15:44):
at that point.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Yeah, it's like nice Cause, like if someone were to
put me back in school, I'd belike, so I have like four
classes.
I it's like nice because, like,if someone were to put me back
in school, I'd be like, so Ihave like four classes, I have
like three homework assignmentsand I just got to be ready for
tests.
Like I'm in, like are youkidding me?
I used to complain about thisLike compared to like what I'm
expected to do.
It.
I mean any sort of job or anysort of thing that can, like
give you a living wage, like,yeah, that sounds, that sounds
(16:06):
really nice, but then also givesyou like that mental space to
be like what do I want to do?
What does life look like?
What kind of business do I wantto start in understanding more
of like the details of it?
But then it's hard because,like I mean, everything you
learn in school is such in asilo and like such a theory
compared to like what you'vebeen used to of operating and
opening restaurants, like that'sthe actuals and like the actual
experience of doing it, whichis never as simple as a
(16:27):
classroom will let you make itseem to be right.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yeah, like uh when I took over whole foods, one of my
departments was prepared foodsand the previous manager had
hired all these kids out ofculinary school.
Everybody wants to be a chefand that's like, well, you guys
gotta clean, you guys gotta makestuff to this recipe, you guys
gotta do dishes like, you guysgotta do all this shit.
And they're like what we?
Just everybody wants to be.
(16:51):
You know, chef, I want to makethis dish and like, culinary
kids were not the ones to hire.
So if you want to get in theculinary industry, go work at a
restaurant.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
For guys Go wash some dishes, go bus some tables and
then appreciate all of thethings that build up to it,
Because it's not just do the funstuff and hand everything else
to everybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
See if that's what you really want to do.
And in fact one of therestaurants we opened with a
consultant and this guy had abunch of money, decided he
wanted a fine dining restaurant,went to culinary school and we
got that thing open and he justhe couldn't handle it, couldn't
handle the pressure of therestaurant.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
He's like I've got millions of dollars opening
these businesses.
This would be easy.
I'm like good luck, let me knowhow it goes.
Yeah, so he's not running thatrestaurant anymore.
Somebody else took over.
That makes sense.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
It made it work Well because so my, actually I'm
going to go visit him thisweekend.
He lives in Portland, inWillamette Valley.
He's been a chef his entirelife, for the most part, and but
also it's fun too.
So they live with lab of valleyand your response makes you,
you know that.
You know what it.
I mean.
It's wine country a lot, tonsof pinots, tons of shards and
hops and hops, yes, and so he'llalways so.
(18:03):
I mean him and his boyfriendare, I mean, wine enthusiasts
through and through, but he alsofor I mean his restaurants and
work has always purchased winethrough it.
So it's fun, we go taste.
It's like, oh, come to the,come to this room.
Here's the reserve bottles,here's all of like just totally
red carpet treatment, which isfun.
But his nephew named jonathan,he went to oregon state and
became an engineer, graduatedand then he got done with school
(18:26):
.
He's like, actually I think Iwant to go work in a restaurant
and be like j Nice and so, sureenough, like goes and works.
I mean it's like a really nicerestaurant in downtown Portland
called Le Pigeon, but I meanstarts washing dishes and starts
bar, like I mean just, I meanthe hard, like the shitty part
of it, but then now he's finallylike up to like I mean sous
chef and like actually cooking,and he's like, yeah, I like this
(18:46):
a lot more than, oh, it's whatI was doing, that's fun, I mean,
especially in the middle ofchaos, a big rush, and you've
got just a line of people andyou're looking at your tickets
and you're just like, wow, we'renever getting out of this,
we're gonna.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
This is our life now.
Yeah.
But then you see it to that endticket and it is the most
rewarding thing and you're, andit's done, everybody's,
everybody can breathe.
We're done.
Oh yeah, we did it like it'slike it's done, everybody can
breathe.
We're done.
Oh yeah, we did it.
It's like a game, it's so fun.
It's like well, see youtomorrow.
Yeah, let's do it again.
It's not for everybody.
(19:21):
No, it takes a certain personto do it and that's a lifestyle
and it's fun.
Talking to other serviceindustry people, we try to plan
meetings and stuff and peoplelike, oh, that's a hold it.
Well, I'm more so, we're stillopen.
So like doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
What do you think people want to do when they're
off?
Yeah, I'll have a beer and agood meal with their friends.
And guess what I do?
I give them that beer and agood meal.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
Yeah, that's like you know, talking to other industry
people that are hanging outhere today, it's like we're
trying to plan like some partyfor somebody and it's like, well
, every day is a Friday for us,so what's the slowest day we can
do this party?
Let's do it Monday, yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
That'll work for everybody.
Oh yeah, so you go to the?
U, you have kind of this timeto take a break to be at school,
which is the best part ofschool, but I mean, what
happened after that?
I mean, at what point were youlike, all right, I think I know
what I want to do for my ownbusiness and it's going to be
this.
Yeah, I mean it's.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
I'd probably say it was high school.
It was when I discovered craftbeer and and Corona's to trick a
lot of Corona's and I just hadthis like idea, like wow, I want
to, I want to open my ownbrewery.
And you know, when I was 28,about the time I started college
(20:40):
, I started home brewing too andwinemaking, grow my own
Chardonnay grapes at home andgrowing up for a long time used
to just make wine every year andI just put them in beer.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
But Like eh we're, we're gonna dump it all into
here instead yeah, and so justreally got into it.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
you know, I spent a lot of time, um, just dialing in
recipes and, uh, I took over my.
My whole basement ended up likeripping out all the carpet in
my basement, putting epoxyfloors and standstill steel
sinks and extra sinks, and I hadlike two, three homebrew
systems at one time.
(21:14):
And I don't know if you sawthat kegerator that's in that
room next to the bar.
Yes, but there's.
I think there's eight taps onthat thing, but that was in my
basement.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
And I have friends that come in here and sit at the
bar like, is that the kegeratoryou had in your basement?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I'm like, yeah, that come in here and sit at the bar
like is that the kegerator youhad in your basement like?
Speaker 1 (21:32):
yeah, like yeah it's come, it comes with me,
obviously.
Yeah, so he you know he broughtthat here.
I still had a bunch of stuff abunch of beers and stuff left
over when we first opened and Itold him, hey, try this stuff
out like.
And people are like why don'tyou bring your homebrew system
here and like let's start stuff.
So that's that's what we do now.
Every friday you can tryhomebrew batches.
Pretty much, you know, smallbatches for my brewers, but
(21:56):
anyway.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
But I guess during that time when you're starting
because again, like you havethis whole period of exploring
from, like the ripe old age of18 till, let's say, 20 when you
start school I mean, was thereany sort of beers you gravitated
towards or what was thatlearning process like, because I
can't imagine it was justsuccess from the beginning?
Speaker 1 (22:13):
You know we were, we were so limited here with beer,
you know, and it was, it washard to get anything high point
or anything like reallyinteresting.
We just, I mean we've had somegood beer.
I mean we've got some greatbreweries that have been around
for a while.
They're pretty big now andpretty much all sold and no
longer really local.
Um, but we've, you know, we'vealways had good beer here, but
(22:33):
it's always been just kind ofjust simple, nothing like really
nothing really out there,nothing really too interesting.
Occasionally some of ourbreweries did do that some
really interesting stuff andthen they stopped doing it.
So I just I would travel aroundand and drink beer everywhere I
go.
And I remember actually here Iwas hanging out at a friend's
(22:58):
house and, um, he had a friendthat was in town from Oregon or
Washington, somewhere in thePacific Northwest.
Yeah, I'm drinking a fullsuspension and you know this is
20 something years ago, it's 4%,and I'm like this beer is 20
something years ago, it's fourpercent, and I'm like this beer
is so hoppy, it's so good, and Istill love full suspensions
great, great beer classer.
(23:18):
But he's like, try this, handsme a red hook esb and blew my
fucking mind.
I'm just, I'm like what is thebeer tastes like this holy shit,
so like just elevated my, mypalate.
I'm like, what is the beertastes like this Holy shit, so
like just elevated my, my palate.
And I'm like, how do I get thisbeer?
So I ended up going up toOregon, going to Washington it
(23:40):
was near Seattle so went to the,went to the brewery, checked it
out, like just really kind ofwent after it.
I'm like, like, how do I, howdo I brew this?
So I brewed a lot of that,brewed a lot of esb at home and,
um, you know, that was like myearly 20s when that happened.
And so I did all this discoveryof all these beers.
I'm like, fuck, we can't.
Nobody's brewing all the stuffI want to drink.
(24:02):
I have hit root myself.
If no one else is doing it,you're gonna have to do it
yourself.
Yeah, and luckily a lot ofpeople had that same idea.
So now we've got a lot of greatlittle local breweries all over
Salt Lake and you know, kind ofspreading out all over Utah and
that's amazing and I'm like, ifI can go and everybody's kind
(24:23):
of doing their own thing, and Ilove it.
We have so much good beer herein Utah.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
And it's so funny because it's like this, almost
like it's so contradictory,because obviously utah
population you can always assumehalf of people don't drink and
taboo around it all and alsoweird liquor laws, but at the
same time breweries keep poppingup and they all keep doing like
really, really well, and it'sso.
It's fun to see how muchsuccess there is, how much,
because I mean it was fun, likein the same way that you talk
(24:50):
about Washington, like Seattleis where I really started to
appreciate beer, because Ireally didn't start like
drinking until college-ish Shoutout Mormonism.
But when I did it was like Imean I was again Mormonism.
I was like just wanted anythingsweet, nothing too bitter.
So I'd be like, oh, let me geta Heff, let me get a Blue and
let me get a.
That's the gateway beer.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Let me get a blue and let me get a.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
I mean gateway beer.
It is the gateway beer,especially in Utah.
If I wanted to open up abrewery and just get people and
be like here, take this, doyou've never had this before?
Great, then just come closerand closer.
But that was the first placeLike there was.
I'll never forget this.
There was one time so I met thisfriend there via my partner up
(25:35):
meeting him, and it was one ofthose like this is so fucking
awkward, what are we doing?
But then at the end of likedamn it, you guys were right and
so and he had he's from montana, was it went to the udub and
had a bunch of friends fromthere.
He just kind of like be likehey, like we're gonna hang out I
know you don't have any friends, come hang out.
And there was one time thatlike hey, we're it's game three
of whatever.
I think that would have beenlike what?
2017?
I think it was a year beforeanyway.
Um, so we go to buffalo wildwings and we just tell the
(25:57):
there's probably like 20 of usat this long table and we're
like, hey, just whenever youcome back, just have two space
dust in your hand and we'llfigure it out from there.
Nice, needless to say, everybodypretty much like borderline
blacked out that night becausewe just kept like chugging space
dust, like it was PBR, and butthat was the time I was like, oh
, what is this?
Like that's a, that's called anIPA and that's like don't drink
(26:19):
too much.
Anyway, you can imagine how itgoes from here, probably.
Yeah.
Then there's always likebecause I mean, they have a
liquor store here, I mean, andElysian is an amazing brewery,
and so like I'll always take apicture of it and send it to
those friends and be likeremember that one time.
And everybody's like, how couldwe forget?
So, yeah, I mean Washington isanother place that I explored
(26:40):
and understood and appreciatedbeer and coffee.
But so I love that you havethis experience of like, oh well
, there's beer I want.
I can't have it, I'm going tomake it and it'd be fun to do
this, but I mean, at what pointdid you bridge those two
together?
And we're like you know whatTime to do it myself.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
On a bigger scale, I would say, yeah, I mean, it's it
always been kind of on the backof my mind.
I'm like someday, someday, I'mgoing to do my own thing.
And you know, then my son wasborn kind of my mid-30s and I'm
just like I can't keep workingfor other people.
The corporate thing is justboring to me and there's no real
(27:23):
vision there.
They're not really doinganything to make the world
better, they're just trying tomake money and I struggled with
that.
And then I'm working forsomebody else on his.
You know, the sultan I workedfor is, you know he's a fraud
and it's like, oh, this sucksworking for this guy, like you
know.
So I, I was just like I have to, I have to open my own business
.
And you know, I I got a, um, apoker game of friends I've been
(27:49):
going to for 15 years orsomething cool and and I'd
always bring my homebrew.
And people are like, finally,one of my friends is like dude,
you need to open your ownbrewery, you do this.
And he kind of like startedpushing me and he was like he's
like whatever, whatever you needhelp with.
Because he had opened his own,uh, business doing sushi.
(28:10):
He's like whatever you needhelp with, because he had opened
his own business doing sushi.
He had like a sushi cateringbusiness for a little while and
so he kind of knew like gettingthings started, and so he helped
me.
He's like let me help you out.
And so he kind of pushed me toget started and so I started
getting things going, got theLLC going and I'm like all right
, I'm just going to startlooking at properties.
And you know, and a couple ofmy friends, you know, they
(28:34):
backed me, they're like well,we'll pitch in with you and
let's do this, let's make ithappen.
So I start shopping around andI was down on state.
There's this place across thestreet from Epic Brewing.
This building's changed handsso many times over the years and
we we were looking at that.
I'm like you know we might beable to make this work, but like
(28:56):
, no, going into an industry Idon't want to, I don't want to
be an asshole or anything toother breweries and try to, you
know, take anything from them.
So, um, because here in Utah weneed, we all need each other,
we all need all the breweries.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Oh yeah, and like that's the fun thing.
That's been like because notonly do I see how many people
have worked together at so manydifferent places, but then
hearing how much everybody'swilling to help each other, and
because it's I mean it's acommunity, and then I mean in
talking with other people inother places about it, it's like
I mean, people don't talk toeach other, people don't want to
(29:31):
help each other, but here it'svery different.
So I love that there's likethis support network of people
that are willing to dropwhatever they're doing, like oh,
you're so-and-so's broken, oryou're thinking like I'll be
there in five minutes and let'sfigure this out together.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
Oh yeah, I mean it's beer Keto's.
Like I love going there andseeing my friends.
I'm friends with the brewersand owners and it's a totally
different thing with businessand especially in this market.
(30:05):
Like there's camaraderie inother beer markets around the
country but nothing like Utah's.
So it's been awesome, it's beenan awesome thing to be a part
of.
And you know, and we even sell aton of different uh breweries
or uh yeah breweries, uh beers,yeah, um, high point.
We we don't have a canning lineyet.
We're working on that but, um,with our silly draft laws we're
(30:29):
limited to 5%.
So people want strong beers.
Like we bring them in becausethere's so many good ones around
.
So, um, but back to originallylooking at that location.
Um, down on state street.
You know, we looked at a fewand that one was kind of the one
that were like ramps, cheap andkind of worked out for what
we're looking for, and now wewere opening a kitchen.
(30:52):
There's a lot of money, it's alot of work and I was like I'm
like you know what?
We're just going to go tap roomfood trucks.
Keep it real simple.
Um, I'm going to call the owner,epic, to ask if it was cool.
I'm like cool for over here,like you know that Anax and
(31:13):
Sugarhouse, we're going to sellit, so I'd kind of forgotten
about this place.
You know they opened and youknow it was good, food was good
and whatever, but just I didn'treally remember it, just never
came back and come to find outit had been like five iterations
(31:34):
over five years and Just Ididn't really remember it Just
never came back, yeah, and cometo find out it had been like
five iterations over five yearsand geez, nobody could really
figure out the formula here.
So everybody talked about thecurse there was a curse here and
all this stuff.
And so he's like, yeah, we'regoing to sell that.
And I'm like, oh shit, likethis just got real, yeah, and in
your head you're like oh shit,like it's just got real, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And in your head you're like I know exactly where
that is.
Feels like cause.
I mean again, if, like knowingway less than you do about
everything that you do, you putthe state street property and
this property head to head, I'mlike yeah, like of course of
course this.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
I'm like, yeah, sugar houses, like that's my dream is
to have a brew pub and sugarhouse.
But I like that's my dream isto have a a brew pub and sugar
house.
But I didn't think that wasever gonna happen.
Yeah, you know, there's likethe money that would have to go
into that and um and trying tofind the right property.
So, luckily, luckily, theseguys did the groundwork for me
and didn't really want to keepdoing it.
(32:26):
So so it worked out for metotally.
So I so I came in and it was afine dining Italian restaurant
at the time, and so I came inhere and had dinner, checked out
the space and I'm like, allright, guess, I'm opening a
restaurant too, so let's do it.
So my friends weren't too keenon the restaurant.
(32:48):
Part of my like.
Well, it's my background.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
So yeah, let's do it.
I will show you that I can makethis work.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
Oh yeah, so, yeah, we went for it and then.
But there was a catch, like Ifwe wanted the bar license, we
had six weeks to open.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Of course there's some sort of wrench in
everything that you have to.
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
So it's like, do we go restaurant license?
And just you know, restaurantlicenses are so complicated,
especially for a brewery.
Oh, you guys got to get food.
You know kids are in here.
And it's just like I can'tstand up with your beer.
Like I'm like I don't want arestaurant license.
I can't stand up with your beer.
Like I'm like I don't want arestaurant license.
We want to be a bar.
We want it to be fun andwelcoming when we'd be able to
walk around with your beer andnot have to order food if you
(33:32):
don't want to.
Yeah, so, um, so we went for it.
I'm like challenge accepted,let's go.
And you know it was.
It was real nice Cause umEpic's head brewer came down.
Um did a brew day with me andkind of showed me the system.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
So cause that?
Cause it sounds like they theykind of just like right, we'll
leave it here, yeah, fun.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yeah, you can, you can buy this property from us.
And here you go and they'rejust kind of like, you know,
they've offered that it a shotand I'm like, all right, let's
go.
And no, so I was brewing onthat system and then I, working
(34:14):
on the kitchen, like I came upwith the initial menu and it's
cooking in the.
I'd brew all day as a come cook, all night, damn.
And then my buddy helped hirethe bar staff and kind of helped
, um, get that going, but I wasstill bartending too.
So I was doing all the thingsand we got open in six weeks and
we still didn't have our foodquite where I wanted it, so I
(34:36):
was just giving it away.
I'd come up to the bar, likewhat you guys want to try, like
what do you need to give me somefeedback?
Yeah, like, and it was a hit,people loved it and you know,
and we, and then it stuck, sowas finally, I finally got a
badass kitchen team and theywere able to take over and you
kind of you know I did my teamautonomy.
So it's like hey, these, I usedto have these, these tie wings
(34:59):
on the menu.
They're super high prep andreally just a lot of work and
they were so good.
But my my team was just like,like, these are so hard to make,
can we like, simplify or likeand come up with other flavors?
And so I kind of let my my teamkind of formulate their own
recipes and try some other stuffthat ended up working really
well.
So so it's cool.
(35:20):
It's been a, it's been a bigteam effort in here and you know
, the past few years I've beenable to step away from the brew
house, which I miss.
I miss the, uh, I miss brewingbeer.
Um, but I've got some awesomebrewers now to take care of
everything cool, got an awesomekitchen team and you know, I I
bartended for a little bit.
(35:40):
Now I'll pour a beer every oncein a while when I'm back there.
But we've we've grown so muchnow we've got some really nice
cocktails and everything I'm notgonna.
I don't know what they're'mback there, but we've, we've
grown so much and now we've gotsome really nice cocktails and
everything I'm not going to.
I don't know what they'remaking back there.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
You guys know how to do it better than I do.
I've got other things to do.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Yeah, I come up to the register.
A guest walks up.
I'm going to, you know, I'mgoing to help them, of course,
and I'm sitting there like I'm anew kid.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
They just see you walk around by yourself and
start pushing.
They're like are you sure you?
Speaker 1 (36:04):
work here.
You're like yeah, I own theplace, but I just can't remember
how to.
Yeah, I don't do this veryoften.
That's why I tell them, like Idon't do this very often, sorry,
but I'm not going to leaveanybody hanging.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Totally no-transcript a part of their own programming
(36:36):
.
And even you, I mean I can'tremember who was telling you a
story, but you've kind of feellike this like ringleader of
kind of like these sugar housebusinesses and everybody that
comes together.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
Yeah, yeah.
So everybody kind of looks tome like what's what's Chad doing
over there and like so that's,that's cool.
We're all friends, we all liketo help each other out and
promote each other's businessesand you know we want everybody
to be successful around here.
I've got some awesome smallbusinesses around here, totally.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
So.
So I mean, what kind?
Speaker 1 (37:10):
of beers I mean is Hopkins most known for.
Where do you see kind of thenew batches coming through or
new beers that you want to workon?
You know construction with theroad has slowed Sugarhouse down
the past couple of years.
So I mean, we're still doingwell, but we're not selling out
of beer like we used to Like.
We used to have to bring inguest tasks, we were just out
and so we've.
We've got some time now, so I'vehad my brewer working on some
(37:33):
lagers, because lagers take atleast a month to condition and
um really hit their peak wherethey're supposed to taste like,
and so so I'm like make somelagers, like let's go.
So so we're still making, youknow, some sours and fruit ipas
and stuff like that, uh thatpeople really like to drink.
(37:54):
But you know, as, as brewers,we we like our lagers.
So I think we have like four onright now.
So but we were able to givethem the time to condition and
um.
But now we're, you know, for ourthe last two anniversaries we
did um, we collabed with otherbreweries.
Um.
For our five year anniversary,we collaborated with uh Bewilder
(38:16):
and we brewed a classic Westcoast IPA, like I wanted and um,
then this last year, for oursixth year, we did a, a, a right
ipa, with fisher brewed overthere and they canned it and you
know.
So these are all those twobeers are all homebrew recipes
of mine and you know, send it tothe brewers like, yeah, cool,
let's do it, like yeah, so we're, we really want to get into
(38:39):
canning, we really want that, uh, creative freedom.
You know, it's just, that'sreally difficult with.
You know, we gotta hit fivepercent, so it's.
You know it's hard for me tocall some beers ipa when it's
not really an ipa.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah, I was have to warn people in town.
They're like oh, get that on,drive like hold on yeah, let me
warn you before this happensit's gonna be a light ipa.
You're gonna get half theflavor and the same cost.
Like get something in a can,like what?
Like I don't understand, itdoesn't make sense, but just do
it.
Yeah, it's essentially a pillow.
I mean it's so awesome thatyou've been able to hire the
right people and a lot of thosehave been people that you've met
(39:16):
along the way but then also,just freeing them up, the
kitchen staff are like hey, oh,this is too hard to make.
It takes too much time.
Make too takes too much time.
Like cool, give me analternative and we'll do that.
And similarly with your brewers, I mean like hey, quick, this
sounds fun, let's do that.
But like it's also hard when,again, like you have this like
five percent limit on anythingyou can do and so being able to
be like all right, we're goingto take that away now and now
you can make even more funthings right so just continuing
(39:38):
to free people up to be theirown creative genius.
But then it's also got to be funto see how I mean some of your
homebrew recipes have become.
I mean these now collaboratorcollaborations with these big
like other brewers around here,but also just to see how many
people like enjoy these thingsthat you've been making forever
and come back for more.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Oh, yeah, that's great.
And then some of my friendscome in and like, oh, I remember
, I remember this beer whenyou're brewing it back home and
it's, it's always really fun.
Yeah, but yeah, and then withour bar too, we use, um, we've
got some awesome cocktails.
Uh, we've got a great cocktailprogram and a ton of local
distilleries.
So we use local as much aspossible and, you know, give my
(40:18):
bartenders greater freedom tomake, uh, whatever kind of
cocktails they want to put onthe menu.
And so it's a big, it's a bigteam here.
You know, what do we want to do?
What do you guys want to try?
You know, and it's nice, comingfrom the corporate world, like
you make this like the.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Here's the recipe, here's the rules, here's the sop
.
Like here's everything you haveto do step by step, and instead
be like I'm not gonna be thatperson, but what do you guys
feel like doing?
Yeah, I kind of like this, butgreat, go do it, make it work.
Speaker 1 (40:44):
we it work.
We still keep the consistencyin our current recipes and what
we're making.
But then it's like somebody'slike can we try this?
Yeah, let's do it.
Can we bring this in?
Yeah, let's try it out, why not?
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Yeah, if you're not innovating, you're dying Might
as well.
Work with everybody that seesand interacts with people every
day, compared to you coming inas this overlord twirling his
mustache, saying, ah no, butthis will make us more money,
and blah, blah, blah.
And yeah, those never do well,anybody who comes to me is like
well, I have this idea for thisbusiness that could make money.
I'm like are you passionateabout it?
(41:17):
Is there something you have todo?
They're like well, no, but itcould make money.
I'm like you more likely tofail than if it's something you
actually want to do and love todo.
Like that will.
Like.
Everybody feels passion,everybody feels, um, that
authenticity behind it, and Ifeel like this is a good
dedication to that, because it'sit's not like you just decided
oh, there's an opportunity tomake a brewery, I'm gonna go do
that.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
You're like I've been doing this for decades and now
I finally have took my like Itrusted myself to do it on my
own yeah, exactly I mean, that'sjust I didn't do this to make
money like and being arestaurant we don't make a ton
of money anyway, so I'm just Ilove what I'm doing.
That's a lot of fun and my myteam's happy.
I take good care of them andyou know you just come in here
(42:00):
and it's that's a good time.
My team's all always happy tobe here than other industry
people were here like I thinkthat's.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
That's when you know that you've done something great
, when people who are in it comehere to spend their time.
One of my favorite signs of agood dive bar is the waiters,
servers, whoever are off, andthen they just grab a seat and
sit in the bar and start hangingout.
So I feel like it's similar tothat.
People are like oh yeah, I makebeer, yeah, I work at a
restaurant, but like we're goingto Hopkins to enjoy my time off
(42:30):
.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Oh, yeah, yeah, and you see my team come in on their
days off, come hang out.
I'm like, all right, I'm doingsomething, yeah you're doing
something right, you don't hateme.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Good, I mean, obviously you mentioned canning
and getting some higher IPA beer, but then also being able to I
mean sell things outside of heremore.
I mean outside of that.
What are some of the plans youhave for Hopkins?
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Yeah, that's.
The next big step is get acanning line open up, that
creative freedom.
You know kind of have a want tohave a grab and go cooler up
front.
People want to come in and takesome stuff to go and just have
it ready to go, like this PicoRico we just drank.
I would love to have thatcanned, be able to take that
home.
But you know I don't want toget into distribution.
(43:16):
Really, you know that kind ofloses its touch, its value, what
it means to me.
You know I don't want itsitting on the shelf warm at the
dabs or you know I just youmiss that interaction and so
we'll we'll send some stuff outto beer bars and you know, like
slack water, slack water's great, yeah, because they train their
(43:38):
team and people know theirbeers there and that's why I
want my beer to go, if it has togo, be sold from outside of
here, but we'll try to do asmuch as we can from inside here
yeah, you can trust your baby toonly so many people, yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
and because, yeah, I mean like once I mean
distribution is like a wholenother business and pain point,
and I mean I wouldn't want to dothat too.
But then also I mean you lookat all the people I mean the
brewers and that have gotten bigenough if they kind of lost
their soul, and that's usuallythat first step towards that.
And then you get so big thatall of a sudden you are that
corporate guy.
Now you're like, oh, I lost, Ibecame the thing I set out to
(44:15):
conquer.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
Yeah, yeah, and we don't want to go there.
You know I've had a lot ofpeople real estate people and
landlords reach out to me likecome check out this property.
We'd love for you to buildsomething here, like, and we'll
invest all this money intomaking what you need it to be to
put your brew house in.
And people really want me toopen chains and I'm like that's
(44:38):
not, it's not what I wanted.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
Done this before no, thank you.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
No, like it will never be as good as this.
So and I, you know I can't beat all places at the same time
and what's really important tosomething like this is owner
presence, like I got to be here.
I mean I don't have to be, butI should be here.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
I like being here, yeah, so which is a good sign,
like if you had once foundyourself at a place.
You're like, oh, I don't reallylike this anymore.
Like then don't, yeah, but itis a good sign that you're doing
the right thing.
You're like, oh, I like beinghere, I like being present, I
like showing people beer, I likehanding people food if they
want to try something new, orjust I mean, because if you're
not here, you don't know whatthe feel is like, what the
customers are like, what peopledo want, right, and then
(45:21):
judgment calls, but until you'rein the middle of it all, then
you're just kind of outside ofit.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
Yeah, that's just, I don't know you get so
disconnected from your ownbusiness Like I've seen it
happen to other people that'slike, and how their team
portrays them and it's.
You know, I never want to be,never wanted to be like that.
No, so deal.
And I think one thing that isreally cool that we do here is
really focus on local.
You know, I like to say we'rehyper local.
(45:46):
Um, you know, everything fromthe food to the ingredients in
our beer is grown locally asmuch as possible what are some
of your biggest suppliers?
that you use on everything.
Um, so for our beer, um, it'smostly grown up near logan and
solstice malt he, he, uh, jamesis his name he opened his own
(46:07):
malt house pretty close to theairport.
Um, and he picks up grain fromall over Utah and and malts it
himself and delivers it and andso it's.
It's just awesome.
And then you, I need to takethat same grain and you take it
to after you've brewed with thegrain.
You take that same grain andtake it to the farmer and the
(46:28):
they feed their cattle orwhatever with it and like and
some places there's a brewerythat just opened up in Logan.
He's getting his grain fromthis farmer and then he's, after
it's spent, take it, takes itback to the same farmer like
just circle of life oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
I think this beer, I think the malt we got from this
is actually from that.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Anyway, that's funny yeah, so we use a lot of little
local companies for our stuff.
Luckily there's some big onesthat help do a lot of stuff,
like Nicholas and Co's, where weget most of our food from and
they're local and so they have alot of local little businesses.
but we use a lot of differentlittle bakeries for each kind of
specific thing we want to getfor our breads, um, and then we
(47:14):
use a lot of uh.
Caputo's has like a businessthat brings in a lot of
different stuff too.
Yes, we use them a lot, um, butI just for me, it's so
important to bring in local,sustainable stuff, like our
burger.
It's grass-fed, the cows areraised here in Utah and you know
(47:36):
it's better on the environment,and then when you have
humane-raised meat, it tastesbetter too.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Yep.
So you can't make good foodwithout good ingredients and
also you can't make good foodwithout good ingredients.
I mean you can, and also youcan't make good beer without
good ingredients.
And usually the closer it isand I mean especially when you
know the person and you knowwhat they're doing to do to
create whatever ingredients itmight be that's goes better than
.
Where did this come from?
Who made this?
How is it?
What's in it?
What's not in it?
There's a whole level of trustthat starts to disappear.
(48:03):
And also like another detail islike the art on your wall
always changes, because it'salways local artists that I mean
want to promote their own workthat you've given that space for
.
So it's like not only is itjust in the food, but it's, I
mean, everything from the like Imentioned, like the jazz nights
and all the programming thatyou put on to.
I mean everything hanging fromthe walls is local things oh
yeah, and we don't.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
You know, we change that once a month.
We have a whole bunch ofartists that come in and set up
and we don't take any commissionfor it.
It's just like, hey, it's coolto have a place to show your
stuff off and if you sellsomething, great, like, very
cool.
So yeah, we love supporting theartists, the music.
We have a ton of local musichere three to four days a week,
(48:46):
so there's always somethinggoing on here.
Speaker 2 (48:48):
There's always a reason to come to Hopkins.
Oh yeah, if it's even just thebeer and the food alone, awesome
, but then also if you need areason to listen to some music
or have some sort of event, alsogreat to have here.
Because, like I said in thebeginning, one thing I love
about Hopkins is it's like sucha either like double threat or
even triple threat, because youhave, I mean, grape Year check.
(49:09):
You have your own food in yourown kitchen, you have control
over that's amazing Check.
I mean patio if you want to gooutside.
Also a lot of great events, Imean it's hard to find a weak
point here.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
Yeah, it's a good place to have.
Yeah, we have something goingevery day, never boring, no.
Speaker 2 (49:26):
Well, I want to wrap up with the two questions I
always ask everybody at the endof each episode.
Number one if you could havesomeone on the Small Lake City
podcast and hear more abouttheir story, who would you want
to hear from, oh?
Speaker 1 (49:38):
You know, one of my best friends is David
Tastemasters.
He does a podcast.
Is David taste masters, he doesa podcast and and his podcast
is focused on a lot of umbrewers and distillers and he's
a lot of fun to talk to.
I always love hearingpodcasters interview podcasters,
cause it can be really fun.
Yes, and so so he's.
(50:00):
He's good.
Did he's kind of changing umhis whole dynamic on how he's
doing things?
but he's also the head brewer atketo's, so, um, yeah, we're
total beer nerds and just loveour community, so, um, but he's
kind of a big deal with thebrewing community and I think
he'd be a lot of fun to have onthe show oh yeah, because I mean
it's fun to talk about peoplelike their specific beer, but be
(50:20):
like all right, let's look atthe whole landscape, what like,
especially someone who, I mean,knows the industry here super
well and knows beer super well.
Speaker 2 (50:27):
To be like what?
What should I know?
Or what do I not know that Ishould know?
So no, definitely reach out tome.
It sounds like a, because Ithink I've talked about him
before, but fascinating.
Dude, and also just ketos ingeneral, has been another great
brewery that's come through inthe past five or six years and
really I mean made a big impactand made some really cool beer
too yeah, david.
David's done some, some coolstuff over there lately, so cool
.
And then, lastly, if peoplewant to find out more about
(50:49):
Hopkins or see programming,where's the best place to find
information?
Speaker 1 (50:53):
I'd say our Instagram .
I do our social media so I tryto post on there daily and just
post as much information aspossible.
We've got our calendar andwe've got all our events on
there.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
Do All our events on there.
Deal Then come by.
What's the specific address?
Speaker 1 (51:06):
I know it's on 21st South and something it's 1048
East, 2100 South, got a bigspiky ball on the top of the
building from the 50s.
It's pretty cool yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
It's an iconic location.
I mean, even the basement hassigns of the furniture store
that used to be here and all ofthe previous things.
But come by, grab, grab somefood, have some beer.
We got a big parking lot in theback too so, yes, there's
parking spaces to have, so youdon't have to worry about the I
mean construction that somehownever ends but might end one day
(51:37):
, I don't know.
Should be done by september,they say, so we'll see so
that'll probably mean it's likedone at like 2027, uh, but I
mean hopefully it's done inseptember for everybody and
you're safe yeah, yeah, we're.
Speaker 1 (51:49):
All of us businesses are around here.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
We're just, we're ready, like all right, let's
let's be done here, especiallylike how many years longer it's
gone than probably anyway wecould talk about.
I could talk about traffic andconstruction, utah in general,
but it's nuts.
No chad, this has been great.
Thank you so much for creatingthis space.
It's awesome.
It's well welcomed.
But keep doing what you'redoing and, yeah, I'll keep
coming around.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
Cool.
Thanks, man, appreciate youhaving me on.
Speaker 2 (52:12):
No, thank you Right on.
I'd probably say it was high school is when I
discovered craft beer.
Just had this like idea, likewow, I want to open my own
brewery.
I did all this discovery of allthese beers.
I'm like fuck, we can't.
Nobody's brewing all the stuffI want to drink.
I have hit root myself.
Sugar House is like that's.
My dream is to have a brew pubin Sugar House, but I didn't
think that was ever going tohappen.
(00:21):
If we wanted the bar license,we had six weeks to open,
because here in Utah we all needeach other.
We all need all the breweries.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
What is up everybody and welcome back to another
episode of the Small Lake CityPodcast.
I'm your host, eric Nilsson,and this week's guest is someone
that I've been really excitedto talk about.
His name is Chad Hopkins and incase you recognize the last
name, then about His name isChad Hopkins, and in case you
recognize the last name, thenyou probably know that he's the
founder of Hopkins Brewing.
Now, hopkins Brewing is one ofmy favorite breweries to go to
(00:51):
for a few reasons One great beer, two, great food menu and three
great programming.
We talk about how Chad grew up,around the corner from where
Hopkins is today, his passionfor food and beverage and the
energy of working in restaurantswhere he got his passion for
brewing beer, starting to brewhis own and then taking the leap
to truly start his own brewery,thanks to some help from his
(01:13):
friends.
But let's jump into it.
It's a great conversation withme and Chad that you're going to
enjoy.
It was fun because we actuallyrecorded right in the brewery
itself, so enjoy and I'll seeyou on the other side.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
The theater and everything was built over there
where the Barnes Noble.
There were little local shopsall around there and it was just
a big, wide-open parking lotand so we used to skate there.
That was our hangout.
We'd go skate and then, overhere, you had, I mean, you had
Bronx Records, where Whole Foodsis, but you had another record
shop over here.
(01:46):
You had, I mean, you had BronxRecords, where Whole Foods is,
but you had another record shopover here, a hip hop shop, a
skate shop, like you had allsorts of small businesses all
around here.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
And then when the Olympics came here and Barnes
Noble's built, it just kind ofkicked out a lot of the locals
and it got really corporate andit just kind of sure how sausage
feel for a minute there.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
I agree.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
And you know I'm so grateful to be in here.
I feel like I've kind of takenit back, taking back the local,
and more and more localbusinesses are popping up around
here and it's great.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
It's like that's what sugar house is built on, like
we need to keep it local exactly, and I love that it's kind of
become this blueprint because,like, when you think about like
salt lake in its development,sugar house was kind of the
first spot where it's like, okay, cool, we're gonna actually
develop this, we're gonna bringin a lot of new opportunities
not all good ones, not all badones but then we've kind of seen
how, like central ninth isstarting to get developed and
(02:36):
like the post district, allthese other places that feel I
feel like the things we've thathappened here are being learned
onth.
I mean it's all local placesand some of those like badass
businesses, it's all Lake andthe same with, I mean, like post
districts.
I mean it's I don't can't thinkof a completely like corporate
thing in there and they've donereally good about curating that.
So I'm glad that we've gonefrom like all right, listen, we
don't need this anymore.
(02:57):
But we I do.
Speaker 1 (02:58):
I know what we, these local people that actually care
about where they're at oh, yeah, I think the Olympics brought a
big wave of corporatebusinesses here Totally that are
now starting to go away.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Not mad about it.
I'll always support localpeople, so I mean so you're born
and raised in Sugar House,you're, I mean, used to seeing
all the local businessesskateboarding around here.
I mean especially like the,like what I call the Shopko
parking lot, even though Shopkois obviously not there anymore.
Oh yeah, like the.
My last memory of it was so inthe early 2010s.
I found out about this app thatpeople were doing to make a
(03:32):
bunch of money whenever theywanted to, and I was like, well,
that sounds like a great idea.
So I applied to become a Lyftdriver Nice and so I was like
one of the first ones here andthen I got invited to do.
They used to have this thingcalled the mentor program, where
anybody who's been a driver fora while has a really good
rating.
They'll be like, hey, you'regoing to kind of be the last
line of defense.
You'll meet with people, answerquestions, go on a drive with
them, and if it's like the vibesare off, like Caesar thumbs
(03:54):
down, and if it's likeeverything's fine and like good
to go, so I would just like linewait in shopko and just do them
over and over again, andessentially I only have to work
for like four hours a week andthen go back to school.
Uh, it's like that.
I spent a lot of time in thatparking lot just sitting there
and I'm sure there's someonewho's like, is this guy selling
drugs?
Yeah, but no, just just gettingpeople rideshare drivers, but
(04:16):
so so border raising here likevery local to I mean both sugar
house and ninth and ninth area,but I know that so much of your
career in history is based on, Imean restaurant, hospitality,
food and Bev.
I mean, when did that story allstart or where did the journey
begin?
Speaker 1 (04:31):
You know, I my first job in um in restaurants was the
Einsteins on 15th and 15th.
Heck, yeah, so um.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, I started there in like 98, I think so that's
when I look at him, like how areyou still here, like I wouldn't
mind if it was something else,because again the local stuff
and just that area, but yeah, soI mean starts with einstein's
yeah, yeah and it's.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
You know, back then utah was salt lake was just kind
of a weird, kind of weird placeand it just cousin it was.
This area was just kind ofoutcast, it was sugar house was
a shithole, yeah, in the 80s and90s.
And you know people like, oh,you're living sugar house, oh
it's kind of rough, and I'm likewhatever, it's not my hat, like
it's still what I know in myhome.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Yeah, it's like, what do you think?
Speaker 1 (05:13):
but I like it like you know, I wouldn't as a kid
like if I left my skateboard outfront and be gone.
You know, like I live in sandynow.
Like you leave your bikes out,you leave anything out there.
Nobody, nobody gives a shityeah, someone will probably put
in your garage for you yeah soit's, it's a lot different.
So and still, you know it's it'sstill kind of the city here,
(05:33):
you know so.
But yeah, so I worked ateinstein's for a bit and uh
really liked the energy ofrestaurants because there's
you're not going to be bored.
You know there's alwayssomething to do, so you're
always on your feet movingaround and and I liked that a
lot, so I did uh.
Shortly after that I went tothe military for a little bit.
Didn't really love it, but I.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
I get dubious of people who are like I love the
side tangent.
I was golfing with this guyonce at bonneville and I was
playing alone and all of asudden this guy almost like pops
out of the woods walking hiscar's, like, hey, you got room
for one more.
I was like nice, yeah.
And this guy was probably theweirdest person I've ever golfed
with on a golf course.
And so he goes on to be like,oh, what do you do?
I'm like I work in tech and dothis.
And he's like, oh, I'm likewhat did you do?
(06:16):
He's like I'm a retired pilot,like, oh, cool, sweet.
He's like I was at NAMM and Iwas like, oh, I mean, that must
have been tough.
He's like, yeah, unless youlike killing people.
And I was like, okay, like.
And then he goes on to be like,yeah, but then I ended up
getting two women pregnant thereand then found out both of them
within the last years Don'tcare for one of them, but the
other one's pretty nice.
And I was like you, yeah, I waslike you are someone I don't
(06:38):
necessarily know if I want to inthe middle of a golf course, in
the middle of nowhere, but inyour military.
Were you mostly domestic or didyou get to travel anywhere fun?
Speaker 1 (06:46):
No, I just did the reserves and just stayed here.
I you know kind of morepressure from my parents.
Yeah in a sense, and I'm justlike this is not, this is not my
thing, so which?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
is good because you have an experience.
You're like, oh, I like thisenergy, I like doing this and
then being like, not that, let'scontinue to refine what we want
to do.
So you do the reserves and thenI assume you go back to some
sort of food and bed hospitality.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Yeah, I mean, came back here and, you know,
actually went back to Einstein's, worked at a different one for
a little bit and then juststarted working a bunch of
chains around here, cool, helpedopen like all the noodles and
company and payways and just allthese like fast, casual chains.
Um, actually helped open thethe noodles over here.
Yeah, so I worked at the paywaythat used to be here that's now
(07:33):
.
I don't even know it's overthere anymore.
I think it's like a dentistoffice, yeah.
So, um, which is kind of funnyCause when that restaurant we'll
side tangent on that.
When I was, I had a great teamover there.
That was years ago.
I worked there but they wereclosing down as I was opening.
So some of my old cooks werewalking over here and they're
like, hey, you're like you'reopening your own business.
(07:55):
I'm like, yeah, it was perfect,so got a couple of my old cooks
that worked for me at Paywayforever ago.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
I was, I went to that payway a lot like that was one
of my mom's favorite like,because my mom was a
pediatrician before she retired,it's like didn't have a ton of
time.
So she, like I recognized myown adhd hyper fixations in her
old behavior and one of them waslike meals that we would eat.
Like she would go like one,like she got this like a ricotta
and cheese from costco multipletimes a week for like a month
or two and then we wouldn't haveit again.
And then like all of these,just like deep dives.
And then there was one whereshe's like yeah, payway, send me
(08:30):
your order, I'm picking it up.
We're like, we're going topayways.
Like I mean, I don't like don'tget me wrong like I love a good
, uh, what I call like a sugaryfried chicken and rice, but
always a classic.
But that's fun that you could,hey guys, like just walk up here
half a block and come cook overhere.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah, it was interesting doing the the
corporate thing for a while.
I just didn't really love thateither.
I loved the restaurant thingbut didn't like the corporate
thing.
So so I bounced around a fewdifferent places and then tried
to take a break from, break fromit, went to uh, went to Whole
Foods for a little bit and I Iloved working at Whole Foods, um
, because it was a lot of people, like-minded people.
(09:06):
Yeah, you know we all careabout, um, the environment,
sustainability, and a lot ofpeople love good beer and there
are a lot of homebrewers, so wewould all share beer with each
other and and beer wasn't one ofmy departments, so I got to
choose, like a lot of stuff webrought in.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Cool.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
So that was.
That was a lot of fun Did thatfor a couple years and then I
just kind of missed therestaurant chaos so went back to
it um, but started working umwith a consultant and learned a
lot about the back end ofopening restaurants and and so
kind of followed him around alittle bit.
Um turned out he wasn't a verygood dude and so a lot of drama.
(09:45):
He has a lot of people money.
He owes me money but you knowwe're just gonna not worry about
that anymore.
Sometimes you gotta cut yourlosses and move on.
Yeah, it was a.
It was a really good experience.
Um, and then after that went onmy own and just I helped um,
this little small pizza place upin Camas Summit and Pizza
they're in like 200 plus yearold hotel, like I lived above it
(10:09):
, yep.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
I've.
I spent how long was that?
Probably four months living inOakley.
Oh, yes, and like cause.
I mean when you're up in Oakley, like it's beautiful, like that
whole area is gorgeous, amazing, but if you need to get
anywhere, pain in the ass.
Oh yeah, and so I would alwaysbe like it's the end of the day,
I've done so much.
Maybe friday, saturday, weekend, I just want food and there's
(10:30):
only so many restaurants thatare out because you have that
like, unless I want to go justlike ken's cash and grab like a
bunch of random snacks butthere's always some at pizza and
I knew I just went straightdown the road for like two miles
get my pizza and it was good.
Pizza too, that was great wasgreat, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
So yeah, I got to drive up there for a little bit
and kind of it was fun it was.
You know, a lot of my career incorporate restaurants was going
and taking over restaurantsthat were just not really
well-run and kind of flippingthem, yeah, you know, turn them
around, make them successful andthen kind of go on to the next
thing.
So you know, these guys wereestablished.
I think they ready to opensomething new, so so it's cool.
(11:09):
So I got to help design the newstore and get them set up and I
was planning to stick aroundand open more stores for them.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
But do you, did you feel like you enjoyed more of
like that opening and gettingthings started side, or did you
just love the humdrum ofoperating a restaurant, just
kind of the chaos that goesalong with it?
Speaker 1 (11:24):
You know the opening was really fun because I did a
lot of that with the corporatestuff and you know I got to do
that a little bit with theconsultant.
Just, you know, help design andset up restaurants and I really
enjoyed that.
Um, you know, you just kind of,with corporate restaurants,
just kind of get bored doing theday-to-day stuff because it's
like anything extra I'm doinghere is just supporting some
(11:45):
corporation and it's not reallydoing me any good.
So, um, so I got fired a lotfor my corporate jobs.
So you know they want you towork 50 hours and I'm like you
know I create successful storesand a good team environment and
people love the jobs and we, youknow we hit all our numbers and
people like, why aren't youworking 50 hours?
Speaker 2 (12:02):
I'm like I don't need to yeah, everything's happening
the way it should like.
I'm not going to be here forthe sake of being here, no.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
So I'm like you know.
So I went to college, then Ididn't start at the U until I
was 28.
And so I kind of had itcushioned, some of my
restaurants I was running andlike, ran a good operation.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
So if you don't need it, why go spend money to make
money when you're already makingmoney without spending money?
Yeah, so I'm like, no, I, Ithink I'm gonna go to college
now, which is like I think morepeople should take that into
account.
Like I was talking to umsomeone semi recently and like,
oh, I like took to you, like no,it's actually one of my friends
.
She uh has a daughter that Imean, it was the typical kid of
like oh, when I graduate, I'mgetting out of here, I'm gonna
(12:44):
do my own thing.
Blah, blah, you can't keep melike.
All right, whatever, cool, likegraduate from high school.
If you want to live here 500bucks a month in rent, unless
you want to go to school, thenwe'll cover your rent.
Um, choices yours.
She's like, no, screw you, I'mmoving out of here.
So ends up moving in with likethree or four of her friends in
a two bedroom apartment andthey're all working.
I think she was working atcostco, which is like pretty
good side of things, and shekind of looked at what like I
(13:08):
mean just like the trajectory ofher life and like what I was
looking at, and she's like, hey,mom, I'm gonna come move in and
go back to school, it's like,okay, cool, like because, like I
always like when people I meanany time in life where you can
voluntarily make a decision,instead of someone saying here's
the next step, or go do this,or go do that, it makes it more
impactful, it makes it moremeaningful.
You're gonna try so much morebecause you actually care about
it, compared to here's the nextthing that, like, I have to do,
(13:29):
that, I don't want to do.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
This is just what you do, yes, what you do with your
life.
No, I would.
I.
There's no way I could havedone well in college when, like
right out of high school, likeI'm surprised.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
I like I made it work , knowing myself.
Now I was like maybe to go dosomething else for a minute,
come back to it oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yeah, I was.
I was ready when I was 20.
I'm like, all right, let'scheck this out.
And I did great.
I loved it.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
I'm like I wouldn't have loved it before you gotta
appreciate it for what it'sworth and if you, sometimes it
takes a little bit of time, likea fine wine.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you go to school.
I mean, like what did that playin your decision-making process
?
I mean, were you still justlike hey, I kind of want to use
this to be more on this food andbed and restaurant side, or did
you have different plans fromthere?
Speaker 1 (14:08):
you know, kind of my goal has always been on my own
business.
Um, you know, my, my parentsowned their own business and you
know I always told them theyowned a body shop like paint and
body shop and so, um, so I grewup working there a lot too, uh,
working on cars, and I I lovethat.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Um, so I do as a hobby I was gonna say if anybody
that follows you on instagramknows that you enjoy cars, oh
yeah my third toys.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
You know they're fun for me.
So I but I grew up around thata lot and grew around, grew
around, uh, uh, my parents own,you know, a business and and
they had a couple um businessesgoing to and so they're always
busy, Um, but I but I love that,like it's.
It was just really cool to see,like bear in charge of their
lives and what they were doing.
And yeah, they worked a lot but, um, but it was awesome and I
(14:57):
was like Mike, I want to.
Can I buy this business fromyou?
Like, can we like worksomething out here?
And they're like no, you don'twant to do this shit.
Like this sucks.
Yeah, I'm like, well, I'm tiredof working for other people.
So that was off the plate.
You know I was pretty bummedabout that.
But going to the?
U I just wanted to go, just togo.
Yeah, just, you know, gone tocollege and you know I just I
(15:20):
went into business management,entrepreneurship, and you know I
learned some things, but a lotof it I had mostly learned on my
, you know, on my journeythrough working on restaurants
and corporate stuff.
You get so much training withwith corporate jobs, which is
one bonus to it, um, but it wasjust a good experience it was.
I had a lot of fun doing it, so, um, it was pretty easy for me
(15:44):
at that point.
Speaker 2 (15:45):
Yeah, it's like nice Cause, like if someone were to
put me back in school, I'd belike, so I have like four
classes.
I it's like nice because, like,if someone were to put me back
in school, I'd be like, so Ihave like four classes, I have
like three homework assignmentsand I just got to be ready for
tests.
Like I'm in, like are youkidding me?
I used to complain about thisLike compared to like what I'm
expected to do.
It.
I mean any sort of job or anysort of thing that can, like
give you a living wage, like,yeah, that sounds, that sounds
(16:06):
really nice, but then also givesyou like that mental space to
be like what do I want to do?
What does life look like?
What kind of business do I wantto start in understanding more
of like the details of it?
But then it's hard because,like I mean, everything you
learn in school is such in asilo and like such a theory
compared to like what you'vebeen used to of operating and
opening restaurants, like that'sthe actuals and like the actual
experience of doing it, whichis never as simple as a
(16:27):
classroom will let you make itseem to be right.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yeah, like uh when I took over whole foods, one of my
departments was prepared foodsand the previous manager had
hired all these kids out ofculinary school.
Everybody wants to be a chefand that's like, well, you guys
gotta clean, you guys gotta makestuff to this recipe, you guys
gotta do dishes like, you guysgotta do all this shit.
And they're like what we?
Just everybody wants to be.
(16:51):
You know, chef, I want to makethis dish and like, culinary
kids were not the ones to hire.
So if you want to get in theculinary industry, go work at a
restaurant.
Speaker 2 (16:59):
For guys Go wash some dishes, go bus some tables and
then appreciate all of thethings that build up to it,
Because it's not just do the funstuff and hand everything else
to everybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
See if that's what you really want to do.
And in fact one of therestaurants we opened with a
consultant and this guy had abunch of money, decided he
wanted a fine dining restaurant,went to culinary school and we
got that thing open and he justhe couldn't handle it, couldn't
handle the pressure of therestaurant.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
He's like I've got millions of dollars opening
these businesses.
This would be easy.
I'm like good luck, let me knowhow it goes.
Yeah, so he's not running thatrestaurant anymore.
Somebody else took over.
That makes sense.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
It made it work Well because so my, actually I'm
going to go visit him thisweekend.
He lives in Portland, inWillamette Valley.
He's been a chef his entirelife, for the most part, and but
also it's fun too.
So they live with lab of valleyand your response makes you,
you know that.
You know what it.
I mean.
It's wine country a lot, tonsof pinots, tons of shards and
hops and hops, yes, and so he'llalways so.
(18:03):
I mean him and his boyfriendare, I mean, wine enthusiasts
through and through, but he alsofor I mean his restaurants and
work has always purchased winethrough it.
So it's fun, we go taste.
It's like, oh, come to the,come to this room.
Here's the reserve bottles,here's all of like just totally
red carpet treatment, which isfun.
But his nephew named jonathan,he went to oregon state and
became an engineer, graduatedand then he got done with school
(18:26):
.
He's like, actually I think Iwant to go work in a restaurant
and be like j Nice and so, sureenough, like goes and works.
I mean it's like a really nicerestaurant in downtown Portland
called Le Pigeon, but I meanstarts washing dishes and starts
bar, like I mean just, I meanthe hard, like the shitty part
of it, but then now he's finallylike up to like I mean sous
chef and like actually cooking,and he's like, yeah, I like this
(18:46):
a lot more than, oh, it's whatI was doing, that's fun, I mean,
especially in the middle ofchaos, a big rush, and you've
got just a line of people andyou're looking at your tickets
and you're just like, wow, we'renever getting out of this,
we're gonna.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
This is our life now.
Yeah.
But then you see it to that endticket and it is the most
rewarding thing and you're, andit's done, everybody's,
everybody can breathe.
We're done.
Oh yeah, we did it like it'slike it's done, everybody can
breathe.
We're done.
Oh yeah, we did it.
It's like a game, it's so fun.
It's like well, see youtomorrow.
Yeah, let's do it again.
It's not for everybody.
(19:21):
No, it takes a certain personto do it and that's a lifestyle
and it's fun.
Talking to other serviceindustry people, we try to plan
meetings and stuff and peoplelike, oh, that's a hold it.
Well, I'm more so, we're stillopen.
So like doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
What do you think people want to do when they're
off?
Yeah, I'll have a beer and agood meal with their friends.
And guess what I do?
I give them that beer and agood meal.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
Yeah, that's like you know, talking to other industry
people that are hanging outhere today, it's like we're
trying to plan like some partyfor somebody and it's like, well
, every day is a Friday for us,so what's the slowest day we can
do this party?
Let's do it Monday, yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
That'll work for everybody.
Oh yeah, so you go to the?
U, you have kind of this timeto take a break to be at school,
which is the best part ofschool, but I mean, what
happened after that?
I mean, at what point were youlike, all right, I think I know
what I want to do for my ownbusiness and it's going to be
this.
Yeah, I mean it's.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
I'd probably say it was high school.
It was when I discovered craftbeer and and Corona's to trick a
lot of Corona's and I just hadthis like idea, like wow, I want
to, I want to open my ownbrewery.
And you know, when I was 28,about the time I started college
(20:40):
, I started home brewing too andwinemaking, grow my own
Chardonnay grapes at home andgrowing up for a long time used
to just make wine every year andI just put them in beer.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
But Like eh we're, we're gonna dump it all into
here instead yeah, and so justreally got into it.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
you know, I spent a lot of time, um, just dialing in
recipes and, uh, I took over my.
My whole basement ended up likeripping out all the carpet in
my basement, putting epoxyfloors and standstill steel
sinks and extra sinks, and I hadlike two, three homebrew
systems at one time.
(21:14):
And I don't know if you sawthat kegerator that's in that
room next to the bar.
Yes, but there's.
I think there's eight taps onthat thing, but that was in my
basement.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
And I have friends that come in here and sit at the
bar like, is that the kegeratoryou had in your basement?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I'm like, yeah, that come in here and sit at the bar
like is that the kegerator youhad in your basement like?
Speaker 1 (21:32):
yeah, like yeah it's come, it comes with me,
obviously.
Yeah, so he you know he broughtthat here.
I still had a bunch of stuff abunch of beers and stuff left
over when we first opened and Itold him, hey, try this stuff
out like.
And people are like why don'tyou bring your homebrew system
here and like let's start stuff.
So that's that's what we do now.
Every friday you can tryhomebrew batches.
Pretty much, you know, smallbatches for my brewers, but
(21:56):
anyway.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
But I guess during that time when you're starting
because again, like you havethis whole period of exploring
from, like the ripe old age of18 till, let's say, 20 when you
start school I mean, was thereany sort of beers you gravitated
towards or what was thatlearning process like, because I
can't imagine it was justsuccess from the beginning?
Speaker 1 (22:13):
You know we were, we were so limited here with beer,
you know, and it was, it washard to get anything high point
or anything like reallyinteresting.
We just, I mean we've had somegood beer.
I mean we've got some greatbreweries that have been around
for a while.
They're pretty big now andpretty much all sold and no
longer really local.
Um, but we've, you know, we'vealways had good beer here, but
(22:33):
it's always been just kind ofjust simple, nothing like really
nothing really out there,nothing really too interesting.
Occasionally some of ourbreweries did do that some
really interesting stuff andthen they stopped doing it.
So I just I would travel aroundand and drink beer everywhere I
go.
And I remember actually here Iwas hanging out at a friend's
(22:58):
house and, um, he had a friendthat was in town from Oregon or
Washington, somewhere in thePacific Northwest.
Yeah, I'm drinking a fullsuspension and you know this is
20 something years ago, it's 4%,and I'm like this beer is 20
something years ago, it's fourpercent, and I'm like this beer
is so hoppy, it's so good, and Istill love full suspensions
great, great beer classer.
(23:18):
But he's like, try this, handsme a red hook esb and blew my
fucking mind.
I'm just, I'm like what is thebeer tastes like this holy shit,
so like just elevated my, mypalate.
I'm like, what is the beertastes like this Holy shit, so
like just elevated my, my palate.
And I'm like, how do I get thisbeer?
So I ended up going up toOregon, going to Washington it
(23:40):
was near Seattle so went to the,went to the brewery, checked it
out, like just really kind ofwent after it.
I'm like, like, how do I, howdo I brew this?
So I brewed a lot of that,brewed a lot of esb at home and,
um, you know, that was like myearly 20s when that happened.
And so I did all this discoveryof all these beers.
I'm like, fuck, we can't.
Nobody's brewing all the stuffI want to drink.
(24:02):
I have hit root myself.
If no one else is doing it,you're gonna have to do it
yourself.
Yeah, and luckily a lot ofpeople had that same idea.
So now we've got a lot of greatlittle local breweries all over
Salt Lake and you know, kind ofspreading out all over Utah and
that's amazing and I'm like, ifI can go and everybody's kind
(24:23):
of doing their own thing, and Ilove it.
We have so much good beer herein Utah.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
And it's so funny because it's like this, almost
like it's so contradictory,because obviously utah
population you can always assumehalf of people don't drink and
taboo around it all and alsoweird liquor laws, but at the
same time breweries keep poppingup and they all keep doing like
really, really well, and it'sso.
It's fun to see how muchsuccess there is, how much,
because I mean it was fun, likein the same way that you talk
(24:50):
about Washington, like Seattleis where I really started to
appreciate beer, because Ireally didn't start like
drinking until college-ish Shoutout Mormonism.
But when I did it was like Imean I was again Mormonism.
I was like just wanted anythingsweet, nothing too bitter.
So I'd be like, oh, let me geta Heff, let me get a Blue and
let me get a.
That's the gateway beer.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
Let me get a blue and let me get a.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
I mean gateway beer.
It is the gateway beer,especially in Utah.
If I wanted to open up abrewery and just get people and
be like here, take this, doyou've never had this before?
Great, then just come closerand closer.
But that was the first placeLike there was.
I'll never forget this.
There was one time so I met thisfriend there via my partner up
(25:35):
meeting him, and it was one ofthose like this is so fucking
awkward, what are we doing?
But then at the end of likedamn it, you guys were right and
so and he had he's from montana, was it went to the udub and
had a bunch of friends fromthere.
He just kind of like be likehey, like we're gonna hang out I
know you don't have any friends, come hang out.
And there was one time thatlike hey, we're it's game three
of whatever.
I think that would have beenlike what?
2017?
I think it was a year beforeanyway.
Um, so we go to buffalo wildwings and we just tell the
(25:57):
there's probably like 20 of usat this long table and we're
like, hey, just whenever youcome back, just have two space
dust in your hand and we'llfigure it out from there.
Nice, needless to say, everybodypretty much like borderline
blacked out that night becausewe just kept like chugging space
dust, like it was PBR, and butthat was the time I was like, oh
, what is this?
Like that's a, that's called anIPA and that's like don't drink
(26:19):
too much.
Anyway, you can imagine how itgoes from here, probably.
Yeah.
Then there's always likebecause I mean, they have a
liquor store here, I mean, andElysian is an amazing brewery,
and so like I'll always take apicture of it and send it to
those friends and be likeremember that one time.
And everybody's like, how couldwe forget?
So, yeah, I mean Washington isanother place that I explored
(26:40):
and understood and appreciatedbeer and coffee.
But so I love that you havethis experience of like, oh well
, there's beer I want.
I can't have it, I'm going tomake it and it'd be fun to do
this, but I mean, at what pointdid you bridge those two
together?
And we're like you know whatTime to do it myself.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
On a bigger scale, I would say, yeah, I mean, it's it
always been kind of on the backof my mind.
I'm like someday, someday, I'mgoing to do my own thing.
And you know, then my son wasborn kind of my mid-30s and I'm
just like I can't keep workingfor other people.
The corporate thing is justboring to me and there's no real
(27:23):
vision there.
They're not really doinganything to make the world
better, they're just trying tomake money and I struggled with
that.
And then I'm working forsomebody else on his.
You know, the sultan I workedfor is, you know he's a fraud
and it's like, oh, this sucksworking for this guy, like you
know.
So I, I was just like I have to, I have to open my own business
.
And you know, I I got a, um, apoker game of friends I've been
(27:49):
going to for 15 years orsomething cool and and I'd
always bring my homebrew.
And people are like, finally,one of my friends is like dude,
you need to open your ownbrewery, you do this.
And he kind of like startedpushing me and he was like he's
like whatever, whatever you needhelp with.
Because he had opened his own,uh, business doing sushi.
(28:10):
He's like whatever you needhelp with, because he had opened
his own business doing sushi.
He had like a sushi cateringbusiness for a little while and
so he kind of knew like gettingthings started, and so he helped
me.
He's like let me help you out.
And so he kind of pushed me toget started and so I started
getting things going, got theLLC going and I'm like all right
, I'm just going to startlooking at properties.
And you know, and a couple ofmy friends, you know, they
(28:34):
backed me, they're like well,we'll pitch in with you and
let's do this, let's make ithappen.
So I start shopping around andI was down on state.
There's this place across thestreet from Epic Brewing.
This building's changed handsso many times over the years and
we we were looking at that.
I'm like you know we might beable to make this work, but like
(28:56):
, no, going into an industry Idon't want to, I don't want to
be an asshole or anything toother breweries and try to, you
know, take anything from them.
So, um, because here in Utah weneed, we all need each other,
we all need all the breweries.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Oh yeah, and like that's the fun thing.
That's been like because notonly do I see how many people
have worked together at so manydifferent places, but then
hearing how much everybody'swilling to help each other, and
because it's I mean it's acommunity, and then I mean in
talking with other people inother places about it, it's like
I mean, people don't talk toeach other, people don't want to
(29:31):
help each other, but here it'svery different.
So I love that there's likethis support network of people
that are willing to dropwhatever they're doing, like oh,
you're so-and-so's broken, oryou're thinking like I'll be
there in five minutes and let'sfigure this out together.
Speaker 1 (29:44):
Oh yeah, I mean it's beer Keto's.
Like I love going there andseeing my friends.
I'm friends with the brewersand owners and it's a totally
different thing with businessand especially in this market.
(30:05):
Like there's camaraderie inother beer markets around the
country but nothing like Utah's.
So it's been awesome, it's beenan awesome thing to be a part
of.
And you know, and we even sell aton of different uh breweries
or uh yeah breweries, uh beers,yeah, um, high point.
We we don't have a canning lineyet.
We're working on that but, um,with our silly draft laws we're
(30:29):
limited to 5%.
So people want strong beers.
Like we bring them in becausethere's so many good ones around
.
So, um, but back to originallylooking at that location.
Um, down on state street.
You know, we looked at a fewand that one was kind of the one
that were like ramps, cheap andkind of worked out for what
we're looking for, and now wewere opening a kitchen.
(30:52):
There's a lot of money, it's alot of work and I was like I'm
like you know what?
We're just going to go tap roomfood trucks.
Keep it real simple.
Um, I'm going to call the owner,epic, to ask if it was cool.
I'm like cool for over here,like you know that Anax and
(31:13):
Sugarhouse, we're going to sellit, so I'd kind of forgotten
about this place.
You know they opened and youknow it was good, food was good
and whatever, but just I didn'treally remember it, just never
came back and come to find outit had been like five iterations
(31:34):
over five years and Just Ididn't really remember it Just
never came back, yeah, and cometo find out it had been like
five iterations over five yearsand geez, nobody could really
figure out the formula here.
So everybody talked about thecurse there was a curse here and
all this stuff.
And so he's like, yeah, we'regoing to sell that.
And I'm like, oh shit, likethis just got real, yeah, and in
your head you're like oh shit,like it's just got real, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And in your head you're like I know exactly where
that is.
Feels like cause.
I mean again, if, like knowingway less than you do about
everything that you do, you putthe state street property and
this property head to head, I'mlike yeah, like of course of
course this.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
I'm like, yeah, sugar houses, like that's my dream is
to have a brew pub and sugarhouse.
But I like that's my dream isto have a a brew pub and sugar
house.
But I didn't think that wasever gonna happen.
Yeah, you know, there's likethe money that would have to go
into that and um and trying tofind the right property.
So, luckily, luckily, theseguys did the groundwork for me
and didn't really want to keepdoing it.
(32:26):
So so it worked out for metotally.
So I so I came in and it was afine dining Italian restaurant
at the time, and so I came inhere and had dinner, checked out
the space and I'm like, allright, guess, I'm opening a
restaurant too, so let's do it.
So my friends weren't too keenon the restaurant.
(32:48):
Part of my like.
Well, it's my background.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
So yeah, let's do it.
I will show you that I can makethis work.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
Oh yeah, so, yeah, we went for it and then.
But there was a catch, like Ifwe wanted the bar license, we
had six weeks to open.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Of course there's some sort of wrench in
everything that you have to.
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
So it's like, do we go restaurant license?
And just you know, restaurantlicenses are so complicated,
especially for a brewery.
Oh, you guys got to get food.
You know kids are in here.
And it's just like I can'tstand up with your beer.
Like I'm like I don't want arestaurant license.
I can't stand up with your beer.
Like I'm like I don't want arestaurant license.
We want to be a bar.
We want it to be fun andwelcoming when we'd be able to
walk around with your beer andnot have to order food if you
(33:32):
don't want to.
Yeah, so, um, so we went for it.
I'm like challenge accepted,let's go.
And you know it was.
It was real nice Cause umEpic's head brewer came down.
Um did a brew day with me andkind of showed me the system.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
So cause that?
Cause it sounds like they theykind of just like right, we'll
leave it here, yeah, fun.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
Yeah, you can, you can buy this property from us.
And here you go and they'rejust kind of like, you know,
they've offered that it a shotand I'm like, all right, let's
go.
And no, so I was brewing onthat system and then I, working
(34:14):
on the kitchen, like I came upwith the initial menu and it's
cooking in the.
I'd brew all day as a come cook, all night, damn.
And then my buddy helped hirethe bar staff and kind of helped
, um, get that going, but I wasstill bartending too.
So I was doing all the thingsand we got open in six weeks and
we still didn't have our foodquite where I wanted it, so I
(34:36):
was just giving it away.
I'd come up to the bar, likewhat you guys want to try, like
what do you need to give me somefeedback?
Yeah, like, and it was a hit,people loved it and you know,
and we, and then it stuck, sowas finally, I finally got a
badass kitchen team and theywere able to take over and you
kind of you know I did my teamautonomy.
So it's like hey, these, I usedto have these, these tie wings
(34:59):
on the menu.
They're super high prep andreally just a lot of work and
they were so good.
But my my team was just like,like, these are so hard to make,
can we like, simplify or likeand come up with other flavors?
And so I kind of let my my teamkind of formulate their own
recipes and try some other stuffthat ended up working really
well.
So so it's cool.
(35:20):
It's been a, it's been a bigteam effort in here and you know
, the past few years I've beenable to step away from the brew
house, which I miss.
I miss the, uh, I miss brewingbeer.
Um, but I've got some awesomebrewers now to take care of
everything cool, got an awesomekitchen team and you know, I I
bartended for a little bit.
(35:40):
Now I'll pour a beer every oncein a while when I'm back there.
But we've we've grown so muchnow we've got some really nice
cocktails and everything I'm notgonna.
I don't know what they're'mback there, but we've, we've
grown so much and now we've gotsome really nice cocktails and
everything I'm not going to.
I don't know what they'remaking back there.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
You guys know how to do it better than I do.
I've got other things to do.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
Yeah, I come up to the register.
A guest walks up.
I'm going to, you know, I'mgoing to help them, of course,
and I'm sitting there like I'm anew kid.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
They just see you walk around by yourself and
start pushing.
They're like are you sure you?
Speaker 1 (36:04):
work here.
You're like yeah, I own theplace, but I just can't remember
how to.
Yeah, I don't do this veryoften.
That's why I tell them, like Idon't do this very often, sorry,
but I'm not going to leaveanybody hanging.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Totally no-transcript a part of their own programming
(36:36):
.
And even you, I mean I can'tremember who was telling you a
story, but you've kind of feellike this like ringleader of
kind of like these sugar housebusinesses and everybody that
comes together.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
Yeah, yeah.
So everybody kind of looks tome like what's what's Chad doing
over there and like so that's,that's cool.
We're all friends, we all liketo help each other out and
promote each other's businessesand you know we want everybody
to be successful around here.
I've got some awesome smallbusinesses around here, totally.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
So.
So I mean, what kind?
Speaker 1 (37:10):
of beers I mean is Hopkins most known for.
Where do you see kind of thenew batches coming through or
new beers that you want to workon?
You know construction with theroad has slowed Sugarhouse down
the past couple of years.
So I mean, we're still doingwell, but we're not selling out
of beer like we used to Like.
We used to have to bring inguest tasks, we were just out
and so we've.
We've got some time now, so I'vehad my brewer working on some
(37:33):
lagers, because lagers take atleast a month to condition and
um really hit their peak wherethey're supposed to taste like,
and so so I'm like make somelagers, like let's go.
So so we're still making, youknow, some sours and fruit ipas
and stuff like that, uh thatpeople really like to drink.
(37:54):
But you know, as, as brewers,we we like our lagers.
So I think we have like four onright now.
So but we were able to givethem the time to condition and
um.
But now we're, you know, for ourthe last two anniversaries we
did um, we collabed with otherbreweries.
Um.
For our five year anniversary,we collaborated with uh Bewilder
(38:16):
and we brewed a classic Westcoast IPA, like I wanted and um,
then this last year, for oursixth year, we did a, a, a right
ipa, with fisher brewed overthere and they canned it and you
know.
So these are all those twobeers are all homebrew recipes
of mine and you know, send it tothe brewers like, yeah, cool,
let's do it, like yeah, so we're, we really want to get into
(38:39):
canning, we really want that, uh, creative freedom.
You know, it's just, that'sreally difficult with.
You know, we gotta hit fivepercent, so it's.
You know it's hard for me tocall some beers ipa when it's
not really an ipa.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah, I was have to warn people in town.
They're like oh, get that on,drive like hold on yeah, let me
warn you before this happensit's gonna be a light ipa.
You're gonna get half theflavor and the same cost.
Like get something in a can,like what?
Like I don't understand, itdoesn't make sense, but just do
it.
Yeah, it's essentially a pillow.
I mean it's so awesome thatyou've been able to hire the
right people and a lot of thosehave been people that you've met
(39:16):
along the way but then also,just freeing them up, the
kitchen staff are like hey, oh,this is too hard to make.
It takes too much time.
Make too takes too much time.
Like cool, give me analternative and we'll do that.
And similarly with your brewers, I mean like hey, quick, this
sounds fun, let's do that.
But like it's also hard when,again, like you have this like
five percent limit on anythingyou can do and so being able to
be like all right, we're goingto take that away now and now
you can make even more funthings right so just continuing
(39:38):
to free people up to be theirown creative genius.
But then it's also got to be funto see how I mean some of your
homebrew recipes have become.
I mean these now collaboratorcollaborations with these big
like other brewers around here,but also just to see how many
people like enjoy these thingsthat you've been making forever
and come back for more.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Oh, yeah, that's great.
And then some of my friendscome in and like, oh, I remember
, I remember this beer whenyou're brewing it back home and
it's, it's always really fun.
Yeah, but yeah, and then withour bar too, we use, um, we've
got some awesome cocktails.
Uh, we've got a great cocktailprogram and a ton of local
distilleries.
So we use local as much aspossible and, you know, give my
(40:18):
bartenders greater freedom tomake, uh, whatever kind of
cocktails they want to put onthe menu.
And so it's a big, it's a bigteam here.
You know, what do we want to do?
What do you guys want to try?
You know, and it's nice, comingfrom the corporate world, like
you make this like the.
Speaker 2 (40:32):
Here's the recipe, here's the rules, here's the sop
.
Like here's everything you haveto do step by step, and instead
be like I'm not gonna be thatperson, but what do you guys
feel like doing?
Yeah, I kind of like this, butgreat, go do it, make it work.
Speaker 1 (40:44):
we it work.
We still keep the consistencyin our current recipes and what
we're making.
But then it's like somebody'slike can we try this?
Yeah, let's do it.
Can we bring this in?
Yeah, let's try it out, why not?
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Yeah, if you're not innovating, you're dying Might
as well.
Work with everybody that seesand interacts with people every
day, compared to you coming inas this overlord twirling his
mustache, saying, ah no, butthis will make us more money,
and blah, blah, blah.
And yeah, those never do well,anybody who comes to me is like
well, I have this idea for thisbusiness that could make money.
I'm like are you passionateabout it?
(41:17):
Is there something you have todo?
They're like well, no, but itcould make money.
I'm like you more likely tofail than if it's something you
actually want to do and love todo.
Like that will.
Like.
Everybody feels passion,everybody feels, um, that
authenticity behind it, and Ifeel like this is a good
dedication to that, because it'sit's not like you just decided
oh, there's an opportunity tomake a brewery, I'm gonna go do
that.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
You're like I've been doing this for decades and now
I finally have took my like Itrusted myself to do it on my
own yeah, exactly I mean, that'sjust I didn't do this to make
money like and being arestaurant we don't make a ton
of money anyway, so I'm just Ilove what I'm doing.
That's a lot of fun and my myteam's happy.
I take good care of them andyou know you just come in here
(42:00):
and it's that's a good time.
My team's all always happy tobe here than other industry
people were here like I thinkthat's.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
That's when you know that you've done something great
, when people who are in it comehere to spend their time.
One of my favorite signs of agood dive bar is the waiters,
servers, whoever are off, andthen they just grab a seat and
sit in the bar and start hangingout.
So I feel like it's similar tothat.
People are like oh yeah, I makebeer, yeah, I work at a
restaurant, but like we're goingto Hopkins to enjoy my time off
(42:30):
.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Oh, yeah, yeah, and you see my team come in on their
days off, come hang out.
I'm like, all right, I'm doingsomething, yeah you're doing
something right, you don't hateme.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Good, I mean, obviously you mentioned canning
and getting some higher IPA beer, but then also being able to I
mean sell things outside of heremore.
I mean outside of that.
What are some of the plans youhave for Hopkins?
Speaker 1 (42:53):
Yeah, that's.
The next big step is get acanning line open up, that
creative freedom.
You know kind of have a want tohave a grab and go cooler up
front.
People want to come in and takesome stuff to go and just have
it ready to go, like this PicoRico we just drank.
I would love to have thatcanned, be able to take that
home.
But you know I don't want toget into distribution.
(43:16):
Really, you know that kind ofloses its touch, its value, what
it means to me.
You know I don't want itsitting on the shelf warm at the
dabs or you know I just youmiss that interaction and so
we'll we'll send some stuff outto beer bars and you know, like
slack water, slack water's great, yeah, because they train their
(43:38):
team and people know theirbeers there and that's why I
want my beer to go, if it has togo, be sold from outside of
here, but we'll try to do asmuch as we can from inside here
yeah, you can trust your baby toonly so many people, yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:52):
and because, yeah, I mean like once I mean
distribution is like a wholenother business and pain point,
and I mean I wouldn't want to dothat too.
But then also I mean you lookat all the people I mean the
brewers and that have gotten bigenough if they kind of lost
their soul, and that's usuallythat first step towards that.
And then you get so big thatall of a sudden you are that
corporate guy.
Now you're like, oh, I lost, Ibecame the thing I set out to
(44:15):
conquer.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
Yeah, yeah, and we don't want to go there.
You know I've had a lot ofpeople real estate people and
landlords reach out to me likecome check out this property.
We'd love for you to buildsomething here, like, and we'll
invest all this money intomaking what you need it to be to
put your brew house in.
And people really want me toopen chains and I'm like that's
(44:38):
not, it's not what I wanted.
Speaker 2 (44:39):
Done this before no, thank you.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
No, like it will never be as good as this.
So and I, you know I can't beat all places at the same time
and what's really important tosomething like this is owner
presence, like I got to be here.
I mean I don't have to be, butI should be here.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
I like being here, yeah, so which is a good sign,
like if you had once foundyourself at a place.
You're like, oh, I don't reallylike this anymore.
Like then don't, yeah, but itis a good sign that you're doing
the right thing.
You're like, oh, I like beinghere, I like being present, I
like showing people beer, I likehanding people food if they
want to try something new, orjust I mean, because if you're
not here, you don't know whatthe feel is like, what the
customers are like, what peopledo want, right, and then
(45:21):
judgment calls, but until you'rein the middle of it all, then
you're just kind of outside ofit.
Speaker 1 (45:26):
Yeah, that's just, I don't know you get so
disconnected from your ownbusiness Like I've seen it
happen to other people that'slike, and how their team
portrays them and it's.
You know, I never want to be,never wanted to be like that.
No, so deal.
And I think one thing that isreally cool that we do here is
really focus on local.
You know, I like to say we'rehyper local.
(45:46):
Um, you know, everything fromthe food to the ingredients in
our beer is grown locally asmuch as possible what are some
of your biggest suppliers?
that you use on everything.
Um, so for our beer, um, it'smostly grown up near logan and
solstice malt he, he, uh, jamesis his name he opened his own
(46:07):
malt house pretty close to theairport.
Um, and he picks up grain fromall over Utah and and malts it
himself and delivers it and andso it's.
It's just awesome.
And then you, I need to takethat same grain and you take it
to after you've brewed with thegrain.
You take that same grain andtake it to the farmer and the
(46:28):
they feed their cattle orwhatever with it and like and
some places there's a brewerythat just opened up in Logan.
He's getting his grain fromthis farmer and then he's, after
it's spent, take it, takes itback to the same farmer like
just circle of life oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:48):
I think this beer, I think the malt we got from this
is actually from that.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Anyway, that's funny yeah, so we use a lot of little
local companies for our stuff.
Luckily there's some big onesthat help do a lot of stuff,
like Nicholas and Co's, where weget most of our food from and
they're local and so they have alot of local little businesses.
but we use a lot of differentlittle bakeries for each kind of
specific thing we want to getfor our breads, um, and then we
(47:14):
use a lot of uh.
Caputo's has like a businessthat brings in a lot of
different stuff too.
Yes, we use them a lot, um, butI just for me, it's so
important to bring in local,sustainable stuff, like our
burger.
It's grass-fed, the cows areraised here in Utah and you know
(47:36):
it's better on the environment,and then when you have
humane-raised meat, it tastesbetter too.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Yep.
So you can't make good foodwithout good ingredients and
also you can't make good foodwithout good ingredients.
I mean you can, and also youcan't make good beer without
good ingredients.
And usually the closer it isand I mean especially when you
know the person and you knowwhat they're doing to do to
create whatever ingredients itmight be that's goes better than
.
Where did this come from?
Who made this?
How is it?
What's in it?
What's not in it?
There's a whole level of trustthat starts to disappear.
(48:03):
And also like another detail islike the art on your wall
always changes, because it'salways local artists that I mean
want to promote their own workthat you've given that space for
.
So it's like not only is itjust in the food, but it's, I
mean, everything from the like Imentioned, like the jazz nights
and all the programming thatyou put on to.
I mean everything hanging fromthe walls is local things oh
yeah, and we don't.
Speaker 1 (48:23):
You know, we change that once a month.
We have a whole bunch ofartists that come in and set up
and we don't take any commissionfor it.
It's just like, hey, it's coolto have a place to show your
stuff off and if you sellsomething, great, like, very
cool.
So yeah, we love supporting theartists, the music.
We have a ton of local musichere three to four days a week,
(48:46):
so there's always somethinggoing on here.
Speaker 2 (48:48):
There's always a reason to come to Hopkins.
Oh yeah, if it's even just thebeer and the food alone, awesome
, but then also if you need areason to listen to some music
or have some sort of event, alsogreat to have here.
Because, like I said in thebeginning, one thing I love
about Hopkins is it's like sucha either like double threat or
even triple threat, because youhave, I mean, grape Year check.
(49:09):
You have your own food in yourown kitchen, you have control
over that's amazing Check.
I mean patio if you want to gooutside.
Also a lot of great events, Imean it's hard to find a weak
point here.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
Yeah, it's a good place to have.
Yeah, we have something goingevery day, never boring, no.
Speaker 2 (49:26):
Well, I want to wrap up with the two questions I
always ask everybody at the endof each episode.
Number one if you could havesomeone on the Small Lake City
podcast and hear more abouttheir story, who would you want
to hear from, oh?
Speaker 1 (49:38):
You know, one of my best friends is David
Tastemasters.
He does a podcast.
Is David taste masters, he doesa podcast and and his podcast
is focused on a lot of umbrewers and distillers and he's
a lot of fun to talk to.
I always love hearingpodcasters interview podcasters,
cause it can be really fun.
Yes, and so so he's.
(50:00):
He's good.
Did he's kind of changing umhis whole dynamic on how he's
doing things?
but he's also the head brewer atketo's, so, um, yeah, we're
total beer nerds and just loveour community, so, um, but he's
kind of a big deal with thebrewing community and I think
he'd be a lot of fun to have onthe show oh yeah, because I mean
it's fun to talk about peoplelike their specific beer, but be
(50:20):
like all right, let's look atthe whole landscape, what like,
especially someone who, I mean,knows the industry here super
well and knows beer super well.
Speaker 2 (50:27):
To be like what?
What should I know?
Or what do I not know that Ishould know?
So no, definitely reach out tome.
It sounds like a, because Ithink I've talked about him
before, but fascinating.
Dude, and also just ketos ingeneral, has been another great
brewery that's come through inthe past five or six years and
really I mean made a big impactand made some really cool beer
too yeah, david.
David's done some, some coolstuff over there lately, so cool
.
And then, lastly, if peoplewant to find out more about
(50:49):
Hopkins or see programming,where's the best place to find
information?
Speaker 1 (50:53):
I'd say our Instagram .
I do our social media so I tryto post on there daily and just
post as much information aspossible.
We've got our calendar andwe've got all our events on
there.
Speaker 2 (51:03):
Do All our events on there.
Deal Then come by.
What's the specific address?
Speaker 1 (51:06):
I know it's on 21st South and something it's 1048
East, 2100 South, got a bigspiky ball on the top of the
building from the 50s.
It's pretty cool yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
It's an iconic location.
I mean, even the basement hassigns of the furniture store
that used to be here and all ofthe previous things.
But come by, grab, grab somefood, have some beer.
We got a big parking lot in theback too so, yes, there's
parking spaces to have, so youdon't have to worry about the I
mean construction that somehownever ends but might end one day
(51:37):
, I don't know.
Should be done by september,they say, so we'll see so
that'll probably mean it's likedone at like 2027, uh, but I
mean hopefully it's done inseptember for everybody and
you're safe yeah, yeah, we're.
Speaker 1 (51:49):
All of us businesses are around here.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
We're just, we're ready, like all right, let's
let's be done here, especiallylike how many years longer it's
gone than probably anyway wecould talk about.
I could talk about traffic andconstruction, utah in general,
but it's nuts.
No chad, this has been great.
Thank you so much for creatingthis space.
It's awesome.
It's well welcomed.
But keep doing what you'redoing and, yeah, I'll keep
coming around.
Speaker 1 (52:10):
Cool.
Thanks, man, appreciate youhaving me on.
Speaker 2 (52:12):
No, thank you Right on.
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