LIZF’s Brewing News Thread

[TheZagPhish]

So... business plans are in front of investors. Wrapping up lawyer issues and investor agreements hopefully this week or early next week. Need on check in hand and we sign a lease. Then this gets really real.

Dude.

[Martin Centre Mad Man]

So... business plans are in front of investors. Wrapping up lawyer issues and investor agreements hopefully this week or early next week. Need on check in hand and we sign a lease. Then this gets really real.

Wow. Good luck.

[LongIslandZagFan]

OK... know this thread has been dormant for a while. My apologies. We tried to work things out with two of the three investors but couldn't find a middle ground. Ironically, it was their demand of us putting more $$$ in than we already have that pushed us to where we are now. My cousin and I are, along with the third investor, going to self finance via our retirement accounts and some small loans. Ultimately it will allows full control and limited debt (other than to our retirement funds). Sooooo... over the next month or so we are converting to a C corp and rolling over some of our retirement money into the business. Kind of a crazy process, but 100% legal... and largely leaves us with limited debt. If all goes as planned we will be signing a lease for a space in September.

[DZ]

So... business plans are in front of investors. Wrapping up lawyer issues and investor agreements hopefully this week or early next week. Need on check in hand and we sign a lease. Then this gets really real.

Congrats!! That is a huge milestone, could go to either thread.

Mine is not near as much an accomplishment, but I got on the ground floor on a website we have been growing for a couple years. We are about to offer our most loyal readers - up to 50 of them, a stake in the site, moving to an LLC with us retaining control. It's not as big a deal, but is my passion.

[Martin Centre Mad Man]

I'll be honest, sometimes I buy beer based on the artwork on the label. I also sometimes choose not to buy if it is poorly done. no pressure

I’m about to make a short road trip to try one area brewery’s new Rage Against The Machine-themed “Bombtrack” IPA and another brewery’s Arya Stark-inspired, “A Beer Has No Name.”

No pressure.

[TheZagPhish]

OK... know this thread has been dormant for a while. My apologies. We tried to work things out with two of the three investors but couldn't find a middle ground. Ironically, it was their demand of us putting more $$$ in than we already have that pushed us to where we are now. My cousin and I are, along with the third investor, going to self finance via our retirement accounts and some small loans. Ultimately it will allows full control and limited debt (other than to our retirement funds). Sooooo... over the next month or so we are converting to a C corp and rolling over some of our retirement money into the business. Kind of a crazy process, but 100% legal... and largely leaves us with limited debt. If all goes as planned we will be signing a lease for a space in September.

I love this! We did something similar on this end to launch the studio. If you're willing to park your money with a bunch of unknown companies, why not invest it in your own! It's a different level of real this way, but I believe it's an important differentiator. You own all of my brewery notes; one of the most sobering points I recorded was that debt kills small breweries.

You are on the beam.

[LongIslandZagFan]

Application for lease has been turned into landlord... first of a few steps... but hoping to put ink on paper before I go out to Spokane. Depends on how quickly we can turn things around with the lawyers and getting paperwork together. We are in the process of converting over to a C corp and already have things in motion to rollover retirement money. Then it is all about dealing with the town, the county, the SLA, and ultimately the TTB... not necessarily in that order. I think we'll have our TTB fairly early on in the process, if only to allow us to contract brew. Our biggest fights are going to be occupancy based on parking with the town and waste water treatment with the county. I think if we are ambitious we might be on a 8-10 month timeline... more realistically, 12 months... but going to hire an expediter to see if we can turn this around as quickly as possible.

[RenoZag]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!

[LongIslandZagFan]

Don't know how this got marked as read for me... Thank you good sir!

[willandi]

Don't know how this got marked as read for me... Thank you good sir!

Was today your birthday? If so Happy Birthday. Mine as well, along with our anniversary.

[LongIslandZagFan]

OK... sorry for the 3 month hiatus. Been dealing with towns, lawyers, etc.

Here is where we stand.

Met with architect yesterday will be sitting with him next week to get into more detailed design work.
Have a parking/traffic study being done Friday and Saturday.
Lawyer is reviewing our lease and should be back to us this week... assuming our lawyer finds the out clause in the lease as being strong enough.

If all goes as planned, could be signing a lease next week. Once parking study is done and architect gives us a very simple plan for the town to look at, we are hoping to get on the January town docket for initial approval. Basically, zoning-wise they cannot say no... but parking will be an issue as there are hundreds of apartments going in over the next 1.5 years. Everything is going to come down to occupancy. If we get past the initial town meeting... which for the record, we already met with the head of planning for the town, and he is 100% behind our little project... but still needs to go through the regular process.

Once we get past the town, then we get to deal with the county. We are hoping that based on a couple other breweries that have recently went through this process, that it will be more streamlined as the county tries to get a grip on dealing with the waste water.

I hope that this won't turn into another 3 months of silence... but doubt it because things are making serious moved forward.

[Martin Centre Mad Man]

I really hope this all works out for you. I don’t get down to the greater NYC area very often, but I hope to make a side trip on my next visit.

[LongIslandZagFan]

Once we get open... by all means come in... will take care of you.

Town iteslf can't deny us on usage as the use is already part of the current zoning. Like I said, biggest issues are parking and county mostly for wastewater... I know from friends that they have to drain into a slop sink, which makes zero sense, and they have to add a trap so the town can take water samples from time to time. I mean , hey, whatever they want... just expedite the process. We're really hoping that they got their act together with the last couple of breweries. Honestly, a lot of the older ones were kind of given free reign on what went into the sewer systems... now the county is trying to get a firmer grasp on it... and I get that. Honestly one of biggest chemicals breweries use is sanitzer. Those kill bacteria... problem is that bacteria is a major part of what is used in sewage plants.

[TheZagPhish]

Wow.

[LongIslandZagFan]

Meeting with architect tomorrow to go over basic design work... mostly so we can get a simple sketch to the town before January. Then we start designing in earnest... Although we pretty much know what we want to do.