The Blog

2007 Company Preview

Posted on December 22, 2006 at 1:16 PM in News

Yukon Brewing Company 2007 Preview

Introduction

We turn 10 years old this year. It is remarkable to think about what this young company has accomplished in such a short time. You cannot find a bar in our territory that does not carry our product. Arguably the toughest consumers have embraced their home town brewery, making us the #1 selling draught beer in the Yukon.

In 2006 the Yukon Brewing Company stepped into adulthood as a company, and 2007 will see us spread our wings. I would like to introduce myself as the new sales and marketing manager. My name is Stephen Boudreau, I hail from Edmonton, Alberta and I am passionate about being part of this company going to the next level. I built and developed marketing campaigns for both Direct Energy and Shaw Cable, most notably the launch of Shaw’s Digital Phone.

We will be kicking off 2007 with a bang. We are hosting our New Years Eve party at Mount Mac. featuring 7 bands, the release of our 10 year anniversary beer, Discovery Ale.  Discovery Ale was the beer on brewsheet number one, back in early 1997.  The beer is a honey pale ale, but we didn’t use just any old honey. Since fireweed is the official flower of the Yukon, we thought that it would be only right if the first brew should use fireweed honey, which results in a different flavour from other honey beers. Discovery Ale is coppery in colour, and finishes dry on the tongue.

Our Focus

We are going to be shifting our focus more and more on Alberta, from a marketing perspective.  While you can be sure that we won’t be taking our home market for granted, we want to continue to build on the momentum that has started to the south.

Our focus in Alberta will be Edmonton. You will be able to find our beer on tap at Edmonton Cracker Cats baseball games at Telus Field, Original Joes and The Nest at NAIT. At the retail level our beer can be found in many liquor stores across the province, including the large Liquor Depot chain, and our skilled representatives in both Edmonton and Calgary are adding new accounts everyday.

New Year, New Look

We have renamed our beloved Arctic Red to Yukon Red. It is also sporting a new streamlined look. We have been struggling with Molson over the ‘arctic’ word in the name for some time, since Molson has it trademarked for brands they don’t use.  Molson offered to license the name to us free, which looks like a good deal at first.  But….

Then we got to thinking. Why would we build an unbelievable reputation, win international awards just to have Molson own the name? Why would we advertise for them? Doesn’t make sense. So after many deliberations and many names, we concluded that they all sounded fake and contrived. So, we went simple, Yukon Red. We are proud of the name and new look and think you will be to.

Next on the docket is Yukon Gold. We have decided it is time for a new look which will be released later this year and we will be keeping you up to date.

Newsletter – Yukon Brewing Company Blog

The YBC blog will be born on January 2nd. This will allow us to better keep you up to date with what’s going on in the Yukon and Alberta. It also gives you the opportunity to comment and have a much more interactive role in what we do. We are really looking forward to everyone’s feedback.

Yukon Brewing Company and the Internet

We launch our brand new state of the art web site on January 2nd, 2007. We will be using the internet to communicate with our consumer is ways never seen before. Online we will be offering any customer new or old to have us sponsor their party no matter how big or small.

Yukon Distilling Company? Brewery Expansion?

We are bursting at the seams in the building that we are in. In fact, we have been renting storage space in another building for quite some time, a place to keep our dry goods like cardboard, boxboard, empty cans and bottles, and the like.  And, as we add tanks to increase capacity, we are finding it harder to move around. So, we are planning to build onto the back of the building this spring.

Another idea that we are pursuing is distilling.  We attended a course in Michigan in early December to learn more about it, and are now chomping at the bit.  The biggest stumbling block, at the moment, is that the Yukon Liquor Act has no provision for a distillery (or a winery, for that matter).  We shall be seeing how successful we are at getting this small Act change made, as soon as possible (we would be ordering equipment tomorrow, were it not for this problem).

Final Thoughts

2007 will be our biggest year yet. We hope that you all enjoy watching this special company grow and are proud to have you as part of it. Put your seat belts on folks…
Here we go!

Comments

Add a comment

Name

Website

Comments