Oral history interview with Dave Tollefson, 2022

Erin Lawrimore: So today is Wednesday, November 2nd, 2022, and here via Zoom we are doing an oral history interview for the Well Crafted NC Project. My name is Erin Lawrimore. And Dave, let me go ahead and have you introduce yourself and say and spell your name. Dave Tollefsen: Okay. Dave Tollefsen. D-A-V-E T-O-L-L-E-F-S-E-N. Erin Lawrimore: Awesome. So Dave, can you tell us a little bit about your background? I don't want to say everything that leads up to now, but where are you from and your world before the world of craft beer? Dave Tollefsen: Okay, I am a halfback. So I grew up on Long Island and then moved to Central Florida for 16 years, or 18 years, and then we moved up to Apex in 2007 and now we just moved out to Hendersonville. I am a web designer by trade. I'm a graphic artist who learned Photoshop and then learned web design and then just took it over and that kind of helped with what we do. Web design is such a lower term that people say, so I am a software engineer. 00:01:00Erin Lawrimore: Yes. Dave Tollefsen: That's my official title. Erin Lawrimore: So how did you go from software engineer to even an interest in craft beer and brewing? And we'll get to talking about NCBeerGuys, but I know you also did home brewing. You still do home brewing. But how did you first get interested in craft beer at all? 00:02:00Dave Tollefsen: Back early 2000s, I was always looking for what I thought the exotic beers were, all the foreign beers, because they were different, because otherwise you dealt with Budweiser, Coors and such, and Michelob, and I always wanted some other flavor. And there was a brewery in Sanford, Florida and it was actually a brew pub outside of the mall. And I looked on the menu and it said they have a red ale, and I'm like, "What's a red ale?" And I tried it and I just fell in love. And so at that point, I'm now looking in any store to find, now, craft, because it was something different. You didn't find as much in Florida, but then once we moved up here, I went to Bottle Revolution and that just triggered everything. And my first bottle from up here, that I bought up here, was a Black Radish from Weeping Radish. And at that point it just blew up, and I fell in love with... I am a flavor nut. I just like trying all styles. And it's amazing, for all the beers that I've had, I only recently found out about barley wines. I always dismissed them. And pale ales. I always said, "Oh pale ales, everybody's the same." But then someone gave me a Sierra Nevada pale ale and I'm like, "Epiphany." 00:03:00And that's pretty much how it got started. And Homebrew started from there because I had a friend that he had a Mr. Beer kit years ago and it exploded in his refrigerator. And I said, "Well, if that's going to happen, I'm never going to do it." But then I said, "I want to try this." And it started with extract brewing and then a mixed grain extract, and finally all grain, and I'm just addicted to it. 00:04:00Erin Lawrimore: When was it when you first started home brewing, do you remember? Dave Tollefsen: It was 2010. I got a kick out of [inaudible 00:04:17] Erin Lawrimore: Okay. Do you remember some of the resources you leaned on at that time to learn the skills, learn the craft? Dave Tollefsen: Oh, online. I went to all the forums and said, "What do I do?" I mean with extract, it's a thoughtless process, pour the liquid in, boil it and then add some water and then you're done, add yeast and you're finished. But I wanted more. I was like, "This is restricting. I want to play." And so it was online until... I know there were books out there, but I was more about, "I can find it quickly online, not have to read chapters." And that's pretty much what I did. I just learned about the grains and what does what, and processes and I started expanding my equipment to kind of keep up with everybody else. 00:05:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. Do you remember some of your favorite or most successful home brews? Dave Tollefsen: Oh, well, yeah. The most famous one is called Hot Pistol. And that's brewed by NoDa. Back then, we brewed Hot Pistol because it's a chocolate, raspberry, habanero stout. But Natty Greene's, when they were in Raleigh, they had a habanero stout and I never had a pepper beer before. And so I did a sip, I'm like, "What is this tickle I'm feeling in my throat?" And the server was like, "That's the habanero one." "That's the coolest thing ever." So I wanted to create something hot and sweet, but I love chocolate, so I just started playing with it. 00:06:00We first entered the beer into Lonerider's Brew It Forward, that's why it was called Hot Pistol, because it had to be the cowboy theme. And the funny part was the judges killed it. They gave it a horrible score, and I said, "Well, can I ask why it got so bad? I don't understand."I found a judge, and he said, "Well, because your beer's infected." I went, "It's what?" And he goes, "Yeah, I got the tickle in my throat." I'm like, "That's habanero." He went, "Oh, I'm sorry." So we didn't win that one, and then I entered in the Top of the Hop with NoDa and it won. And the prize was you got to brew on their 15-barrel system with Chad, which is the greatest experience. And they brewed it the one time and then they brewed it a few years later on draft, and then they finally put it out in cans. And from there, I had a beer called Stag Bunny, which is a single hop mosaic IPA. And I entered that into the Brew it Forward again with Lonerider and called it Yosemite Gold. 00:07:00Well, it came in second place and I went to submit and I'm like, "How did we come in second? The guy who won last year, won this year." He goes, "And?" I'm like, "Well, how could he win two years in a row? It's not fair." And he goes, "Do you want me to brew your beer?" I'm like, "Yes." So he did. So we brewed it and canned it and the can has me and Glen on the can, which was really great. Eight of my beers have been brewed around the state, which I love. It's great. That's what gave me the complete respect for brewers because it's backbreaking, it's long, and let them do it. Me doing it one day was enough, for each time that I brewed, but it's a great experience. If you've never done, it's so worth doing it. And I'm thankful for every brewery that took the chance to do that. 00:08:00But even then, with beer, some of the brewers, when Mystery was around, Eric, he says, "I'll brew your beer when you come up with something better than Hot Pistol." I'm like, "Oh, that's a tall order." And it didn't come about. But he's another one that I've learned, he's one that I would ask him, if it wasn't for the internet, I would go to him and say, "What do I do? What do you think?" And play around with it, and that was great. But even now, I try and come up with something different. I mean, that's what craft beer is, it's really you're experimenting with something different, something new, and the breweries are doing it all the time. And so now you have the challenge of coming up with something they didn't do yet. So you're unique, so you're not like saying, "Oh well, they brewed it, I can do it, too." No, I want to create something that's me, and so that's why I continue to play around. 00:09:00Erin Lawrimore: When you were going from home brewing to partnering with the brewers on the big production systems, were there any things that were particularly surprising or challenging to you? Dave Tollefsen: Well, some of them, with the equipment that they have, I've seen ones that are like larger versions of my Homebrew, where what goes into the mash is not regulated. It's not like they have a heat jacket around it that says, "Okay, we need to keep it at 153 degrees." It's like mine. I'm trying to keep it warm, trying to, "Please don't go in a plastic cooler, please don't drop six degrees." But they have systems like that, and then you have the ones that are fully automatic. I mean, Town Brewing, his is amazing to me, but it's a massive system, but he's got it on point particularly. So it was surprising just to see the different levels that they have out there. I mean, I would expect it. Money will buy whatever you need. But even now, I didn't brew on the 50-barrel system at NoDa, but Chad has this giant hutch system to do everything and I'm like, "This is incredible." But it's the awe of seeing something bigger and seeing how their processes are. 00:10:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. And did your home brewing experiences and background play into NCBeerGuys or was it vice versa? Dave Tollefsen: They almost came at the same time, but the NCBeerGuys was more about with me trying to find a whole bunch of beers and then I'd have a dark beer, just it could be anything. And they'd go, "What is that?" And I'd say, "Oh, well this is a habanero porter." And they'd go, "I've never heard of that." And they'd go, "Where'd you get it from?" And I'd go, "Natty Greene's." And so we just kept telling people over and over again, "Oh, well go to this brewery, go to this brewery." And we were like, "Well, why don't we just make a small website and let people realize what's out there?" 00:11:00And when we first started, I had a database of every beer. I was controlling the breweries, going, "What do they have? What do they have?" And adding to the database. Now it's untapped. If you're looking for a stout, it'll show you okay, these breweries have it, because when we started they were only 54 breweries so that was easy to keep up. Now with 385, it's a different story. I think that was the brewing was one part of it, but more of this was more information. Also, taught college for a few years and I believe in sharing my knowledge, so I felt that what's the best way? Do it online. And plus it allowed us to go to officially go to breweries and let people know about it and say, "Hey look, this beer is here. You need to come here," because breweries are destinations. 00:12:00Erin Lawrimore: And what year was that? Dave Tollefsen: 2012. Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, that's what I thought. You guys had just hit 10. Dave Tollefsen: Over 10 years. Yep. Erin Lawrimore: Yep. So when you first started, what were your initial hopes for NCBeerGuys? Did you have initial goals for the site? Dave Tollefsen: We wanted to be big. I mean, after we got things rolling, we went to this seminar, I guess it'd be. There was a guy that, he had a website called Freezer Burn and he was doing reviews of all the frozen foods and so Stouffer's was sponsoring him and we thought we can get a sponsor. We'll do craft beer and we'll get someone to sponsor us and we'll just go and do that. And that just didn't happen. But it didn't wane it because we still loved doing what we did. 00:13:00Erin Lawrimore: You mentioned the small number, relatively, of breweries. I mean, 54 still seems large for some states, but compared to what we have now, it's hard enough to keep up with the names of the breweries, much less all the beers that they produce. But can you describe just generally what you remember, what you saw in the craft beer scene in North Carolina when you first started back in 2012? Dave Tollefsen: It was sparse. I mean, everybody knew about Asheville. Charlotte really only had Olde Meck at that point. NoDa just opened up. It was very, very few and so you had to drive to where you wanted to go. And the funny part was, even back then, we met Eric early on from Mystery and he was already talking about there's too many, it's got to stop, we won't hit 100. Because no one really expected that we'd have this giant growth, especially in '12. That's the spike. So we came in just as that spike came. 00:14:00No one expected it. Then it was 54 breweries. That's a lot. This is a good amount. Everybody thought about Portland and Seattle. It was like "Hey, we have as many as they have in the city, in the whole state." That was pretty much, they were the elite. For me, it was the elite, you, Homebrew, but now you guys are doing it on a big scale. So you guys are the professionals and this is great. That's the way we saw it. 00:15:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. And so with that initial beer scene, obviously things have changed pretty significantly. How have y'all with NCBeerGuys kind of shifted your perspective, your goals, to match the boom in the industry? Dave Tollefsen: Well, I mean it's hard to keep up. We had people that say, "I'm going to visit every single brewery in the state," and I'm like, "Good luck." Because as quickly as you hit that number, there's going to be one that's going to open up on the most impossible place to get to. So for it really hasn't changed because it's just a matter that I go on the website, once a brewery opens up. Sometimes I find out by happenstance. You're on Facebook and they go, "Hey, we had a great opening today." I'm like, "Who are you? I mean, because you're not even on the Coming Soon so this is really out of nowhere." 00:16:00But it's keeping up. I want to make sure my information's right. I want to make sure we have what's there, because we also had breweries closing and like "Why is that Brewery still in the map? They've closed three months ago." So to me it's just making sure we have what's right. Social media plays a big factor in it. I mean, it's bigger now than it was back then. And it's keeping up, because if you don't, it wanes away. So we're always trying to do that. Most of my work now is keeping up with events. It wasn't as much back then because there was less, but now you have a whole bunch. But it's me finding them. The breweries, maybe they sometimes send it to us, but for the most part it's trolling to find it. So I'll see it on Facebook or Instagram and I'll send myself the link and then I add it on and then we'll socialize it. But now our site is the only site that has that. I mean, if they look for events and I tell everybody, "Search." I can claim we're number one in everything, which we're not. But I know we're within the top five of a lot of the searches. 00:17:00If you look at the searches, we're always within the top five. And even at this past weekend, there was the lighthouse, they had their festival this weekend in Wilmington. 4,500 people pinged my website in a week to go to that thing. Well that's a lot of people going to mine to find your event. And that's great. I mean, it got the word out mean. If that means that many people went to, it's fantastic. We want to become that authority, that we're the one-stop place, that we're not just regional, we're not just doing Raleigh or Asheville or Charlotte, that we cover the entire state. So no matter where you are in the state, if there's an event, we got listed, hopefully. 00:18:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, and I understand the challenges of keeping up with everything. Again, with more breweries comes more events and it just keeps going. I'm curious, though, y'all just expanded your focus to include our neighbors to the south. Dave Tollefsen: Yes. Erin Lawrimore: What led to that decision? Dave Tollefsen: We thought about it a few years ago because the breweries that were down there were saying, "Why don't you list us?" You're South Carolina. North Carolina. And they go, "Okay, fine." Well then you have the Charlotte region is including Rock Hill, which is South Carolina. And so they're like, "Now South Carolina's growing." So I had a friend that he lives down Rock Hill and he goes, "Well, I go to all the music venues. I like going to concerts and such around state. I can go and I'll explore all the breweries while I'm going to see these concerts." I'm like, "Okay." So I brought him on board now and said, "The state is yours." And plus, because I know what to do with North Carolina, I did my search for South Carolina breweries and I looked at the South Carolina Guild's website and they list only their members. 00:19:00Well, not everybody's a member. So I had to go searching on different places to find the breweries but then find ones that are actually still open or are not coming soon, that they're there. And I wind up with 97 breweries in South Carolina. And to me I'm like, well that's a quick add on. I mean, considering how many we have in North Carolina, 97, we can handle that. 00:20:00Actually, the site's been down for a few days now because I changed the name over because we're Beer Guys of the Carolinas. So it's been down for three days and it's finally back up again with the new branding on it. So now we're including South Carolina. So now where the Carolinas. But to it's, once again, South Carolina has less, which means it's not as populous as here. So now if we can help get the word out and make people realize that, "Hey, there's a brewery. If you go to Charleston, check out these breweries." You can go and look online and you may find all of them, but you may not. But I know we're going to have all of them. Erin Lawrimore: And in thinking through that, what do you see as, other than just the sheer of size, the differences between the craft beer scene in South Carolina versus North Carolina? 00:21:00Dave Tollefsen: I have no idea. I haven't been to a single brewery in South Carolina yet. Erin Lawrimore: Oh, I've got you beat on that one, then. Dave Tollefsen: I mean, next week I am. But they keep asking me why do they only have that many? And I'm like, to me, my first impulse is it's the laws, something. Because North Carolina has the best laws in the southeast. Virginia is very hard. South Carolina is very difficult also. So there's got to be something that's not as easy to get passed through. And plus, the breweries, based on the map, they're in the cities. They're not in the suburbs or in between as much. There's a couple strays, but for the most part the clumps are in the cities, where in North Carolina they're everywhere. If there's a small town, there's probably going to be a brewery. Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. No, I think you mentioned when you'd see an announcement of a new brewery that has opened and be like, "Who is that?" I have that often where I'm like, "Where is that town?" And I have to Google what town it is. But in South Carolina it's usually Columbia, Charleston, Greenville, Spartanburg. And there's some in between but not a ton, so I understand. Thinking about the 10 years you've been working on NCBeerGuys, do you have some favorite memories, favorite things you've done that just kind of stand out in your head as like, "And that is why I do this work"? 00:22:00Dave Tollefsen: It's really cool the times that magazines spotlighted us. I wrote for Cary Magazine for two years, which to me it got me writing again. It gets the creativity out, which is fine. Honestly, it's having that honor of bringing with brewers and picking their brains and realizing that they're on a big system, I'm on a small system, can I keep up with them? When we learned about winning with NoDa, it was great. It was like euphoria times 10, just to say that a big brewery is now going to have my beer. When we go to festivals and people recognize us, I mean I could be anybody, but when they recognize us, if I don't wear this shirt and they go, "Hey I know you," that's good. It's humbling that they know who I am and it's not just a website. 00:23:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. And I'm going to ask you to toot your own horn, I guess, for a little bit. Can you talk about, in your view or in things you've been told, what the impact of NCBeerGuys has been on the industry here in North Carolina? 00:24:00Dave Tollefsen: Well, I mean, we're partnered with the Guild and I got an award from them a couple years ago, doing what I do. We got award for that and that was really fantastic. I guess, because of the impact of, like I said, when we discuss the events that people, they know that we're going to have it and the people go to it. In terms of analytics, I don't know how much we've impacted. I know people tell us, "I'm on your website all the time. I use your website for my business. I have insurance and I just go through everything that's in there." I'm like, "Hey, use it. It's there. Take advantage of it." What we contributed, I guess it's just a matter of information. I wish there was a way that for any events they go, "How'd you find out?" Or we put in a thing saying, "If you go to an event and say, 'Hey, the NCBeerGuys sent us,'" kind of a thing. And so they realize how many people actually listen to us. But I'm hoping that we contributed to it, that the breweries do the beer and we let the people know about the breweries. So we basically share knowledge. 00:25:00Erin Lawrimore: And like you said, I think it says a lot, that not only that folks would recognize you without the NCBeerGuys shirt, but that they recognize NCBeerGuys as an important resource for all sorts of things in the industry. I know we use it a lot. Dave Tollefsen: Oh that's good. Erin Lawrimore: It's important. It's important to us and it's an important resource and I think, particularly as the industry grows, having kind of a central information spot is- 00:26:00Dave Tollefsen: And I think that's why the Guild has a really important role. They said they are there to help the breweries and they're part what I call the legislative part because there's so many laws that they got to fix that weren't done right, and they use us as the customer-facing part. They realize that we are out there with all the craft beer enthusiasts and they realize that we attract a lot. So I think that's why they've decided when you go to their website, they send you our website because we keep up with it. And I think that's also really nice for us and it's nice for them too. Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. Can you talk a little bit more about that collaboration? When did it start and how does it evolve? Dave Tollefsen: It's been several years. I mean, we've collaborated with them several times. I think it became official maybe five or six years ago, where it was more of a NC Beer Month, which we just passed, so when NC Beer Month was in April. But at that point, Visit NC was NC Beer and the guild was helping them. And then I guess Visit NC Beer went back to the Guild but they used us. They realized, "Hey, can you keep up with all the events that happen? If we send them to you, can you keep up with it?" I'm like, "Oh sure." 00:27:00And the first time that we did it, I mean, traffic was ridiculous. And for us, having 50,000 page views in one month, it's great for our size. This is only North Carolina and it's a very, very finite audience. We have people around the country, but not a lot. It's 12 in Idaho and things like that, but North Carolina it's bigger. And so I think at that point when they saw what we did and how we helped with NC Beer Month, they realized the reach. And then we've just been back and forth with them. So now I know every year for the Brewers Cup, I go and judge. I actually think it's an honor to do that, but I'm here to help them and they help me. It's just a back and forth synergy that we have. 00:28:00Erin Lawrimore: And thinking about the Guild, one of the themes that's popped up really when I've talked to a lot of brewery owners and brewers is the importance of the Guild in North Carolina. Can you talk a little bit about that? Dave Tollefsen: Well, I think it's the same thing that they have, somebody that's there. Because I get the newsletters so I was part of what they call an affiliate member and they said, "What do you think's missing? What can we offer brewers?" And years ago when I had my own company in Florida, I joined the Chamber of Commerce. And the one thing about the Chamber of Commerce is medical benefits and theirs were cheap because they pooled from all the other chambers around the country. I'm like, "Wow, this is great so I'm going to stay in Chamber for as long as I need medical benefits." 00:29:00And so I said, "Brewers want ROI of some sort from you guys." And so the Guild now, they do a lot of training for them, whether it's in marketing or basically how to run the brewery. They do training constantly with the Brew Smart program, and they are offering them benefits that will help them in some way keep the business going. Because if you have a brewery, a small one, they're running a two-barrel system and it's the husband and the wife and this is their livelihood. It's not like the wife's working a job, use her benefits and he could do his thing. They both work in the brewery. How do they get some of the benefits? And so the Guild's trying to, in some way, help them in that way, in that cause. And even now with the conference, that they're introducing members during the trade show. So basically it's giving them a lot of helpful information for the breweries to keep going. I think the Guild is vital. Especially with the work that they do in the capital, and beyond actually. 00:30:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. So I want to talk a little bit about your views on the North Carolina craft beer industry as a whole. Over your time being involved in watching the industry side of things, what have you seen as some of the biggest challenges that the industry has had to overcome over the last 10 or so years? Other than COVID, which is kind of the obvious elephant that would sit in the room for anything. 00:31:00Dave Tollefsen: Right. But the funny thing, and I keep blaming COVID, is the breweries that could afford packaging, and you saw them in the bottle shops, and part of their problem was that we have the supermarkets and then you have bottle shops. And we have more bottle shops in our state than a lot of other states. People don't realize what are bottle shops. I mean, total wines are another issue, but for a while, you didn't get your beers in the supermarkets. Budweiser owned those. And then you had Lowe's Foods who they did the big-time initiative, and Ingles out here is like a bottle shop in itself. But that's only good with Lowe's Foods, they have draft also, with, But Ingels doesn't. But if you didn't have a package, your beer got out to the restaurants and anyone that's local, but when you're smaller, that's not as easy. 00:32:00So COVID comes around and tap rooms are shut down. So what does a brewery do? Now you have the mobile pack, the mobile canning companies coming in and even breweries with two-barrel systems are getting canned. Or they realize, "We'll get a Crowler system," because they couldn't sell it in the tap room, but they could do it where, "Buy it online, we'll put it out in your car and then you're all set." And now everybody's canning. And so now there's the "Who's going to pick up your cans?" Because other stores have stepped up. Food Lion, we had one runner right around the block from us in Apex, it was all Anheuser-Busch. And then they started getting some local ones, like Double Barley, but it was an end-cap. But it was an end-cap, and then blows Budweiser and it's a local beer at the top. And I went to the manager, I'm like, "That's local for three shelves, but not those." But now they've stepped up and they've got a whole area for them. 00:33:00So some of the supermarkets are picking up, but it's getting into them now. And it's almost the same fight as before because if you don't keep up with it, you're out, they're in. And it's still the breweries, now you've got 385 competing with each other and if you can't load them to your tap room, how do they get your beer? Then you have to try and fight for the shelf space everywhere else. So now it's a fight. There's just so many and it's the fear of saturation. I don't think we're at that because, like I said, creativity is king, but it's still, I think a lot of them also are, "What did they brew? We don't want to do what they did." What's unique? I mean, there's only so many ingredients out there. I thought years ago that they would've run out of ideas and they'll just regurgitate the same thing over again, or they'll come up with variants of these things. But all of a sudden you've got hazy IPAs and you've got milkshake IPAs and they're going crazy with Berliner Weisses and Goses, creating all these wild flavors. So creativity's still there, but I think it's not such an easy thing to come up with that, that's going to drive people to get your beer. 00:34:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, I think that's completely true and I think that's [inaudible 00:34:41] for a lot of the breweries maybe that haven't been able to stick around through the recent boom, too. Can you think of pre-COVID other challenges that you saw across the industry? You mentioned NCBeerGuys started right around the big 2012 explosion. Boom's not even a good enough word for that. Super- 00:35:00Dave Tollefsen: Exponential. Erin Lawrimore: Exactly. Can you talk about maybe some of the challenges that were facing the industry around that time and maybe even what you saw contributing to that boom? Dave Tollefsen: Well, I think, pre-that, it was more of, regardless that you have craft beer started in the '80s and such, but even then, if you think about North Carolina, one in the '80s, several in the '90s and then they came in, there was still a lull. After Pop the Cap, that I think was a driver because brewing less than 6% is ridiculous, but I think it was more... I just lost my train of thought. I was going back in time and I'm trying to think of in 2012. Oh yeah. So it was that you had to fight against Budweiser and Coors and people had their staples. 00:36:00You know you can get a Budweiser. You know it's going to taste the same no matter what. And they're used to that. And all of a sudden you have these breweries coming out with names of beers that people never heard of. "What is a dark beer? It looks like oil. Why am I going to drink oil? I don't do dark beers." And that was a big thing. We heard that a lot early on because I'd hand people, they go, "What's your favorite beer style?" "Oh, no, I don't drink that stuff." "Why not? Have you ever had one?" And they dismiss it before they even try it. Or they're, "Oh, it's too hoppy." I do, "Do you even know what hoppy means?" Are you talking it's very bitter or are you saying the wonderful flavors that hops bring? I mean, that's hoppy. So I think a lot of it was educating the public about what is craft beer and why it's different than the other beers that you've been drinking for 70 years prior and such. So I think that with the boon, I think it was all over the country, but I just think it was at that point where there was enough breweries that teased people. 00:37:00So going between 2000 and 2010, you had some that were out there and people were slowly learning. But I think people just decided at that point, I can do this, I can brew beer, I'm going to do it on a big scale. And it happened all, 2011 on up, that everybody thought they can and that there were enough laws that allowed them to do it on a larger scale. Now, it's different now than it was back then because I read the books. I wanted to open up a brewery in 2013 and they said you have to start with a 10-barrel system. If you don't do 10-barrel, you're never going to make it and you just wasted all your money because it's going to collapse. 00:38:00Brewers are opening up one barrel, they're opening up one or two-barrel systems, they're getting it out there. They're basically learning the industry without the big upfront expense. They got rental of someplace and they get people in and they're just reinvesting in themselves and getting a larger system and growing from there. Where, you think about when the breweries in 2012 had opened up and they said, "Oh, we have to do 10-barrel, 15-barrel, that's several hundred thousand dollars. That's a big commitment. And if you had money, whatever, you could do that. But starting smaller also just kind of helped people realize, "I'll grow as opposed to start big and worry about it. I'll just work my way up." 00:39:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. And one thing you mentioned that I wanted to tease out a little bit more is the changes in the consumer side of things over the last 10 years. Can you talk a little bit more about not just consumer palate changes, but just expectations that have changed over the last 10 years? Dave Tollefsen: They're spoiled like me. Well, because you go back to, you think about the breweries that were in the pre-millennium, that you could create a brown, you create a pale ale, you have an IPA, a Kölsch, maybe, basically, the core styles. And maybe some would experiment, but it's like, "You're putting fruit inside of a beer?" Back then it'd be like that's unacceptable. "No, we don't do that." So I think it was that once you gave them the taste of something different, then it expanded, it grew, because then the expectations were "What else can you do? Do you brew pawpaws?" 00:40:00It's basically, "Entice me." Creativity. "I went to Seattle, I had this. Do you guys do it over here?" It's a matter of just you let them have it and now they want more, and I am as guilty as everyone else because when I see beer, I want to get my hands on it. And I'm still amazed at the creativity. I think people just, they're offering more and more and more. I mean, a great example I was blown away with was at Southern Pines. They created a Bloody Mary. I think it was a bloody Mary Berlin device, but they did it on nitro. And they also had a Tequila Sun. They called it Tequila Sunrise. But the Bloody Mary, it was pure white. And that blew me away, right away. 00:41:00Because they walked by and I went, "What is that white stuff in the glass?" And they go, "That's the Bloody Mary." I went, "That does not contain tomato." But it actually tasted better than a regular Bloody Mary because the tomato was so toned down. But it was beer. And then they made a Tequila Sunrise and they put grenadine on it so you had the nice sunrise effect, but these were Berliner Weisse and Goses. They were making cocktails out of beer. That's creativity. And I think that's what people want. They want to see something new, new, new, new, new. That's what they want and that's what everybody craves for, that a brewery comes up with this, what else can they do? What else is new? That's why, if you see a lot of them, there are few breweries that have core styles. I mean, they're there. Sierra Nevada Pale is going to be there no matter what. It's always going to be the same. But a lot of the breweries now it's rotate, rotate, rotate and create something different and new. You may have two or three of the core styles, but everything else is going to be wild. 00:42:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. And in addition to those style changes, I think even the looks and feels of tap rooms and public spaces has changed a lot in the last 10 years. Dave Tollefsen: Oh yeah. And what surprised me is now it's not just a man sitting at a bar drinking a beer all day. That's what I learned when trying to open a brewery was I was told breweries are bars. I'm like, "No, they're not. Breweries are not bars." And I go, "Because bars will sell you a $2 Pabst or a $3..." And you could spend all day and drink and everything else. I said, "Breweries have now become family friendly and dog friendly and they have events now. You could do yoga, run clubs, walk clubs, crafts, all these things are at breweries." 00:43:00But it's just become more friendly for everybody. It's not just dad going down to the brewery and sitting there by himself. You could bring the whole family and there's things for everybody to do. And breweries are catering to that because they realize, "Bring the family." And if you look, even going back to 2012 to 2015, there weren't a lot of brew pubs in the state. You had breweries, but brew pubs were Front Street, Natty Greene's. But there were few and far between because it involved having a kitchen and people were like, "No, I know brewing but I don't want to get involved with the kitchen. That's a whole other world to deal with." 00:44:00But now you think about Brad, when Unknown Brewing was opened up, he had the pizza food truck outside, but before he had that, people, between 4:30 and 6:30, what happens? They got to go get something to eat. And they go, "We'll be back." And they go out and they don't come back because it's probably where they want to eat, they probably have beer there so they don't come back. And he goes, "I'm losing my clientele." So when he got the food truck in, he goes, "I took the wheels off, it is now my restaurant." And that's great. So now you look at other breweries, a lot of them now have food because it keeps the people in there, and they take different approaches to it. With Bear Waters, he leases out the kitchen. It's true. "I do the beer, you do the food." Great concept. Hillman, when they were on Sweeten Creek Road, started the same way. They leased it out, but then they learned more about it and they took it over. And so things like that where now they've become... It's a true gathering place where you can eat and have great beer. And that's changed recently because people realizing that you got to keep the clientele there. 00:45:00Erin Lawrimore: So for you personally, when you go to a tap room, are there things that you are specifically looking for or that if you see a certain thing you get very happy and excited? Dave Tollefsen: A big menu. I love that they have food now. I'm a big advocate of beer and food pairings. I love when they exploit that they're using beer in the food. So I love going with this food, but even just going to a tap room, I'm not into the big and loud. I want a place that I can sit and relax and people watch if I want to. It doesn't have to be a sports bar where... If the TV's on, great, if they have it. Some brewers say, "No, we don't want you coming here and watching sports. We just want you to come here and talk. The whole point is to communicate with your friends." 00:46:00To me it's just having that I can go there and I can find something I want to drink and at least have a comfortable seat, that it's not just going to be bar stools, that there's some place. And some breweries are really exploiting that by putting living rooms in the tap rooms. They have a giant couch and you can sit and relax. It's nice. And things like that, it's different and I enjoy seeing those kind of spaces. Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. Can you think of aspects of the North Carolina brew scene that stands out to you as just different from anywhere else in the US? Is there something that makes North Carolina unique when it comes to craft beer? Dave Tollefsen: That's a hard one because I'm naive with the other breweries. My parents live in Florida so every time I go to Daytona Beach, I go to the breweries. And one I fell in love with is Dunes Brewing. But is it any different than the ones up here? I love that brewery. If I go down to go to Florida, I'm going there. It's the same thing. I really can't say that there's anything NC-centric about it. I mean, I'm very limited. Even when I was in Ireland and we went to a pub, comfortable seats, there's a bar, and I got beer. Not really. I mean, a lot of differences, actually, I just gave somebody from... His friend is turning 40 and they're coming from Norway and he says, "How can I go through North Carolina? I want to go to Asheville, but I want you to tell me where to go and tell me everywhere. If I'm coming in at Dulles Airport, tell me everything in between." 00:47:00And it's funny because there's no other place in a state like the South Slope, where you can walk to a lot of breweries, and that's walking. Because I'm going to him going, "Okay, where can I send him? Where can I send him?" And I said, "Okay, South Slope, you can walk. But then you're going to have to drive if you want to go to Hellman or Highland." And then he's driving along 40 and he's going to go up to 85 to 95. So I like, "Well, you go to Winston-Salem." You can walk three, Fiddle and Fish, Wise Man, and Radar. But it's a little bit of a hike to get to Incendiary and foothills. 00:48:00So all the cities like that, Greensboro, you kind of need an Uber to go around. So South Slope to me is a big draw. But then everybody talks about Portland where it's like there's 60 breweries in the city where you can just walk and there's like three in one block region, and I've never been there so I can't compare it. And they say Tampa's the same way. I don't have a real reference to that. Wilmington, with the coast, it's really cool, but is it any different than any other coastal city? I couldn't really differentiate. I love our state, that's all. 00:49:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, and I think even narrowing that question down even a little bit more, you kind of touched on this a little bit, but do you see differences in the scene across the state? Asheville versus Raleigh versus Charlotte versus- Dave Tollefsen: Oh, yeah. I always say that Charlotte's my favorite beer city. Everyone's like, "Why not Asheville?" I'm like, "Because I love Asheville, but I love Charlotte." And to me I have a bias because NoDa Bird Song and Triple C were the three breweries that we started when they started so I kind of love going there. There's differences. I mean, Asheville has its own little clique, but it's growing out. It's not just the one hub anymore in one area, it's now growing out so it becomes like everyone else. 00:50:00Raleigh, there's not really a lot of, and I'll call it downtown proper, where it's in the city, but then it's the same thing as Charlotte. Where all the skyscrapers are, there's no breweries. They're all outside of it. So they're either south in LoSo and everywhere else, or they're up in NoDa and then they start spreading out there. To me, I don't know if it's like each one you've got... Charlotte has their... I see it in my head. I keep saying the group. This is pretty bad. I'm blank. They work with the brewers altogether, the Charlotte area- 00:51:00Erin Lawrimore: The Independent Brewers Alliance? Dave Tollefsen: Yeah, the Brewers Alliance. Thank you. I went totally blank. And there was one in Raleigh, but then that kind of dissolved away. But Triad has one and there's one out in national and there's, then you have the group that's in Wilmington, the Cape Fear Craft Beer Alliance. So they're trying to keep everybody in that one group and take care of them. But the triangle doesn't have that anymore. So that's kind of like, why not? And I think a lot of it was that everybody's doing their own thing. They're not as cohesive as maybe the other cities are. I can't say yah or nay to that. But if they were, then they'd have something that kept them all [inaudible 00:51:50]. It was a good initiative but it just didn't come through. So I don't see, as I bounce to all the cities, because I try to get to as many as I can, I don't see anything different. I mean, I think Charlotte is more passionate about craft beer than the Raleigh area is. And that's by people just because you see how things get packed. Raleigh, because it's just so spread out where you've got a grouping by Crank Arm and White Hill and then you've got to go up to Atlantic to go to Limwood Grill and such. So it's more spread out. Where there are major packs in all the other cities. Wilmington has that group right in downtown. But in terms of them being different than the other cities, I don't think it is. And plus now with everybody collaborating with everyone else, they're all trying to get with each other anyway. 00:52:00Erin Lawrimore: Well, and we're starting to see so many breweries that have second, third, fourth, fifth tap rooms in other cities, too. Dave Tollefsen: I'm calling that the new trend. The first trend several years ago was to get a brew pub. Everyone's now starting to get more. Now it's, "I can have my brewery here and I can have a tap room in here, here, here, here." I mean, High Wire, you've got mean you've got three locations in Asheville and then you got Durham, Wilmington and Charlotte and Knoxville and everywhere else. And even breweries, Mythic, who has multiple occasions. Tobacco Wood in Oxford and then they have the location in Durham. 00:53:00To me it's like, that's a great thing to do to get your brand out because all your money's in the tap room and that's where you spend the most, I mean in the brewery. But if you open up a second tap room, what does it take? A manager and three full people to work, no brew house, just a draft system and you got to bring it to them, so it's less expense but now you have this whole new area to sell your beer so you can expand out that way. 00:54:00Rather than fighting with distribution, you're your own distributor because you can bring your beer back and forth. So I think that, it's great, but I hope that doesn't hurt in the saturation effect because now you have just craft beer everywhere and now you have tap rooms competing. When you got 385 breweries and then you have 60 extra top rooms. And then if that keeps growing, then what do you do? Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, I see that, too. Can you think about, putting on your forward-thinking cap, get your crystal ball, where do you see, and you take this one of two ways, where do you think, or where would you like to see the industry going in the next five or 10 years? Dave Tollefsen: I can see elements like what you have in Charlotte, Brewers at NC, where it's a group. And I think when we get a little bit saturated, I think what may happen is you'll have some breweries joined together and doing it that way, so power of multiples. So you'd have basically a little mall of beer because you can go in there and rather than have one brewery that's got six or seven that they have on draft, and now they're kind of competing with everybody else, that they can now be part of three or four breweries that get together and they just merge their inventories together so that it can serve that much more and bring it all in. 00:55:00I mean, you've got Brueprint is now with Lonerider, so they're working on a way to get... That's what I think is going to be a trend soon if it comes down to that, where it starts to get a little bit more cutthroat with breweries where now they've got to partner up and they're better partnering to get a bigger audience. Because now if everybody come in, they go, "Oh, I didn't know about you." And then that way your name's still out there, you're not closing down, you're kind of becoming part of a group. 00:56:00I think that me would be the next trend, only because of competition. And also, if real estate gets to be ridiculously expensive, how can a brewery open up when they can't get a place to go? So they go, "Well hey, why don't we join together and join forces?" We can't get any more bottle shops. And the supermarkets are picking up on beer. They're all become candy stores. You can only keep adding more and more and more and saying... I mean, like Lowe's Foods having this mile-long refrigerator of craft beer and it's North Carolina and it's amazing, but you can't get bigger than that. I mean, what else are you going to do? 00:57:00So I think I kind of see it trending towards that way. I think the funny part, and I felt it was going to be a bigger trend, but not as many have stepped up, these restaurants that decide "I don't want to buy beer from anybody, I'm going to brew it myself." A couple have done that. They get a one-barrel system and they create their own beer, but then it's maintaining it. And that's why I don't think it's gotten there, because people realize, "Oh, that's involved with keeping a brewery going?" And it didn't happen. But look what's happening now with breweries and spirits. How many breweries now create rum, vodka? Mica Town, is it Up Country? Hop Fly has craft cocktails upstairs. So now they're starting to sell not only beer, but they're selling distilled spirits. And then they get the benefit of, "Oh, I made rum and I have a barrel. Ooh, now I can run barrel-aged beer." But more are doing it now. All they do is get a license. And unfortunately, our website, we have a distillery map and we have a cidery map and we have cideries and eateries. 00:58:00Well now I go into a brewery, "Oh yeah, we make our own cider." Do I add this brewery to the cidery map? Do I add this brewery to the distillery map because they are making vodka and everything else? It's getting to be that they're reaching out to other ways. Beer is great, but now we can offer something else, and it's really not a lot of overhead. So I think that's another thing that they're going to start expanding to other ways to serve it. 00:59:00I actually told the people from UNC Pembroke that they go, "What would be a good business to do?" I'm like, "Well it's funny, when I see something that says brew on it, my brain automatically goes to beer." "No, it's coffee." I went, "Oh." So imagine, and this is in Ahoskie where they have a coffee house as well as a brewery. So now you've got an audience in the morning and then stop that and now you can do them in the afternoon, so you got something all day. So I think maybe with the distilled spirits, the brewers are going to start expanding to find something other creative that they can sell, after when it's just beer and then you can have food, but something different. I think we're going to see them kind of changing their menus. Erin Lawrimore: And thank goodness you're not trying to keep up with seltzers, too, because- Dave Tollefsen: Oh, I don't even do seltzers. We don't have a seltzer map at all. I said I don't do seltzer and I don't do wine. 01:00:00Erin Lawrimore: There you go. Thinking about the industry today, you've mentioned a number of trends that you see in the future or things you see kind of us going towards now. Thinking about what's happening right now in the industry today, are there specific things that you see that you particularly like or particularly are not pleased by? Dave Tollefsen: Well, it's funny, it started a while ago. I was off-put a while back, just because Full Steam, I went there one time and I'm like, "Why are there a bunch of kids running around here?" And someone was having a one-year baby birthday at the brewery. It was awkward. To me it's like the baby doesn't know anything, it's really for the parents. But it was that it's great that they can bring the family, but I've had instances with dogs where someone's sitting at the bar and their dog is with them and the dog is barking, angry. I'm like, "How am I going to go to the bar if this dog is like that?" They shouldn't be in there. But they're afraid to tell the people to go out. 01:01:00It's good that now you're seeing signs of brewer saying, "Well trained," and that your kids must be kept in check. You cannot let them run around. But some breweries don't. And that's a bad thing for me. But I think some of them are learning that you have to come up with a better system. Let them come in, but keep them in control. In terms of other breweries, I mean, when breweries try to become sports bars, that's a problem, because a couple of them that I'm yelling at the person behind the bar and they still can't hear me, and I don't have a loud voice so it's hard. But I guess they're listening to what the people want. But that's a very difficult thing to do. And I think they've got to learn that you may be off-putting. You've got to decide which is your bigger audience at that point. 01:02:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, the balance issues. Dave Tollefsen: Yeah. Yes. Thank you. Erin Lawrimore: So, thinking about beers, this is the hardest question to ask folks, and I don't like to phrase it as, "What's your favorite beer from North Carolina?" Because I know that that's nearly impossible, but can- Dave Tollefsen: Yeah, it is. Erin Lawrimore: I was going to say, do you have beers that stick out in your mind over the last 10 years as kind of honestly beers that you won't forget? Dave Tollefsen: Well, the Natty Greene's having a reporter, because that was my first one and it was the first pepper beer. I'm always a diehard fan of Black Radish. I mean, I know Ule's not doing the beer anymore, and what I like about it, and of course I always look for shorts beers, so Mason Jar and other places, because when people go, "I don't like dark beer," I'm like, "This is a lager." And they're like, "What?" I'm like, "Uh-huh." So don't do this mud and oil thing. It's not. It's a very light and it's [inaudible 01:03:29]. Bhramari Brewing, I was going out there because we were going to the Cider Fest one year and he was doing his Count Chocula, but he whiskey-barrel aged it. I was blown away, literally. I'm like, "How many barrels do you have left?" And I haven't opened them yet. It's been a few years, but I'm like, "No, I'm aging these babies even though they shouldn't." 01:03:00But it was funny because while I had those, he let me try that one and I was like, "Yeah, I'm getting those." But it was also smoked lager. I'm a smoke nut. I know it's not the best selling and breweries don't do it, but I am such a Rauchbier nut and his had that, it was perfect. I love this to death and I tried to reproduce it like he did and I never quite get to his level. But smoked beers, I love. Of course, I'm going to say Hot Pistol because there's still nothing like it. There is still no beer anywhere. Tell me that you're going to find one that is chocolate raspberry and habanero. So you're getting hot, chocolatey, sweet. I love that to death. 01:04:00I just got the rest of another one I'm in love with, Triple C's Up All Night Breakfast Porter. They're not brewing it anymore and I'm like, "What?" So I grabbed two four-packs, and they're going to sit in my refrigerator for years because I've been saying it since he brewed it, and I actually sell their beers and I have them. They're in our stores right now. I have the first-year Up All Night Breakfast Porter that I have to give back to Chris because I want to, because he's celebrating his 10th anniversary. So when I get it I'm going to bring it back to him. But I always said it's the best cup of coffee in a beer ever. 01:05:00I mean, those really stand out. Some of the rich, rich Burial stouts, because they're just adding so much in there. But it's just decadently 15% and amazing, as long as they don't get too... When you read them and they've got like 15 ingredients, I'm like that's a little bit too much. But when they go with just lower it down, bananas and chocolate and yeah, I'm all about that. Even what I mentioned earlier with Southern Pines, now Drunken Vigils is an amazing beer and I try to get that because it's so rich and beautifully chocolate. 01:06:00But when they did that Bloody Mary, unreal, and it tasted amazing and I was like, this is a beer. And even Bond brothers, they're Sorcery series, which are all the kettle sours, Triple Berry Sorcery, we got it when I was with my wife and she tries it. She'll try everything, she'll try every beer that I brew. Even when I buy them, she'll try them, and she goes, "I don't like beer." But I gave her that one. She took a sip, she goes, "I could do a pint." I ran to the bar and got her very first pint, because "This is a beer and you're drinking it." And I still love that one. They made that one so nice. And then they had a Pineapple Coconut Sorcery, which the balance was perfect. Because usually one will overshadow the other. They had them just right on and it was so good. 01:07:00Erin Lawrimore: And one thing you mentioned when you were talking, you talked about short beers, which is my favorite style, too. But the last 10 years, I think one of the things we've seen a big growth in, or resurgence really, of lagers. Dave Tollefsen: Yes. Erin Lawrimore: A lot of breweries. Can you talk a little bit about that? Dave Tollefsen: Well, I guess people realize you're going back to your roots again. Now, if you think about it though, Red Oak is the second oldest brewery and that's all he does. And if you could do Reinheitsgebot, you're doing loggers. So Olde Meck is lagers. Mason Jar, lagers. It's not like it's [inaudible 01:08:06] but the breweries are not coming up because you have to appeal to a lot of people. And lagers aren't going to be crazy flavorful because when you lagger them for a while it just dissipates off. And I know that one because I like to brew IPLs and before I lagger it, it's like, "Oh, the hops is amazing." By the time it gets through, it's like it's all gone. 01:08:00But they do get creative like that. And I think that's just because associate, I hate to associate with Budweiser, but that's a lager and people see those as easy to drink, very, very refreshing. And people sometimes are off-put by the IPAs and such, so this is appealing to a larger audience. It's just the problem with that is you need to have space in order to be able to store it for one and a half months. 01:09:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. I have one last question that I wanted to ask you and then we'll see if there's anything we've missed out on. But you talked about one of the big things that NCBeerGuys does is promote events. Can you talk about some of the festivals in North Carolina and the beer festival culture in the state, where you see that fitting into the bigger picture? Dave Tollefsen: Well, I mean the main one is Brewgaloo, and I say main because she started off small and we were part of the Brewgaloo staff. Well, the committee I'd say. Because the first year that we saw it, I was at a wedding up on Fayetteville and we looked down and one of the guys at the wedding party goes, "Oh yeah, I have tokens for that. I'm part of the committee." And I went down there and they're in this circle by the Marriott and that was busy. And then they had food trucks and then Railhouse was on the other side of that and there was nobody there. 01:10:00And I went, "Oh, this can't happen. No. Why isn't he in a circle? Why isn't he with the rest of the breweries?" And so we joined that and they said, "Well, we're statewide. Do you want us to bring in breweries from across the state?" And they went, "Nope, nope, nope." And then Jennifer went, "No, we should." And every year we grew them to be over 100. And then now they're always over 100. But they had 50,000 people. So before COVID they had 50,000 and COVID came and went down and they did their thing. This past one that they had was 50,000 again. So people will go to that and the festivals are coming back. But I think, unfortunately, they've got to relearn how to do it again. Because this year they didn't have Beericana. That was one that didn't come back this year and maybe next year. But I think to me it's always what I always told people in the breweries is festivals are great because you learn about a beer not in the area, if they bring them in. 01:11:00And now festivals used to be, okay, we're going to have, and even a lot of them, they would have the NC breweries and then over here they'd have Budweiser and everyone else, just to satisfy. Now the festivals are going, "No, we're good with just NC." So Brewgaloo is only NC and only NC-rooted. So Sierra Nevada can't go to it. New Belgium cannot go to it because they're not rooted. And so now a lot of these festivals are doing that same kind of thing, which I think is great because it promotes us and makes people realize that we have that. And then if they want to have festivals and they're still around, where they bring them in from out of state, then you can appreciate those even more. And what's happening now is it doesn't mean that the festivals have to be in these giant areas. You've had Barrel Culture having a festival in their little area, but it was like 16 breweries from all over the country. So I think that it doesn't have to be these grand big events like Brewgaloo. That's great. But they're making these smaller ones and then they're also mixing in the Moon Brew Festival. So it's burgers and music. Or these concerts. And I think they're kind of adding more to your ticket value by having multiple things. And I think now you're going to see a lot more of those where it's multiple things, not just beer, but you're going to have multiple things there. 01:12:00Erin Lawrimore: And I think even with the beer only, or primarily, festivals, we're starting to see not necessarily smaller festivals but more focused festivals. A lot of our only festival, or [inaudible 01:12:48] only festival, I think those are interesting, too. Dave Tollefsen: Yeah, because when you specialize in that, how often do you get those in one area? Now, the scary ones would be like if it was a barley wine festival because they'd have to wheel you out. 01:13:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, you'd have to be that at with nap stations or something. Dave Tollefsen: That's right. That's right. Erin Lawrimore: Well, that was basically the list of prepared questions I had. Is there anything we didn't talk about that you want to talk about to get your full picture in the industry? Dave Tollefsen: No, what we've always done and you have places like Visit NC and other ones that we've always said that breweries are destinations, and people don't think that. They go, "Well, it's a brewery." They're destinations. I mean honestly, I learned the state by going to all the breweries. Now, I've not been to all of them either. I think last I counted I was a 325. But you learn so much about where things are and towns I've never even heard of and how different the breweries are from each other and how they handled things. And it's just really cool. I mean, I saw one which... And I knew I was going to forget them again because it's not New Origin. It's a new brewery that's north of Asheville, but they brew in glass. Oh yeah. It's an all-glass system and oh yeah, it's a small system, but it's all glass and it's amazing to see it. They're right down the block from Zillicoah. 01:14:00Erin Lawrimore: I'm going to have to find it. I love Zillicoah so I'm going to have to find the new glass brewery. Dave Tollefsen: It's just north of it. Just north of it. And I feel bad that I can't [inaudible 01:14:38] Erin Lawrimore: I've never seen that. Dave Tollefsen: Yeah, you walk in, it's to the left and it's a really unique system. But it's just that everybody's finding these little different approaches on how to handle things. And it's nice to see different top rooms, different locations, what kind of buildings did you put it in? That's the way you learn. I said, "It's a great way to explore the state." People are like, "Are you the in the tourism industry?" I'm like, "No, but we should be because we promote you going all over the state." 01:15:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah, yeah. No, I definitely think, like you said, every little town now, it seems, has a brewery or wants a brewery. One of the two. Dave Tollefsen: Yeah, they're begging for them. Some of the cities that say, "How do we get a brewery into... What can you do?" I'm like, "Well, give me a press release. I'll post it out and see if you get any people that take it." But I said, "I'd love to see a brewery." I mean, I think Goldsboro sent me, they go "Here are eight locations, do you think you can get anybody?" I'm like, "Oh, I would want that location. There's a train station." I went, "That would be an awesome location for them." But it hasn't happened yet. But maybe soon, someday it would. Everybody realizes the power of a brewery in a town, as we mentioned a little before, Four Saints, but it attracts people, it attracts businesses because people will go to that brewery and then they're like, "Well what's around? Is there any food around?" Do you need a restaurant? So I think for them it's a great way to basically keep the industry up in a small town. 01:16:00Erin Lawrimore: Yeah. Can you think of anything else that we would want to get in this bigger story? Dave Tollefsen: I can't think of anything. Erin Lawrimore: Awesome. Well, I'm going to stop the recording, but I want to say thank you very much and- Dave Tollefsen: Thank you.