About Bad Weather Brewing Company

The Twin City Craft Brewing scene is on fire! But you really can’t visit Minneapolis or St. Paul without stopping by Bad Weather Brewing Company. We sat down, virtually of course, with co-founders, Joe Giambruno and Andy Ruhland to get the full story.

Bad Weather Brewing Company opened in October 2015. Co-founders Joe Giambruno and Zac Carpenter started out as home brewers. Their wives both worked at Target Corp and knew their husbands wanted to start a brewery. They introduced them and the rest is history. Zac thought of the name Bad Weather while home brewing with his dad and brother in the garage. They would always joke about that bad Minnesota weather and if they started a brewery it would be appropriately named; Bad Weather Brewing Company.

Passion for the craft brewing industry

Their passion and excitement really shows in everything they do. The founders are truly down to earth and feel like they are living a dream come true. Joe describes his excitement, “I always get excited trying a new beer and giddy when seeing new beer labels. I think our industry encourages a more engaged “fan base” which adds to my excitement.

Joe is very passionate about his customers and craft beer fans. He explains, “Creating something that people are excited to pick up is really fun and helps to keep me motivated in what the brewery is doing. There’s nothing like an enthusiastic taproom regular or seeing folks post about beers online to get me out of a rut. When the taproom opens to the public I like to grab my laptop and move my ‘work’ out of the office and onto the bar top. Seeing the enjoyment people get from everyone’s hard work is really powerful.”

With eclectic artwork and bad weather beer related names like, Hopcromancer, Windvane, Anomaly and Ominous, how could you not be excited to visit Bad Weather Brewing Company!

When asked what they are most passionate about in the brewing industry, Andy adds, “I suppose it’s the want to keep learning and improving. Not only myself personally as a brewer, but also as a company. We strive to make a fantastic product and to improve upon it in any way possible.”

Their passion is clear. We had to ask a simple question. What is your favorite beer style and why? Andy responds, “My favorite is a Munich style Helles lager. It was the first lager I ever brewed and I love German style lagers. They are elegant, delicious, and a challenge to brew.”

It doesn’t sounds like they ever hide from a challenge! Their Munich Helles is scheduled to be on tap at the end of June.

 

Challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic

Bad Weather, like most breweries, across the country have faced challenges since the start of COVID-19 pandemic.

Joe describes his concern for his team, “Our biggest challenges are making sure the staff and their families are protected both from a health perspective but also financially. When we closed the taproom down and halted new production, it makes the ability to pay everyone very difficult. We faced a lot of scary uncertainties and a lot of stress. Everyone worked incredibly hard changing almost every aspect of the business to focus on off sale crowlers and cans to supply our distributor. There still is a massive amounts of uncertainty but I’m proud of what the team has done in the face of this massive challenge.”

However, Bad Weather did have to get creative with some aspects of the business as Andy describes, “We have switched to to-go orders here at the brewery. We created a online inventory of what we have available in 750mL bottles and crowlers so customers can pre-order online if they’d like. They can walk up to the brewery and order from a safe distance of course from our staff.”

 

Moving forward with support

Throughout all the challenges, Bad Weather has continued to brew. Andy says, “Today, we’re brewing our best selling beer, an IPA called Hopcromancer! Our latest beer release is a Rye Porter called Midnight Portage.” Seems like Bad Weather haven’t missed a beat!

Since production has slowed down for them, they still haven’t had time to experiment in the brewhouse and have been more dedicated to as Andy describes, “cleaning, evaluating our SOP’s and the cleaning some more!”

Minnesota has started to open up at a very small scale. The stay at home order is scheduled to end June 1^st. Until then Bad Weather’s tap room will remain closed.

Andy and the Bad Weather team are so grateful for the community support they have received along the way. : Andy describes their shift in focus, “With bars and restaurants shut down we’ve focused our distribution to cans. Liquor stores remain open so our can sales have been really good. We are still playing catchup with our can supply though as the shutdown hit us at a really bad time. We were in between brews for our distribution brands as well as in between can orders.

He goes on to explain what is going on at the brewery, “As for the brewery we sell 750mL bottles and crowlers to go only. Those sales have almost quadrupled during the shutdown. The local support has been amazing! We can barely keep up with crowlers. Which is a great thing because we have a cooler full of kegs we are trying to salvage.”

 

Thank you!

We want to extend a big thank you to Joe and Andy at Bad Weather Brewing Company for participating in this initiative during American Craft Beer Week! We know many breweries across the country are going through similar situations. Our goal is to celebrate our partners and tell their story’s during this difficult time. Bad Weather is open daily from 12pm-6pm for online orders or walkups.