Location | Charlton, Massachusetts, United States |
---|---|
Website | treehousebrew.com |
Tree House Brewing Company is a brewery located in Charlton, Massachusetts, approximately 60 miles west of Boston. [1] It is considered by some to be amongst the best breweries in the United States, including public beer-rating sites like Untappd (ranked 8th best brewery in the country) and Beer Advocate (brew 3 out of the top ten beers in the country), as well as sites including Forbes, the Boston Globe , and Thrillist. [2] [3] [4] [1] [5] Founded in 2011, the brewery was originally located in Brimfield, Massachusetts, then moved on to Monson, Massachusetts in 2013, before a multimillion dollar project landed them at their current site in 2017. [6] Tree House is a non-distributing brewery—it is only available to buy on site—but given its popularity, lines at the brewery can run an hour or more on certain days. [1]
Tree House Brewing Co. was founded in Brimfield, MA in 2011 by Dean Rohan, Nate Lanier, and Damien Goudreau. [7] The three founders had begun as homebrewers, making beer in Lanier's kitchen starting around 2008. [8] Their initial commercial site was a small 2.7 acre farm, on the edge of which sat the tree house which inspired the brewery's name. [9] The brewery's time in Brimfield proved productive, despite legal challenges from at least one citizen in Brimfield, as customers would come to visit, have their growlers filled, and return, passing along rave reviews on the way. [9]
In 2013, after the zoning dispute came to a head, Tree House moved to their site in Monson to Koran Farm, owned by the family of one of the founders. [8] The brewery was operated in a somewhat cramped space in the farm's stand, with a retail store in a shed. [8] In 2014, an expansion was planned in Monson, which expanded the breweries capacity six-fold, from an operation capable of producing about 150 gallons of beer at a time, to one capable of producing about 900 gallons of beer at a time, including a tap room which was able to pour draughts on site on occasion. [8] During this time, Tree House claimed to be one of the only off-the-grid breweries in New England: "The beer is made with well water that is pumped right out of the ground on the property, and he said it is a key ingredient in the final product." [8] The site in Monson has become the home of Tree House's barrel-aging program since their move to Charlton.
Following a public hearing in 2016, Tree House was approved to purchase land in Charlton, MA for the construction of their new 53,000 square foot brewery. [10] According to the public hearing notice, the entire project cost approximately $18.5 million, $7.7 million of which was issued as a bond by Mass Development. The new site in Charlton doubled the brewing capacity of the company. [11]
The Charlton site opened in May 2017. [12] Despite continuing to sell beers on-site only, the brewery regularly sells out its supply, which now includes canned beer in addition to draught selections. [11] Though the new site has the capacity to produce nearly 150,000 barrels of beer per year, compared with about 30,000 barrels in the post-2014 Monson site, Lanier had said initially that they would not begin in Charlton by producing at maximum capacity: "We still think we can sell at least 30,000 barrels to a hyper-local market — whether that’s all in house or limited distribution throughout Massachusetts." [11] The continuing success of Tree House is marked by the proposed addition to the Charlton site of a 16,000 square foot area which would include outdoor space and an expanded bar, as well as a 2,000 square foot mezzanine inside the existing space. [12] [13] Further, the burgeoning necessity of a traffic light on the road adjacent to the brewery indicates the heavy traffic driven by the brewery, and illustrates the need for the local community to aid in managing the impact of the brewery because of its popularity. [14]
In February 2019, the Hartford Business Journal reported that Tree House purchased a 100-acre farm in Woodstock, CT. [15] This farm will help Tree House in expanding their range of offerings, from fresh fruit to sell at stands on site, as well as to use in further experimenting, as well as bolstering their forays into alternate methods of brewing, such as barrel aging and open fermentation.
In November 2020, it was announced that Tree House was planning expansions to both Cape Cod [16] and Western Massachusetts, [17] in an effort to relieve pressure on their Charlton campus; both locations opened in 2021. Furthermore, planned enhancements at the Charlton location include a series of on-site hiking/biking trails, an orchard of fruit trees, and a set of beehives. [18]
It was announced in December of 2020 that Tree House purchased the former Channing Bete headquarters in Deerfield, MA. [19] The location opened January 13, 2022 offering a taproom, pizza, and retail store. [20]
In May 2022, it was announced that Tree House had purchased Tewksbury Country Club in Tewksbury MA, with plans to open an expansive beer hall and retail store, while continuing to operate the golf course and other amenities. [21]
Tree House is particularly known for their production of American-style IPAs and also their stouts. According to Gary Dzen: "There’s something to know if you’ve never had a Tree House beer: they’re great, almost all of them, from the thick, milky stout to the piney Sap to Julius, which is probably the best IPA I’ve ever had. If you’ve ever heard people describe beers as “soft” and didn’t quite grasp why, you will immediately see with Tree House, whose hoppy beers all maintain a delicate, melon-y quality I’ve never seen matched." [1] Their beers rank 3 of the top 10 beers in the world on Beer Advocate, and 6 out of the top 20. [2] Tree House sources hops from organic farms in Valhalla.
Beer Name | Beer Type | ABV (%) | Beer Advocate Rating (out of 5) |
---|---|---|---|
Alter Ego | American IPA | 6.8 | 4.55 |
Bright | Double IPA | 7.8 | 4.39 |
Bright w/ Citra | Double IPA | 7.8 | 4.42 |
Doppelganger | American Double IPA | 8.2 | 4.58 |
Eureka w/ Citra | American Blonde Ale | 4.1 | 4.28 |
Green | American IPA | 7.5 | 4.58 |
Haze | Double IPA | 8.2 | 4.57 |
Julius | American IPA | 6.8 | 4.66 |
Lights On | American IPA | 5.3 | 4.34 |
Sap | American IPA | 7.3 | 4.33 |
That's What She Said | Milk Stout | 5.6 | 4.22 |
Beer Name | Beer Type | ABV (%) | Beer Advocate Rating (out of 5) |
---|---|---|---|
Double Shot | American Stout | 7.6 | 4.55 |
King Julius | Double IPA | 8.2 | 4.73 |
Single Shot | Coffee Milk Stout | 6.4 | 4.37 |
Trail Magic | German-style Pilsner | 5.2 | 3.95 |
The Boston Beer Company is an American brewery founded in 1984 by James "Jim" Koch and Rhonda Kallman. Boston Beer Company's first brand of beer was named Samuel Adams after Founding Father Samuel Adams, an American revolutionary patriot. Since its founding, Boston Beer has started several other brands, and in 2019 completed a merger with Dogfish Head Brewery.
Craft beer is a beer that has been made by craft breweries, which typically produce smaller amounts of beer, than larger "macro" breweries, and are often independently owned. Such breweries are generally perceived and marketed as emphasising enthusiasm, new flavours, and varied brewing techniques.
Harpoon Brewery is an employee owned American brewery, with locations in Boston, Massachusetts, and Windsor, Vermont.
Batemans Brewery(George Bateman & Son Ltd) is an English brewery based at Salem Bridge Brewery in Wainfleet, Lincolnshire, and founded in 1874. The company owns 69 public houses, with 23 situated in Boston alone. The brewery focuses on cask conditioned ales, their best known being XB and XXXB. Their slogan is "Good Honest Ales".
Otter Creek Brewing is a brewery in Middlebury, Vermont, that produces two lines of beer: Otter Creek Craft Ales, and Shed Brewery Ales. It brewed Wolaver's Organic Brewery beers from 2002 until 2015, when it ceased brewing that line.
Smuttynose Brewing Company is a craft brewery in Hampton, New Hampshire, United States. The company takes its name from Smuttynose Island, one of the Isles of Shoals several miles directly off the coast there. Smuttynose beers are all unfiltered and known for their distinctive labels, many of which feature original photography. Its beer is distributed in 25 states and 11 countries. The Towle Farm brewery has been certified LEED Gold by the U.S. Green Building Council.
The U.S. state of Vermont is home to over 100 breweries, microbreweries, nanobreweries, and brewpubs that produce a wide variety of beer.
Kentucky common beer is a once-popular style of ale from the area in and around Louisville, Kentucky from the 1850s until Prohibition. This style is rarely brewed commercially today. It was also locally known as dark cream common beer, cream beer or common beer. The beer was top-fermented and was krausened up to 10% making it quite highly carbonated. Like cream ale, it was consumed fresh, usually as draught beer. In 1913 it was estimated that 80% of the beer consumed in Louisville was of this type. Many local breweries made only this style of beer.
The beers of the Caribbean are unique to each island in the region, although many are variants of the same style. Each island generally brews its own unique pale lager, the occasional stout, and often a non-alcoholic malta beverage. Contract-brewing of international beers is also common, with Heineken Pilsener and Guinness Foreign Extra Stout being the most popular. The beers vary between the islands to suit the taste and the brewing method used.
On June 1, 2011, a total of six tornadoes touched down in both western Massachusetts and western Maine. The strongest was a long-track, high-end EF3 tornado that caused significant damage to the city of Springfield, Massachusetts as well as several adjacent cities and towns. By the end of the day, three people had been killed, at least 200 were injured, and over 500 families were left homeless.
The Elysian Brewing Company is an American brewery, owned by AB InBev, that operates two pubs and a taproom in Seattle.
Untappd is a geosocial networking service and mobile phone application founded by Greg Avola and Tim Mather that allows its users to check in as they drink beers, and share these check-ins and their locations with their friends. It incorporates aspects of gamification.
Bad Martha Farmer’s Brewery is an American microbrewery based on Martha’s Vineyard and founded in 2013 by Jonathan Blum, the sole owner of Bad Martha Farmer’s Brewery with locations in Edgartown, Martha’s Vineyard and Falmouth, MA.
Trillium Brewing Company is a brewery that currently operates six facilities throughout Massachusetts and Connecticut, United States. These locations include a production brewery in Canton, MA, a restaurant/taproom/beer garden in Canton, MA, a full-service restaurant and pilot brewery in the Fort Point neighborhood of Boston, a taproom/beer garden in Boston's Fenway neighborhood, an open-air seasonal beer garden in downtown Boston, and a farm focused on regenerative, wholistic agriculture in North Stonington, CT.
Rhinegeist Brewery is a craft brewery and craft cidery based in Cincinnati, Ohio. The company also sells their ciders under the name Cidergeist, using an alternative apple-shaped skull logo. The brewery's 25,000 square feet (2,300 m2) taproom and production facility is located in Cincinnati's Over-the-Rhine neighborhood, and occupies the former, pre-Prohibition bottling plant of Christian Moerlein Brewing Co. Rhinegeist operates an additional shipping, storage and innovation brewing facility in Cincinnati's Camp Washington neighborhood.
To Øl is an international craft brewery based in Denmark.
Craft beer tourism refers to tourism where the primary motivation of travel is to visit a brewery, beer festival, beer related activity or other event that allows attendees to experience all aspects of the craft beer-making, consuming and purchasing process. Travel and tourism constitute one of the largest industries in the world, with Americans spending a total of $1.1 trillion in domestic and international travel in 2018. The beer tourism industry has evolved from the larger culinary and beverage tourism category in which people began planning travels based around experiencing food and drink of different geographies. Informally, vacations centric to the theme of enjoying beer have been dubbed "beercations".
Blackrocks Brewery is a craft brewery in Marquette, Michigan, United States. Former pharmaceutical salesmen David Manson and Andy Langlois opened Blackrocks in 2010, taking the name from a local landmark. They originally brewed their products in the basement of a Victorian-style house and used the building's other two floors as a taproom.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)