Beer Edge

Joey Redner of Cigar City Brewing joins us to discuss the sale of his brewery, his fear of debt, and whether the beer industry is still a**hole free.

Show Notes

Welcome back to the Beer Edge podcast. In last week's episode, we talked with Joey Redner of the Cigar City Brewing Company about his origin story, what got him into beer, and the state of the beer scene in Florida when he started his brewery. If you haven’t listened to that episode, I’d recommend pausing this one and going back and giving it a listen.
 
 
In part two of the interview this week, we explore how Redner started to think about Cigar City’s future and what gave him second thoughts about navigating it alone. We go into detail about his thought process leading up to the sale of his brewery, his interactions with Anheuser-Busch and why that deal didn’t go through, and why going deeper into debt scared him. Redner tells us how the brewery eventually got so big that it grew beyond both his talents and interests. He always envisioned running a small, innovative brewery. And Cigar City was no longer a tiny operation. We also talk about Redner’s thoughts on the evolution of the American craft beer industry, how it has changed and changed him, his love of classic beer styles, how he hopes that Dunkel becomes the next rage. 

 
It bears repeating that this interview was recorded about a year ago, long before the pandemic. But it remains a pretty compelling listen. Here’s the second half of our conversation with Joey Redner.
 
 
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What is Beer Edge?

A weekly dive into the business and culture of beer. Hosted by Andy Crouch and John Holl, The Beer Edge podcast provides listeners with unparalleled insights into the beer industry. Our mission is to provide consumers and industry players alike with a fresh and unfiltered look at the world of better, flavorful beer. We seek to capture the essence and passion of brewers, both big and small, foreign and domestic, each of whom has a distinctive and colorful story to go along with the beautiful beers they produce.