No better way to start the day than a scrapple breakfast discussing the benefits of worm farms at breweries.
“What’s scrapple?” asks Pat Conway, co-owner of Great Lakes Brewing Company (GLBC). We all stared around in a silent laughter thinking amongst ourselves, “how do you describe such a special (for a lack of a better term) regional offering?” Johnny Billotta of Two Guys on Beer decided to step up and try and explain it, but in the end Pat decided between the hangover he was battling and the drive back to Cleveland after breakfast, that passing was probably the better idea. Once we got past the scrapple discussion and a random debate on geology, we did finally end up talking beer and brewing in Cleveland, Ohio. Of course, scrapple came up again, multiple times.
Before Pat Conway, there was no such thing as craft beer in Cleveland. Today there is barely a bar in the city that doesn’t carry a Great Lakes brew. Pat has turned Great Lakes into the behemoth it is in the beer world by not just brewing great beers, but also by running a great business. GLBC has a created a business philosophy they call the Triple-Bottom Line. It is a philosophy that revolves around engaging in economic, social and environmental practices in order to run a sustainable and profitable business. These engagements include reducing, reusing and recycling, being energy efficient, investing in local community non-profit organizations and more. There is actually a meaning behind having three waves in the logo—they stand for the triple-bottom line philosophy.
Not having waste and being efficient is something Pat is extremely passionate about. Going green has become a huge movement over the past couple years, but it is something Pat started over 15 years ago at the brewery. “After school I traveled the world. I came back and was appalled by how much poverty I had seen, but inspired by how resourceful a lot of people are. Like flattening cans and turning them into shingles for their house and collecting falling coals on the train tracks to heat their house.” This was Pat’s inspiration for transforming his brewery and something he has taken to great extents. “We feed worms our office paper, kitchen scraps and barley. When you feed them, their waste, their shit is called castings. It’s full of nutrients and if you use that as a soil amendment, it does great stuff.”
Yes, Pat even put a worm farm in the basement to decrease waste and increase productivity from his farm. A large majority of the food used in the restaurant is locally farmed or raised. The brewery and restaurant is also heated through the use of solar panels. The efforts put into making the brewery more environmentally friendly is a never ending mission. GLBC has also recently worked out a deal with a local historic farm in the Cuyahoga Valley Countryside Conservancy in which they are going to farm the land like it would have been hundreds of years ago. GLBC will serve the food in their restaurant and in exchange they will help celebrate and promote the conservancy which has been struggling for years and losing interest amongst tourists.
After discussing Pat’s Triple-Bottom Line philosophy with him, it is hard to argue that it isn’t a huge reason behind the success the Great Lakes Brewing Company has seen. GLBC is a local staple amongst all types of people and is becoming a staple to beer drinkers’ fridges country-wide. Oh and if you were wondering whether or not Pat like the scrapple? “No.”