Step One: Understanding Who Unseen Creatures Brewing & Blending Is

Opening a brewery is serious business. It requires meticulous planning, lots of money, a little luck, and a lot of hard work.  You’ll spend every minute of your spare time second guessing yourself, going over financials, and wondering whether anyone would even want to visit the brewery once the planning, questioning, harassing other brewers for every bit of knowledge they are willing to share, and loans and investor money has been spent.  This ain’t no cakewalk.  Still, in the grand scheme of things, this has been the most rewarding process we’ve undertaken. 

Unseen Creatures is led by myself as CEO & Brewer and my wife Vicky as our CFO.  She’s the numbers brain, CPA by trade.  I’m the crazy “let’s do this…” guy.  We’re lucky to have struck a great balance between the way our minds work.  When it comes down to it, you need that person who can help you manage numbers all while understanding what you want to do.  If they’re good, like Vicky is, they’ll give you enough leash to be crazy but make sure it makes sense in dollars and cents.  The brewery does have to make money after all.  I’m lucky that that person lives with me.  If yours doesn’t, find them and try to convince them to.  

For us, this process started about two and one half years ago.  I started jotting down ideas.  What did I want Unseen Creatures to represent?  What did I want us to be five years later? What did I want my kids to one day want to takeover.  Most importantly, what was our philosophy going to be and how would we make sure we stayed true to it?  Conversely, why would our philosophy matter? I wanted the brewery to stand for something.  It became clear to me that representing my community and featuring the fruits which are synonymous with my culture and city were important to me.  Staying true to ourselves would mean emphasizing and representing that culture through drinkability, balance, and nuance.  We would support local farmers whenever possible and as much as possible. We would support local chefs, musicians, artists, and charities.  We knew what we wanted to be.  Now, how would we get there?

Understanding what the top of the mountain should somewhat look like, the trick was going to be understanding just what I’d need to raise, spend, and borrow to get there.  Here’s where things start to get real.

So We're Opening a Brewery

For the last few years we’ve been working on a business plan to open a brewery.  It’s been a dream for quite some time and it’s becoming a reality little by little.  The decision to open a brewery was not one we took lightly.  Yet, the name has been selected, the money being raised, and the concept is coming together into something that we can’t wait to share with all of you.  We hope to open Unseen Creatures Brewing & Blending in Miami, FL, in the first half of 2018, and will be sharing the process, our progress, and the stories that come out of stressful yet extremely rewarding process with you on Craft Commander.  Craft Commander will continue.  We will still be shining a light on some of the best breweries across the country in the same way we always have – through the brewers’ own words.  It will give us new perspective and hopefully make the conversations that much better now that we’re also in the game.

Many of you have asked us why the stories and conversations on Craft Commander have slowed down.  This is it.  This process takes most of your free time and every extra ounce of energy you have.  That said we’re having a blast doing it and can’t wait to share our story with you whether you’re just interested in hearing about what it takes to open a brewery or want to follow along just for the heck of it. 

Unseen Creatures is a farmhouse inspired brewery that will focus on barrel fermenting and aging wild/sour beer and producing sessionable and rustic clean fermented farmhouse beers all while showcasing lots and lots of hops.  More than anything, we see Unseen Creatures as a philosophy of sorts.  It will be a constant endeavor to push boundaries, a way to express the true terroir of Miami through a locally foraged yeast and bacteria culture and the city’s beautiful and bountiful tropical fruits.   A way of life that chooses creativity over stability and conformity and a melding of different forms of art all under one roof.  We are excited to create an environment of free thought and a place for creative thinkers.  Long story short, we can’t wait to show you what we have in store and can’t wait to have you over.

We’d like to thank our friends in the industry for providing not only inspiration but infinite wisdom and guidance.  Your advice, constructive criticism, and honesty has helped us in our pursuit of our dream and we are forever indebted to you for that.  This is truly an amazing industry and you are all very special.  You know who you are.

Our first collaboration will be brewed in the first week of June with one of our favorite breweries in the world (more on that later).  We are close to getting our own space and beginning build out.  We can’t wait to share the good, the bad, and the ugly of opening a brewery.  Most of all, we hope that writing about this journey gives you all a better understanding and appreciation of the breweries in your home towns.  A better appreciation of the people that strive to provide a quality and enjoyable product for you through passion and hard work.  The people who showcase and represent the best of their communities – local products, local people, local ingredients, and local pride.  We hope to be one of those breweries one day.  Miami is still in its infancy when it comes to craft beer.  We’re just happy to be part of the movement.