USA: Krones realises first complete brewery in the USA for New Glarus Brewing Company

Krones AG, Neutraubling announced on September 27th that it has accepted a bid from New Glarus Brewing Company, New Glarus, Wisconsin, for the erection of a Greenfield brewery with a yearly capacity of 120,000 hl. It is the first complete brewery Krones AG will implement continuously in compliance with their technical, technological and constructional standards together with their US American affiliate Krones Inc., Franklin, Wisconsin.

The order includes the malt house, malt handling and cleaning, the brew house, the whole cold area with yeast propagation and storage as well as the connection of the new process section to an existing Krones filling line. Also the complete engineering including all necessary utilities such as water, steam, CO2 or air and automating the brewery with the process control system Botec are integral part of the order.

State-of-the-art Steinecker brewhouse technology
The brewhouse will be equipped with Steinecker's state-of-the-art technologies, among which are a 5 6/h grist mill type Variomill, the mashing system ShakesBeer, the lauter tun Pegasus and the wort boiling system Stromboli with energy storage. In the first expansion phase, the brewhouse will cast 6 brews per day at 120 hl each. To be able to produce 12 brews, the brewhouse just has to be supplemented by one pre-run vessel. In combination with the appropriate tank farm and utility expansion, the total capacity of the brewery may be increased to 300,000 hl per year.

Local support and international know-how

Besides the innovative Steinecker technologies, there were also others reasons that prompted Dan Carey, co-owner and master brewer of New Glarus, to award the contract to Krones. These include the immediate vicinity to Krones Inc. with their technological and control technical support as well as the know-how, documented in many international greenfield projects, in handling such turnkey projects with all trades and customer wishes.

For instance, the brew vessels shall get used copper domes which New Glarus bought in Germany especially for this project. Krones will polish these domes, adapt them to the new stainless steel vessels, fix them together and then ship them to the USA where the brewery will be assembled under the supervision of Krones with specialised local companies. The first brew in the new New Glarus Brewing Company is scheduled for Summer, 2007.

New Glarus – succeeding "unplugged" too
The New Glarus Brewing Company was established in 1993 by Deborah and Dan Carey, Deborah being the first woman in the USA to found and manage a brewery. Among other things, Deborah is still responsible for the marketing strategy of the brewery, Dan has always been its creative master brewer.

The brewery produces seven main beer types which are available all the year round. The best known is Spotted Cow, an "Unfiltered Farmhouse Ale". In addition to other ales there are also bottom-fermented beers as well as fruit beers Belgian style. The main types are supplemented by four seasonal products such as wheat beer or an American lager. A real speciality are the so-called "unplugged" beers, experimental beers of master brewer Dan Carey, which he produces in "limited edition" only. They include, for instance, fruit beers that are produced in wooden casks by means of spontaneous fermentation.

For quality reasons, New Glarus distributes the beers exclusively in the state of Wisconsin, achieving sustained success. The yearly growth has been in the two-digit range for years. However, this positive development could not be pursued with the old brewhouse – its expansion was not possible for reasons of space. Therefore, Deborah and Dan Carey decided to erect a completely new brewery on a nearby plot of land together with Krones AG. The existing brewhouse will become a test brewery and shall be used for fringe brands.

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