Spencer Nix - CEO/Co-Founder
500 Arnold Mill Way
Woodstock, GA 30188
CookingSociety: How long have you been in the beer business?
Reformation Brewery: It definitely was not a lightening bolt experience. It was years in the making and never in my life did I think I would open a brewery. You could say it was providence that led us to it, and no not the beer.
CS: What got you into beer brewing?
RB: Nick and I used to share flavorful yeast forward beers together that he would bring home from Europe. He is a pilot. This was a time in Georgia when finding anything worth drinking was hard to come by. Eventually Nick got bumped to a bigger plane and no longer flew to those great European beer cities. So Nick and I started home-brewing. When we realized it was a lot more beer than we could drink ourselves, we started inviting friends and family to join us. We always had a great time brewing, enjoying well-made beers and really just sharing life together through those times.
CS: Can you briefly explain the process of beer brewing?
RB: Our brew sessions grew over time and we had a lot of people showing up at Nick's house, so we started scheduling brew nights for every third Friday night. It wasn't long before we could expect 100+ folks. And it was a beautiful community of people from all different backgrounds and experiences. That's really when the lightbulb went off and Nick and I realized this was really bigger than us, even bigger than the beer we were making. We still weren't sure if the beer was good because we were giving it away for free and everyone loves free beer. So we entered our first certified home-brew competition and won. That gave us some confidence that the product was good and we soon began building a business plan rooted in the why and the values that were at the heart of brew nights. Three years later we created our first production batch of beer on Reformation Day 2013.
CS: What is your favorite part of the process?
RB: At Reformation, we believe simplicity is the ultimate form of sophistication. There is a lot of noise in our industry, we simply started with asking "why do we really enjoy drinking good beer?" Our answers kept coming back to the fact that well made beer connects people to each other and to moments in time. We built our entire business model on this concept of enjoying well made beer as a gift and sharing that gift with others. I’m often philosophical when it comes to beer but I think the industry has tapped into something innate in humanity, the desire to connect with the maker. We want to know where stuff comes from, we want to know where stuff is made, how stuff is made, why stuff is made. Local, independent businesses and breweries give people the opportunity to connect more deeply with the product and also with others who enjoy it. It really is a beautiful thing that keeps attracting me to this industry.
CS: How did you come up with the name for your brewery?
RB: Nick (our Brewmaster and Cofounder) and I share many common passions, one being church history and particularly the cultural impact of the Protestant Reformation upon the Western world. Now as a business we hope to see our brand of Reformation have a cultural impact as well. We truly believe beer is a good gift. Like any gift, it’s to be savored and enjoyed. Not necessarily because you’ve earned it, but because it’s truly a blessing. We, largely as a people, don’t take time to cherish our blessings today. Everything is so busy, rushed, temporary, offensive, lowgrade, and forced. We want to elevate the experience around well made beer. Reformation Brewery is about liberating the good gift of beer from institutional tastes, intolerable trends, and social extremes. #setbeerfree
CS: How do you name your beers?
RB: We intentionally pair the names of our beers around moments. When we partake in the good gift of beer we are always in a moment. It may be a moment of celebration, a moment of despair, a moment of reflection, a moment within an adventure, or even just the simple of moment of another day. Each moment deserves a toast, so we hope to help you elevate your experience in the moments of your life. Cheers
