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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

homebrew

Beer Made With a Beer Brewing Robot Wins Gold Medal

In July, a homebrewer using a BEERMKR home beer brewing appliance won gold at the National HomeBrew Competition.

According to a release from BEERMKR, a beer brewed by Christian Chandler of Phoenix, AZ, won the gold medal in the Porters & Stouts category, beating out 164 entries in the contest put on by the American HomeBrewers Association.

The win was an important milestone in that it’s the first time that a homebrewer used an automated beer brewing countertop appliance to help develop an award-winning recipe at the HomeBrew Competition.

So how did Chandler use the BEERMKR to develop his beer? From the release:

Chandler says that BEERMKR’s small batches and ease of use let him make multiple iterations of a recipe and “really tweak things on the fly.” Chandler was able to fine-tune his recipe into a national gold medal winner.  The repeatability of BEERMKRs process also helped him make consistently good beer as he advanced from the first to second rounds of the competition.

Chandler used the BEERMKR to do quick batches, which he later scaled up using a higher capacity brewing system called the Grainfather to increase batch size. While The Grainfather automates some parts of the brewing process, it still requires the user to monitor readings manually and transfer the wort to a separate container for fermentation after the brew. The BEERMKR, on the other hand, automates much more of the process of beer brewing. The brewer chooses the ingredients and builds a recipe, but from there the sensors and software of the BEERMKR monitor much of the process, from brewing through fermentation to carbonation.

In short, Chandler, an experienced brewer, integrated the BEERMKR as part of his recipe development process. He iterated recipes and brewed quick small batches with smaller portions of ingredients on the BEERMKR, and used his bigger machine to brew larger quantities once the recipe was dialed in.

So will it soon become commonplace for homebrewers to use brewbots like the BEERMKR to develop recipes for brewing competitions? I imagine so, in part because the machines essentially act as a tool for serious homebrewers to develop recipes faster. While purists might resent any use of technology when it comes to brewing up a batch, technology like the BEERMKR helps them get better at their craft by automating the boring parts like temperature control and leaving the creative parts up to them.

You can watch a video of Chandler below talking about developing his award winning recipe with the BEERMKR.

BEERMKR beer wins gold at National Homebrew Competition

After a Summer Hit by COVID-19, Home Brew Appliance Startup MiniBrew Secures Funding for 2021

MiniBrew, a Netherlands-based maker of home-brew appliances, announced last month they’ve secured funding to continue operations after a months-long struggle with COVID-19-related difficulties.

The company, which started shipping its home brew appliance last year in Europe, had big plans for expansion into the U.S. and other markets, but saw a number of strategic investors pull out in the midst of the pandemic.

The loss of investment back in June meant the company went into “suspension of payment” (meaning they couldn’t pay their creditors) and laid off members of the team. The resulting reduction in personnel and funding also meant MiniBrew had to put a halt on development of a 110-volt model of its machine for the U.S. market.

Despite the struggles due to COVID-related funding issues, the pullback came amidst an increase of usage of the appliances in the field as home brewers stuck indoors fired up their units to make beer. According to the company’s update, homebound MiniBrew users created three times more beer recipes compared to pre-COVID times.

Luckily for those MiniBrew users, the company announced they’ve reach an agreement with their creditors, secured funding and are once again adding new features for the MiniBrew such as recipe sharing.

MiniBrew’s struggles and small dedicated user base are reminiscent of PicoBrew’s here in the States, although unlike PicoBrew, the MiniBrew team was able to negotiate with its lenders to live another day.

Overall, home beer making automation remains a struggling category. In addition to PicoBrew and MiniBrew, we’ve watched startups like iGulu and HOPii struggle after big crowdfunding campaigns, while others, like LG’s much-hyped HomeBrew appliance, looks like it never got out the door.

Despite the category’s struggles, there are still companies like BEERMKR, INTHEKEG and Pinter rolling out products and an early and enthusiastic of early adopters buying them.

The challenge will be whether the category can ever break out beyond the small group of early adopters who are craving a tech-forward home brew solution.

Hop On: There’s a Sudsy New Wave of Homebrew Appliances Looking To Automate Beer Brewing

How many people will make beer at home if you give them an machine to help in the process?

The next few years should provide an answer to that question as a new wave of beer-brewing appliances hit the market.

Home beer brewing machines aren’t new. PicoBrew started shipping the Zymatic a few years back and followed that product with the consumer-focused Pico. Brewie started shipping its second generation, the Brewie+, last year. Australian extract-beer giant Coopers got into the game in 2017 with BrewArt (though technically some wouldn’t call extract-derived beer “brewing”), and we’re not even counting those like HOPii that have already come and gone.

Despite all this activity, it seems the homebrew market has only just started to pick up speed. With that in mind, here’s a quick look at the new entrants to home brewing appliances coming to the U.S. in the next year:

BEERMKR

Set to ship this summer, BEERMKR’s open platform and proven ability to deliver products make this startup one of the more promising new entrants to the home brew appliance space.

Here’s what I wrote in March after I saw the BEERMKR in action at the Housewares show:

The system, which comes with a brewing appliance and a beer dispenser, sells for a post-Kickstarter price of $399 for the complete system. MKR KITs, the optional ingredient packs for those that want to “brew-by-number”, will each cost $12 and deliver a gallon or so of beer.

At $399, BEERMKR is one of the most affordable new entrants to the market. The company will sell MKR KITS that include all the ingredients for a batch of beer for $12, though you can also use your own grains and hops.

You can watch founder Aaron Walls walk me through the product below:

A look at the Beermkr beer brewing appliance

LG HomeBrew

We were as surprised as anyone when LG announced their intent to enter the home-brewing appliance space in advance of this year’s CES. The new appliance, aptly called LG HomeBrew, sees the South Korean appliance giant taking a Keurig-style approach to home brewing with an all-in-one capsule-based system that automates the entire process, including dispensing.

If anything, a big consumer electronics brand like LG entering the home-brew-appliance space helps legitimize it, even if LG runs into challenges finding a market for their product. Of course, much of the product’s ultimate success will depend on pricing and on how well it actually works, but I worry that by creating a fully-capsule based system the company might be going against the trend towards more open brewing systems. After all, consumers who go through the trouble of making beer at home have shown they want some room for creativity, one of big the reasons PicoBrew finally opened their platform to enable ‘bring-your-own-ingredients’.

MiniBrew

MiniBrew, the brain child of two Dutch advertising executives, is different from all the other appliances on this list for one reason: it’s already shipping.

The product, for which the company raised €2.6M in funding in December, started shipping throughout Europe in the fall of last year and the company is targeting a 2020 entry into the U.S. market.

Cofounder Olivier van Oord gave me a walk-through of the MiniBrew when I was in Europe last month, and I have to say I liked what I saw. The system is both open enough to allow the brewer to craft their own recipes while also also applying enough automation to make the brewing process (and serving) much easier and approachable.

One aspect I liked was an app that allows the user to craft recipes easily around their own beer preferences. From there, they can order ingredients based on their own recipe or choose an ingredient pack based on a beer from one of MiniBrew’s partners. Once the wort is created, the user tosses the yeast into the brew keg and tells it to start the fermentation process with the app.

Keeping the the wort and what becomes the fully fermented beer contained in one keg that also serves as the (fully refrigerated) dispensing keg is something van Oord saw as critical, in part because it eliminates room for error:

“Where beer goes wrong is in the transport of wort,” he said. “Working clean is the most important part of beer brewing.”

The MiniBrew isn’t cheap, selling for €1,200 (which is roughly $1,350 USD), but for those that was a powerful but open system — and one that is already shipping — the MiniBrew is a strong contender.

You can see my walk through of the MiniBrew below:

MiniBrew Beer Brewing (and Dispensing!) Appliance

DrinkWorks

While not technically a home-brewing machine, DrinkWorks at least deserves mention for one reason: the home adult beverage machine is a product of a joint venture between Keurig and the world’s largest beer company, AB InBev.

The DrinkWorks machine, which is now available in beta in the Budweiser’s hometown of St Louis, MO, to consumers statewide in Missouri and Florida, uses pods to make cocktails and, surprisingly, beer. While it’s unclear exactly how the beer is made from a pod, it’s not through traditional brewing and fermentation methods. But for those that like the idea of making cockails and beer at the press of a button with a Keurig-like pod system, you have to at least be intrigued by DrinkWorks.

While DrinkWorks has been fairly vague on details, we expect the product to be more widely rolled out later this year. For now the DrinkWorks machine will set you back $399, though pricing could change in future.

Brewie Adds Connected Fermentation to its Homebrewing System with Plaato Partnership

Peanut butter and chocolate is probably a slightly odd comparison to make when talking about home beer brewing appliances, but that’s kind of the feeling you get when learning about the new partnership between Brewie and Plaato.

Brewie is a connected home beer brewing appliance that pretty much automates the entire beer brewing process… until you get to the fermentation step. Which is why the company is hopping (ugh, sorry) on board with Plaato, which makes a connected air lock that monitors the fermentation aspect of beer making.

The two companies have integrated their technologies into one mobile app allowing homebrewers to monitor their beer as it goes from grain to wort through fermentation.

Brewie launched in 2015 and went on to crowdfund $720,000. Unlike other crowdfunded home beermaking appliances, Brewie actually delivered, and has sold more than 2,000 units across 50 countries. While the Brewie can be fully automated for the amateur, it is also an open platform that allows more serious brewers to full control every aspect of the brewing process.

The Brewie appliance normally sells for $2,000, but starting on May 10, to promote its partnership with Plaato, customers will be able to purchase a Brewie and Plaato bundle for $1,599 for a limited time (the price will go back up to $2,150 after the promotion ends).

Brewie is billing this partnership as the only system that covers the whole grain-to-beer process, but that doesn’t appear to be the case. Picobrew offers the PicoFerm to monitor the fermentation process. And the forthcoming BEERMKR does the brewing and fermenting all in one device.

Regardless of who’s the first or only, the broader point is that whether you’re a n00b or a pro, devices like Brewie and Plaato and BEERMKR are making homebrewing as easy and as sweet as chocolate (stout).

Crowdfunded Home Beer Maker iGulu Appears to Be a Goner

If you love beer and are contemplating backing a crowdfunded home brew machine — don’t. This free advice is brought to you by more than a year of covering Kickstarted beer campaigns, most of which have taken the public’s money, only to shut down before shipping any product.

Following in the steps of Brewbot and HOPii, it now looks like iGulu is the latest automated home brewing appliance to fold. The following update was posted to Indiegogo and Kickstarter on April 4:

Dear Backers,

We regret to announce that we have to put our project in ‘hibernation’ and pause our regular update. For the past few weeks we have experienced some of the hardest challenges for our company and the project. Our funds were exhausted and we experienced a significant team downsizing due to the financial constraints.

While I still maintain great working relationships with all of our key team members, I couldn’t keep them as employees before I secure new funds from the investor. We have been talking with several prospects since last year, but the financial markets are unfavorable to start-ups like ours recently so I haven’t had any luck yet.

I’m still trying but I cannot at present give any specific timeline for recovery of this project. I will share any further updates whenever we have tangible progress that we are able to report. I deeply apologize again. We have shipped the first machine to one Australian backer. We will continue to fix existing bugs, optimize our product, ship 2nd, 3rd and more machines. Please believe us. We won’t give up.

Regards,

iGulu Team

This development isn’t actually that surprising for anyone who backed or followed the project. iGulu met its funding goal in May of 2016, and after a litany of production and manufacturing delays, the CEO publicly apologized to backers in December of 2017 and said the company had secured an undisclosed amount of funding from three Chinese VC firms to supplement the $1.1 million it had raised via crowdfunding. At that time, the company was expecting to ship its product in July 2018.

This projected ship date obviously came and went with no (well, one?) iGulus brewing up frosty mugs of beer for the backers who ponied up at least $489 a pop to get one. And though the latest update seems to offer those who funded the project a ray of hope, history shows its unlikely that all of the 1,000+ backers will ever get their iGulus.

We’ve reached out to iGulu for comment and will update if we hear back.

At this point, we sound like a broken record, but there’s a HUGE caveat emptor when backing hardware projects from untested companies on crowdfunding platforms. Designing a one-off prototype is relatively easy. Manufacturing that same device at scale in China brings up a host of unforeseen and expensive issues (see: Rite Press, Cinder).

Some home beer brewers have come out of crowdfunding unscathed — Picobrew and BrewArt, for example. I am also optimistic about BEERMKR because that was built by an existing company that had previous experience with beer-related hardware.

It doesn’t look, however, like iGulu has got what it takes to succeed. Appliance giant LG is getting into the home brew appliance business; maybe it can do what Desora did with Cinder and buy up iGulu’s assets for cheap.

Oh, and if that lone Australian who received their device is reading, please drop us a line to let us know how it works.

Spoon Newsletter: LG’s HomeBrew Appliance, Spinn Update, World’s First Cell-Grown Steak

This is the post version of our weekly newsletter. If you’d like to get the weekly Spoon in your inbox, you can subscribe here.

When it comes to smart kitchen startups, there is no shortage of companies trying to change how we make our morning cup of joe.

One of the highest profile startups in this space over the past couple of years is Spinn, maker of a grind-brew coffee machine that utilizes a patented centrifugal brewing technology. I was intrigued enough with the company and its tech to plop down over $300 to join the first “batch” of orders in 2016, but almost two years past the promised ship date, I’m still waiting for my Spinn.

The company has hit some snags as they work to get their coffee maker to customers. While many of the Spinn’s early customers have been understandably frustrated, it appears most are hanging on, intrigued by the company’s periodic updates showing progress on the product. If they’re like me, I suspect many are getting frustrated with a company that continues to advertise and sell their overdue appliance, all the while creating more and more distance between new customers and those still waiting at the front of the line.

Still, I know I have no one to blame for investing my money in a Spinn with the knowledge that coffee startup products have been historically risky investments. With companies like ZPM and Arist turning out to be colossal misses and others like Bonaverde sputtering along for years and periodically shipping out products, I knew full well that I might never see the product. In the end, I may have been better off putting my money towards a Tesla like Spoon reader Rebecca:

“I put money down for this machine in Nov. 2016 (I’m a 1st batch-er) and at around the same time my husband put down money for a Tesla Model 3. At least I now have a smooth ride to the coffee shop!”

You can read my latest update on my Spinn journey here.

Coffee isn’t the only category that can be rough sailing for new startups. The home brew market has been notoriously tough as well, with companies like HOPii and iGulu struggling to ship and others like BrewArt and Brewie failing to get much traction.

Still, this hasn’t stopped South Korean consumer electronics giant LG from jumping into the game. The company recently announced they would debut a new home brewing device by the name of the LG HomeBrew at CES.  The capsule-based beer brewing appliance, which makes roughly the same amount of beer as a PicoBrew Pico per cycle, is expected to ship sometime next year.

What’s interesting to me is a company like LG usually only gets into a business if they see a high volume opportunity, which begs the question what will they do to differentiate their product?  While PicoBrew has certainly raised awareness around automated beer brewing, the company has yet to make home brewing a mass-market hobby, something I am sure LG hopes they can do.

Either way, next year promises to be an interesting one when it comes to tech-powered boozing at home. About a month ago, Keurig and AB InBev launched Drinkworks, a capsule-based instant serve cocktail, cider and beerbot machine expected to ship in limited quantities next year.

While home bev-tech space continues to slowly gestate, the pro market continues to move along at a rapid clip. Just this week, a robot powered bartender by the name of UR5e debuted at Broncos Stadium. The new bartenderbot is essentially robotic arm that grabs a beer cup and fills it (through the bottom, no less) for waiting customers.

Moving beyond beverage bots, this week also saw the introduction of a new sidewalk delivery bot from Postmates that goes by the name of Serve. Serve, which looks like the lovechild of Minion and Starship deliverybot, is expected to roll out in Los Angeles over the next year. And speaking of food delivery, this week Chris wrote about the breakup of Amazon and Instacart, something that’s been rumored ever since the big online retailer acquired Whole Foods.

There’s lots more great analysis to catch up from this past week, including looks at the first cell-grown steak and what the new farm bill means for CBD, so make sure to check it out.

That’s it for now. Have a great weekend and we’ll see you next week!

Mike

In the 12/14/2018 edition:

Presto Eats May Be the Most On-Trend Meal Kit Company Yet. But Will It Succeed?

By Catherine Lamb on Dec 14, 2018 11:16 am
Whenever I get word about a new meal kit company, it’s hard not to be immediately skeptical. It’s no secret that meal kits are struggling: Chef’d surprised everyone when it shut down abruptly earlier this year. Boston hyper-local meal kit Just Add Cooking ceased operations this fall. And Blue Apron’s stock continues to underwhelm.

The Denver Broncos Get a Beer Pouring Robot at Mile High Stadium

By Chris Albrecht on Dec 14, 2018 08:04 am
While the Denver Broncos may be in the midst of a losing season, they could win over fans this weekend when a new robot starts dispensing Bud Light at Mile High Stadium (h/t The Washington Post). You’d think that such a mechanical miracle would have a fancy name like the “Robo-Bronco” or the “Elway 3000,” […]

Startups! They’re Just Like Us! Amazon and Instacart Break Up

By Chris Albrecht on Dec 13, 2018 04:00 pm
Like Ben and Jennifer, Brad and Angelina, and Cardi B and Offset*, Instacart and Amazon have broken up. In a blog post today, Instacart announced that it was winding down (consciously uncoupling?) its grocery delivery relationship with Amazon. Like with so many other power couples, this breakup wasn’t entirely a surprise.

The Farm Bill Just Passed — What Does That Mean for the CBD Market?

By Catherine Lamb on Dec 13, 2018 02:08 pm
After months of back and forth, Congress voted yesterday to pass the 2018 Farm Bill. The $867 million bill contains lots of wide-reaching legislative measures, like expanded farm subsidies, SNAP revisions, and permanent funding for farmers markets. But perhaps most interestingly, the bill legalizes the production and sale of hemp at a federal level.

What Bowery’s Latest Funding Round Says About Indoor Farming

By Jennifer Marston on Dec 13, 2018 12:00 pm
New Jersey-based indoor-farming startup Bowery announced yesterday that it has raised $90 million in fresh funding. The round was led by Alphabet Inc.’s GV with participation from Temasek and Almanac Ventures, General Catalyst and GGV Capital (Bowery’s Series A investors), and various seed investors. Bowery produces what founder Irving Fain calls “post-organic produce.”

ImpactVision Raises $1.3M Led by Maersk

By Chris Albrecht on Dec 13, 2018 10:11 am
ImpactVision, a startup that uses hyperspectral imaging to assess food quality, has raised $1.3 million, according to VentureBeat. The round was led by logistics and transportation company Maersk, and brings the total amount raised by ImpactVision to $2.9 million. As we wrote last year about ImpactVision: Using a combination of digital imaging, spectroscopy and machine learning, […]

Postmates Debuts its own Bright-Eyed Delivery Robot

By Chris Albrecht on Dec 13, 2018 06:00 am
You know what you can look forward to in 2019? More robots (but more on that in a later post). Case in point: delivery service Postmates announced today that it has developed its own autonomous delivery rover that will be hitting sidewalks next year. Dubbed Serve, the li’l robot is a bright yellow square-shaped box […]

Hi Fidelity Genetics Raises $8.5M for AI-Driven Plant Breeding

By Chris Albrecht on Dec 13, 2018 04:00 am
Hi Fidelity Genetics (HFG), which combines sensors, data and artificial intelligence (AI) to improve plant breeding, today announced that it has raised an $8.5 million Series A led by Fall Line Capital and Finistere Ventures. This brings the total amount raised by HFG to $11.5 million. There are two parts to the HFG system.

Deliveroo Goes Back to the Future with Brick and Mortar Food Hall

By Catherine Lamb on Dec 12, 2018 04:00 pm
You know how they say that in fashion, everything old comes back around and eventually is new again? It seems that the same might be true for restaurants. This week London-based food delivery startup Deliveroo opened up its first brick-and-mortar location in Hong Kong (h/t CNBC). The so-called Delivery Food Hall is home to five […]

Waitr to Acquire Bite Squad for $321.3M

By Jennifer Marston on Dec 12, 2018 02:00 pm
Online delivery platform Waitr has announced plans to acquire third-party delivery service Bite Squad for $321.3 million. The purchase price is a mix of cash and shares of common stock of Waitr. Both companies serve small- to mid-sized U.S. markets. Waitr is a full platform from online order and delivery. Restaurants partnering with the company […]

BEERMKR: A Crowdfunded Countertop Beer Machine that Could Actually Deliver

The first thing I told Aaron Walls, Cofounder and CEO of BrewJacket, during our phone interview was that I didn’t think his BEERMKR Kickstarter campaign was going to work.

I was sure it would get funded (and it did)–there’s a huge opportunity for an all-in-one countertop beer-making appliance that takes the hassle out of homebrewing. But BEERMKR isn’t the first company to promise such a device and ask people to fund it. PicoBrew‘s success aside, Kickstarter and Indiegogo are littered with the remains of Brewbot, iGulu and HOPii, all of whom promised easy home brewing, all of whom collected big money from everyday people, none of whom made it to market.

But after talking with Walls, I think BEERMKR might actually be different. It might actually, dare I say it, become an actual product you can pay actual money for and actually use.

Like those before it, BEERMKR is a device that promises to take all the work out of home brewing. There’s a countertop appliance that is both a brewer and fermenter, a separate dispenser and a mobile app that provides recipes and sends you notifications throughout the brew process. From a press release announcing that BEERMKR hit its Kickstarter goal, the process seems pretty straightforward:

How it Works in Five Easy Steps:

  1. Add the grain and hops from the MKRKIT into the ingredient bin and start the brew on the BEERMKR app.
  2. When brewing is complete, remove grain and hops from ingredient bin and add yeast.
  3. Start fermentation via the BEERMKR app and ferment the wort into beer.
  4. Once complete, transfer the finished beer to the BEERTAP dispenser and then screw inthe CO2 cartridge to carbonate.
  5. Serve and enjoy.

 

There are a few things that make BEERMKR stand out from existing homebrew systems like the Pico. First, BEERMKR is totally open. You can buy pre-made brew kits with ingredients from BrewJacket, customize those kits with your own ingredients (think: raspberries from your garden or whiskey-soaked oak chips) if you want, or just build your own recipe from the ground up. This is different from the Pico, which still makes you buy Pico Packs (at least for now) and doesn’t allow for as much experimentation.

BEERMKR also uses a “brew pouch” system. These are single-use, recyclable bags that contain the beer during the brewing and fermenting process. Once the beer is ready, simply take the pouch out of the brewer and hook it up in the dispenser. Oxygen never touches the beer and there’s no need to clean and sterilize buckets and hoses. Want to brew another batch? Pull out another pouch.

The BEERMKR itself costs $329 for early backers (it goes up to $379 if you wait too long), and each brew kit costs $12 and will produce the equivalent of a 12 pack of beer. The BEERMKR app guides you through each recipe with notifications on things like when to add yeast, and how long to ferment, etc., and keeps track of what ingredients you’ve added if you’re building your own recipe.

So why am I more bullish on BEERMKR than its predecessors?

Mainly because the people behind BEERMKR have a track record. BrewJacket is a real company that’s been around for five years and has already produced — and shipped — beer brewing products like the BrewJacket Immersion Pro fermentation temperature control system.

Assuming they can replicate their previous fulfillment success, what’s even more exciting about BEERMKR is that its open approach actually makes me want to brew my own beer, and I hate beer. The idea of adding tea or chocolate or Twizzlers or whatever to a beer sounds fun.

The company is showing off the BEERMKR in action at the Great American Beer Festival in Boulder, CO this weekend and says it will ship units to backers in March of 2019.

PicoBrew Goes Beyond Beer with Pico U, a Universal Brewing Appliance

Today PicoBrew announced the Pico U, a new multi-drink brewing appliance that allows users to make beer and a variety of other craft beverages such as cold brew coffee, kombucha, and horchata.

While the move into what the company calls “fusion drinks” is a significant new direction for PicoBrew, it’s not altogether surprising. The eight-year-old company has become reliably predictable by introducing new products every year that are both more affordable and offer greater functionality.

The dimensions of the Pico U are significantly smaller than both the Pico Pro and Pico C, which PicoBrew told us was in part an effort to make the appliance more attractive to those worried about kitchen counter space. Makes sense, since the crowding of countertops is real in the era of kitchen gadget proliferation, and the Pico U’s footprint is closer to that of an espresso machine to that of the Pico C’s countertop microwave oven-like dimensions.

With the move to smaller form factor and fusion drinks, the Pico U also comes with a smaller step filter which holds the company’s compostable ingredient pods called PicoPaks (the smaller PicoPaks for the mini step filter will be called, naturally, PicoPak Minis).  The smaller step filter makes 1.3-liter batch drink brews, and those looking for larger batches (or who want to brew beer) will need the standard 5-liter step filter.

To brew fusion beverages such as kombucha, horchata or yerba mate, Pico U owners will need to buy a PicoPak through the PicoBrew website. The company has indicated that they will offer both multipak and single pak versions to buy online and that the pricing for the Paks will range depending on the price of the ingredients. More exotic brews with high-priced ingredients like saffron or peaberry might cost over $15 for a batch; simpler tea based brews will be lower.

In typical PicoBrew fashion, the company is launching the new product via Kickstarter. The Pico U, which ship this fall to backers, comes in both a “basic” and “deluxe” configurations seen below:

Pico U Model Configurations

As can be seen above, Kickstarter pricing for the basic configuration starts at $169 and pricing for the Deluxe configuration is $189. My guess is that with only a $20 price difference the Pico U Deluxe package will be the most popular, particularly for those who have been on the fence about buying previous Pico models and were waiting for the price to come down. When these models come to retail, they will be priced $249 and $299 respectively.

One feature of the Pico U that is intriguing to me is the single serve coffee capability. With its single-serve coffee function,  PicoBrew allows the Pico U owner to brew coffee with “Gold Cup” standard precision temperature control, which means the water must be 200°F plus or minus a couple degrees when it hits the grounds.  That’s pretty cool since Gold Cup coffee makers are a thing, but I’m more intrigued by the ability to do single cup brews, one of the things I wanted with my still MIA Spinn.

I also like the idea of being able to use my own coffee beans, a departure from other beverages such as beer which require PicoPaks. If there’s one complaint I’ve heard from home brewers considering previous Pico models, it’s that the cost-per-brew of the Pico is still fairly high. PicoPaks range in cost from $20 for the PicoBrew house brands up to $25 to $29 for PicoPaks from their brewery partners. That translates to about $1.50-$2 per 12 ounce beer, which is less than buying in bottles but still not exactly cheap.

Pricing gets us to the broader question of is whether this is the PicoBrew model that will take the company – and home brewing – more mass market. The company seems focused on making that happen by continually dropping prices, improving the ease of use and making their products smaller all while adding new features like fusion drink brewing. And certainly, by doing all that with the Pico U, my guess is they will likely entice more wannabe homebrewers into the PicoBrew universe.

However, going more mass-market will ultimately depend on how many are ok with paying for ingredient packs.  Long term, it will be interesting to see if the company starts to bring the pricing down on their ingredients, something which will ultimately be heavily dependent on volume. Of course, this is dependent on how many Picos are out in the field brewing up batches of beer and kombucha. If that sounds like the classic chicken-egg problem, that’s because it is.

However, there’s no doubt the Pico U is the most approachable and mass market-ready PicoBrew yet, so I expect we’ll see the company beat its past crowdfunding records and sell a whole bunch of beer brewing appliances.

Brew Cloud App Keeps Your Beer Recipes Handy

Old school homebrewing is a complicated process that involves following precise instructions. The problem with writing down recipes on paper is that you can spill beer on them and make them unreadable.

This was (for real) one of the reasons Steven Edwards set out to make Brew Cloud, an app that lets you create, store and access your favorite beer recipes in the cloud.

Edwards is president of Avocado Toast Co., a Noblesville, Indiana-based design and development shop that created Brew Cloud. Edwards is one of the 1.1 million homebrewers in the U.S., and noticed a lack of full featured apps that would help him create his beer.

Released at the tail end of this past summer, Brew Cloud lets you identify the style of beer you want to make, list the ingredients, figure out your gravity, calculate your alcohol percentage and more from your phone. You can also play around with the recipe to see different outcomes from various tweaks.

Right now the app is limited to creating and saving your own recipes. There are no pre-set recipes baked into the app, and there are no ways to share recipes with other app users. Edwards said that their plan is to release a sharing feature sometime next year.

Brew Cloud isn’t the only app to help hop-heads with their homebrewing. BeerSmith is, according to Edwards, the de facto homebrewing app. While they are full featured, BeerSmith charges $7.99 in the app store and Edwards believes that the Brew Cloud offers a fresher user experience. That said, there are other competitors such as Fermenticus Brew Log and Brew Pal.

Brew Cloud is bootstrapped and currently available for free for iOS and Android devices. Edwards says they have roughly 300 users and 80 monthly active users. While Edwards has big plans for the app including an advertising option, he’s not in any hurry to scale too quickly and wants to grow organically.

Hopefully Edwards isn’t jotting his Brew Cloud plans down on paper where beer could spill all over them.

Brew-IT’s Beer Cube Hopes to Bring Luxury Brewing to Your Home

You might think the words “beer cube” refer to some new exotic, angular packaging for your favorite brew. But the Beer Cube is instead a home beer making machine currently in development that aims to take all the work out of letting you recreate your favorite craft beers from around the world in the comfort of your own home.

The Beer Cube is a product in the works from Brew-IT, a Québec-based startup, which the company hopes to debut in March of next year. The device, as explained to me over the phone by co-founder David Brouillette is a modular, stackable system of cubes, measuring 13 inches by 13 inches by 13 inches.

You add a can of beer “concentrate” (roughly the size of a can of Coke) and water to the machine and Beer Cube takes care of the rest. A few days of fermentation and a notification from your smart phone later and you have five liters of your freshly made beer on tap. The Beer Cube takes care of everything from heating to chilling to sanitization and recipe maintenance.

All this beer goodness won’t come cheap. Brew-IT is aiming for this to be a luxury item with a $1,000 price tag for two cubes and a docking station, and is targeting people who want to make craft beer at home — but don’t want to bother with any of the complicated work involved.

The other part of the Beer Cube system is the cans of concentrate that goes with it. Brouillette says the company uses a patented process to extract water from the wort made by breweries to make this concentrate that does not involve standard evaporation methods.

The company’s goal is to partner with breweries so people could buy concentrates of their favorite beer from anywhere in the world for about $20 a can. Since the concentrate is non-alcoholic, it can be exported more easily.

Given the complexities involved with the creation of such a magical machine, it’s natural to be skeptical. The company is bootstrapped, only has a prototype at this point, and the actual production of homebrewing machines has befuddled others in the marketplace such as Brewbot and iGulu.

Additionally, the Beer Cube seems to offer much of the same functionality as the Hopii home brewing system that was showcased at our recent Smart Kitchen Summit.

Brouillette says that the competitive landscape is why Brew-IT is taking its time. The company had a previous homebrew device that people could pre-order, but it ran into development issues and was dropped (that product is still listed on the company’s site as available for pre-order, though Brouillette says it will be taken down soon). Brouillette says that his product differs from Hopii because Beer Cube will let you have multiple beers brewing so you never run out, and its concentrate will be more lightweight and easier to ship.

Another way the company hopes to avoid the pitfalls of its competitors is with real world access. In addition to selling cans of concentrate online, the company hopes to have them for sale in brick and mortar craft beer stores as well, so they are easier for people to access.

While Brew-IT is certainly aiming high with its product, the company still has a long way to go to prove itself. Brouillette wants to have the prototype done in time for SXSW and launch it on Kickstarter in March of next year.

BrewArt, The HomeBrew System From Australian Giant Coopers, Hits Kickstarter Goal

If at first you don’t succeed, run another crowdfunding campaign.

That’s exactly what the people behind home beer brewing system BrewArt have done. After an aborted campaign in March in which they only raised just under $3 thousand after three weeks, the BrewArt is already in the money after hitting their $30 thousand goal in just one week.

Of course, it’s not like there was ever any doubt the system would make it to market in the US. That’s because BrewArt – which has been available in Australia since 2016 – is from that country’s largest brewer, Coopers, a company responsible for roughly 70 million liters of beer annually.

Chances are if you’ve heard of Coopers in the US, it’s because the company is a force in DIY home extract brewing. The company created its extraction process in the early 80s and has been selling DIY brewing kits ever since. The company also acquired their biggest DIY extract competitor, Mr. Beer, back in 2012.

And, just like Cooper’s own DIY kits, the BrewArt system utilizes extract ingredients in making a brew. Only unlike Cooper’s syrupy looking extract, each brew made with the BrewArt brewing system utilizes a series of packets of powder-based ingredients called Elements and Enhancers, as well as packet each of yeast and hop oils.

The video below walks through how the BrewArt ingredients are added to a brew.

BrewArt: Brewing Using BrewArt Ingredients

Unlike whole grain brewing systems such as those from PicoBrew and Brewie, BrewArt’s powders simplify beer brewing by allowing the home brewer to skip the mashing process. While some home brew purists prefer whole grain brewing since it puts them at the same starting point as most craft breweries which use raw ingredients, the truth is that there are some breweries that make very good beer using extracts. Add in the extra convenience and time-saving benefits of extract brewing, and you can see why it has its converts.

BrewArt convenience also goes beyond a simplified brewing process. The system streamlines the cleanup process with disposable linings for the store kegs, something I find appealing since cleaning out the serving kegs is the least enjoyable part of using my PicoBrew. The BrewArt disposable linings mean I wouldn’t have to mess with home detergents or going to your local homebrew store to pick up keg cleaner.

Another difference between the BrewArt system and other automated home brew systems is it comes in two full parts: The BeerDroid, which is the beer brewing component, and the BrewFlo, a refrigerated kegging system that houses the Store Kegs (where the beer is fermented and stored).

The full retail price of the BrewArt system will be almost $1,700, but Kickstarter backers can save 40% and get the full system for $995.  If that’s too much or you prefer to use your kegerator, you can pick up the BeerDroid by itself on Kickstarter for $495.

And much like PicoBrew Pico users need to buy brew ingredients in the form of PicoPaks, BrewArt backers need to buy the BrewPrints ingredient packs when they want to brew up a new keg of beer. However, the BrewArt allows the user to mix and match their ingredients to change flavors such as making beers extra hoppy or more fruity*.

Bottom line, there are definite advantages to the BrewArt in a simplified brewing and cleanup process, as well as slightly more control over brew ingredients than competing systems like the Brewie.  However, the retail price is still fairly high compared to the PicoBrew Pico C, which will sell for $549 this fall, and some purists may shy away from the BrewArt because they want to brew from whole grains.

*The PicoBrew PicoPaks do allow for customization, but that’s done online through the company’s online PicoPak customization tool, the BrewCrafter. Once you design your customized PicoPak, it is made in the PicoBrew packing facility and sent to your home for brewing. 

Update 7/22/17: On Kickstarter, the creator of the BrewArt system, Scott Harris, described what their powders are made. We asked for these details in an email interview, but the company was vague in describing how exactly the brew ingredients were made. This new description gives us a much better understanding of what a brewer is getting in the BrewArt Brewprints. 

Lastly, while he says these aren’t the “extracts” home brewers have become accustomed to, I would suggest the BrewArt Elements are still an extract in the sense they are a concentrated powder made of mashed malted barley. 

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PicoBrew Breaks Kickstarter Record In Food Category

You do this crowdfunding thing for a while, you start to get the hang of it.

Especially when you’re a company like PicoBrew, which has had three successful previous campaigns for its beer brewing appliance products. According to a statement made by the company, this time around they reached their target funding goal in just seven hours, making the campaign for the Pico C brewing appliance the fastest funded campaign ever in the food category for Kickstarter.

From the Kickstarter update:

Our campaign goal of $350K was achieved in a mere 7 hours? WOW! OK, we were hoping the Model C would be popular, but this is insane! This is a faster start than any Kickstarter Food campaign in history!

The company is also on pace to break their own previous Kickstarter record for backers.  As of this writing the Pico C has 1807 backers, compared with a total of 1898 backers for the original Pico.

Breaking the total funds raised might be a bit more of a challenge. That’s because the Pico C pledge tiers are for smaller dollar amounts, the result of lower-cost product (For this campaign, the Pico C was available at a starting point of $279, while the original Pico pledges started at $499). However, with 37 days left in the campaign and lots of interesting new incentives for backers yet to be introduced, there’s a good chance this campaign could also easily become the company’s biggest in terms of funds raised.

Related: PicoBrew Debuts All-You-Can-Brew Subscriptions With New Lower-Priced HomeBrew Appliance

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