What lies beyond the pandemic? MassForward is MassLive’s series examining the journey of Massachusetts’ businesses through and beyond the coronavirus pandemic.
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“We’re still standing, so I guess we’re doing pretty darn good,” Sam Hendler responded last week when asked, “How are you doing?”
Sam, along with his brothers Jack and Eric, opened Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers in Framingham in 2011. The brewery has since tripled its size. And in an overwhelming crowd of craft breweries, Jack’s Abby stands out with their one style of beer: lager. To pay homage to the lager’s Bavarian history, Jack’s Abby adheres to traditional German brewing standards, but with a modern influence. Their beer has been recognized worldwide and has received gold medal awards from the Best of Craft beer Awards, Great International Beer Festival and RateBeer Best awards, among others.
But all the awards in the world can’t help you prepare for a global pandemic. And over the past six months, at times, things have gotten dark and bleak, says Sam Hendler, who handles sales for the brewery.
In March, as COVID-19 concerns mounted in Massachusetts, the brewery was forced to make layoffs and dump thousands of gallons of its beer.
“When the governor announced that our hospitality operation would have to close, from then, through the summer, I could kind of see that we were in survival mode,” said Hendler. “There were times that were, to be frank, very dark and the future was really bleak for the brewery.”
Even with the uncertainty of the brewery’s future hovering overhead, Jack’s Abby found time and resources to give back to its community. With schools closed, the brewery offered free cheese pizzas to all Framingham students as students would be without their usual school lunch. The brewery also worked with the United Way to go out into the Framingham community and donate pizzas to those in need.
Now, as summer winds down, and state-mandated coronavirus restrictions ease up, Hendler says the future is still unknown, but things are beginning to fall back into place.
Jack's Abby Craft lagers has relied on can sales throughout much of the coronavirus pandemic. (Photo courtesy Jack's Abby Craft Lagers)
“As we’ve gotten through summer, things have been stabilizing a little bit,” he said.
The fact it is summer helps, Hendler said. With more people spending more time outdoors, it’s the best time of year to sell beer, he said. In June, just in time for the sunny weather, the brewery was also able to open up a beer garden, which allowed customers to return onsite and drink draft beer.
Hendler added that PPP money was also a big boost for the brewery, too.
“I think we’ve transitioned from survival mode to adaption mode,” he said. “It’s challenging. When you go into survival mode you have to cut costs and it becomes hard to do new things, but as we have stabilized, we’re taking a really hard look now at how we need to adapt and change the environment the next couple years.”
There are opportunities to succeed, Hendler says, and the brewery is putting itself in the best position to win those opportunities.
In July, the brewery became one of three craft breweries to collaborate with an NBA team as it announced a four-year deal had been inked with the Boston Celtics. As part of the deal, Jack’s Abby would brew a specialty beer — “Pride and Parquet.”
“We’re really excited to be doing something cool and unique with them,” said Hendler. “It’s not just a banner or a billboard somewhere. We’re going to be creating beer with them, which is just a really fun project to get to work on with one of the best, most prestigious, long-lasting brands in Boston.”
“Pride and Parquet” is a “hoppy lager” and is the perfect representation of what Jack’s Abby is, says Hendler, as the beer combines the traditional brewing techniques of lagers with American innovation and hop techniques of IPAs.
Another opportunity the brewery is taking advantage of is low-alcohol beer.
The brewery launched the “2% Beer Initiative” project, which reimagines classic style beers with a much lower alcohol volume, without sacrificing the taste.
The low ABV beers are perfect for people looking to have severals beers in one sitting, without getting too tipsy. Naturally, with less alcohol, they have less calories, too.
The response has been awesome, says Hendler.
“First of all, the beer is fantastic,” he said. “There’s been a lot of attraction to this idea of a super low abv beer. We weren’t really sure what to expect from it. Jack just thought it was something fun to try and see how much flavor he could get into a beer with low alcohol. So far, the response has been really, really great.”
Like all industries post COVID-19, the brewing industry will be damaged, says Hendler.
“Unfortunately, I think the reality is breweries will close because of this,” he said. “...My hope is that when we do get to the other side, those who have managed to figure out a way to thrive in this new environment, will be on really strong footing to continue to do that moving forward.”
MassForward is MassLive's series examining the journey of Massachusetts' small businesses through and beyond the coronavirus pandemic.
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