Ninth Stop - Independence Brewing

I’m realizing that breweries tend to be built where rent is cheap. Because of that I’m slowly gaining a great appreciation for breweries that aren’t in neighborhoods rough enough that I get shifty-eyed when cruising by in my Toyota Corolla. It has significantly stood out in a few of these areas to say the least!

My assumption that all city breweries I visit will be in bad areas left me pleasantly delighted when I found Independence Brewing Company of Austin Texas. It’s in a nice, relatively new warehouse/office park.

That wasn’t all that impressed me right off the bat either. My dad has owned a family business for almost exactly twenty years now so I have a certain appreciation for any true family business. When I hit the door at Independence I was met by the husband/wife co-owners Rob and Amy Cartwright, their one month old daughter Ruby, and their two dogs Jasper and Indy. I don’t know how it could get to be much more family-oriented than that!

More than any of that, it was just a fun environment. I know that every brewery is full of hard workers and Independence is no exception, but they seemed to have some kind of “X” factor that made everyone love walking in the door for work. It might have been the relaxed atmosphere, the cool bosses, or the dogs just hanging out. It may have had something to do with Rob cooking up some BBQ on the grill out front. He had a full rack of ribs, some hand-twisted sausage, and a beer can chicken going. Of course, not just any can though, a custom made one that he could pour Independence Brewing’s Convict Hill Oatmeal Stout into. Rob and Amy even invited me to stay and eat with them but sadly I had to move on and get to Real Ale out in Blanco, TX.

Despite the fact that Austin seems to be a new mecca for craft brewers (at least seven are currently in development stages), Independence is currently the only one that bottles their beer. They still do a brisk keg business. In fact, Rob told me that their keg business has been increasing over the last year to take back a majority of their business.

The increase in keg sales is great but Independence still has one beer that ALWAYS sells out of bottles in a matter of a few days of when it goes on sale. Oklahoma Sucks. It’s an amber beer that goes on sale the week before the annual football game between the University of Texas and Oklahoma. The beer is a creative idea that came about when Rob and Amy found out that a brewery in Oklahoma sells “Texas Sucks” year round.

Watch for the book version of All Hopped Up where I’ll tell you about some of the amazing events hosted by Independence Brewing, more about Rob and Amy, and some other neat stories about the brewery.