Summit

Minnesota’s original craft brewer values our passion for their business and their beers.

Founded in 1986 in St. Paul, Summit is Minnesota’s original craft brewer. The business is focused on creating original ales and lagers, driven by quality and consistency, and they really care about the character and flavour of their beers.

In order to scale profitably over the last 30 years, Summit wanted to manage yeast better, improving their yeast performance and management. They realised that the key lay in tighter management of yeast pitching rates, improving their fermentation management systems and increasing consistency across the board when it came to yeast performance.

Aber’s technology solution, expertise and partnership has been a vital ingredient helping Summit to grow from 30k barrels to 130k barrels of production.

How does Aber benefit Summit?

As experts, Summit strive to manage labor costs and tank turnover rates with the aim of improving consistency of fermentations to ensure they are getting their product out the door as quickly as possible without compromising quality levels or the relationship they have built up with their customers. Perfect Pitch has helped Summit focus on these key areas:

• Labor – reducing overhead as there’s far less guesswork when it comes to managing the yeast process.
• Tank throughput – by shaving a couple of days off their primary fermentation times allowing them to maximise the throughput of their tank farms.

What makes Aber a great partner?

Summit value how Aber technology has enabled them to improve their efficiency and consistency.

As Damian McConn – self-proclaimed Chief Brewing Hooligan at Summit says, “We’re committed to consistently improving our yeast management systems. There are always challenges with yeast pitching rates and optimising viability levels and we’re trying to dial in our fermentation times to maximise throughput of our fermentation tanks. Aber’s Perfect Pitch system has allowed us to be more accurate when it comes to our pitching rates and also tie those pitching rates into the viability of the yeast we’re actually working with.”

Summit aim to bring together the best people, the best ingredients and the best kit. Working with Aber fits this approach – our Perfect Pitch technology complimenting their existing technologies and process.

Aber’s Perfect Pitch has allowed Summit to move things forward. “ It’s clear that they they want to help us drive our business forward, to work as a partner not just sell us equipment.”