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Crowdfunding considerations

by Indigo on May 12, 2014 at 1:21 pm
Posted In: Blog

In any new business venture, funding is key. No money, no business. It’s just that simple. All of the next steps I need to take in setting up the Megalith Brewing taproom – from getting the necessary permits, signing a lease on a space, and assembling my brewing setup – will require more money than I have at my disposal right now.

My original financial plan relied heavily on being able to secure a sizable loan from a bank, hopefully one backed by the insurance provided by the SBA. The remainder of the financing was going to be raised through a combination of equity partnerships, and reward-based crowdfunding. Since reaching out to a local SBA-backed bank, though, it’s been explained to me that traditional lenders don’t like lending to high-risk borrowers, such as a nonexistent start-up being operated by someone with a history of credit problems like myself. In my situation, finding equity partners and relying more heavily on crowdfunding for initial capital are going to be the only real solution for me.
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Slow But Steady…

by Indigo on April 26, 2014 at 4:21 pm
Posted In: Blog

Since I made my initial announcement about the brewery plans, lots of folks have been asking me how it’s been going, how are the plans coming along, when are you opening, do you know where you’ll be yet? And I always have to sigh, and resign myself to having to bursting their little bubble. I’m glad that so many other people are excited about my brewery plans too, I just wish I had more to tell them than, “No, I haven’t gotten any closer this week to opening than I was two weeks ago, or a month ago.”
It’s hard to show much progress on the plan at this point, because a lot of what I’ve been doing is simply fine-tuning the plan that I’ll need in order to be able to secure funding. All of the Big Stuff – finding a space, applying for permits and licenses, starting the build-out, setting the opening date, and setting up the brew-space – all of that hinges on me getting the funding I’m seeking, which will rely on having a comprehensive and well-presented business plan.
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Small Business Mentors: SCORE!

by Indigo on April 17, 2014 at 4:31 pm
Posted In: Blog

Starting a business is no small thing. Over the years, I’ve started (or been involved in starting) at least a few, including Lunarbistro.com and Stumptown Comics, Inc. Normally they were as simple as getting a dba account at the bank, and paying an annual license fee to the state. The most complex one was getting the Stumptown Comics organization incorporated. But none of those businesses involved seeking funding, or developing any sort of a business plan. In both cases I felt a business plan was unnecessary – the freelance design business was so simple in structure, and Stumptown (while considerably more complex) had been well-established and fairly well-defined by example. When I started the process of thinking about this brewery, though, I knew I wanted to do this one differently.
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Epic Logo

by Indigo on April 10, 2014 at 1:01 pm
Posted In: Blog

Putting the finishing touches on this ‘Epic’ version of the basic logo, which will be the basis for any large-scale promotional items I make, and will also be key to defining the branding going forward. I definitely want to see this on a t-shirt or growler (in a limited-color-palette capacity, at any rate), or a black-light velvet flocked poster, oh yes.

The coloring came out far more complex than I was intending, but it just looks better this way. I can always reduce the colors for silkscreen purposes, but I figured, this thing is supposed to be EPIC. So, Make It EPIC.

Enjoy!

7 Comments

It’s the small things…

by Indigo on April 3, 2014 at 5:00 am
Posted In: Blog

…Like getting the rest of this site styled properly, and sweeping away the last of the stylistic remnants of the wordpress template it’s built on. I still have a number of pages I’ll need to build before I’d call the site ‘Final’ by any stretch, but there’s a lot that still needs to happen before I’ll have any content for those pages.

Speaking of those things, whenever I’ve shared with folks that I’m putting this project together, one of the first questions I get asked is “Where’s it going to be?” This is the question I’m most anxious to have answered as well, but unfortunately it’s going to be a while before I have the answer. Having spoken to a few retail real estate agents, it’s clear that first I need to get my financing in order, which means sharing my business plan with the bank and getting that ever-elusive ‘Small Business Loan’. I’ve been told they’re fairly easy to get these days, and that I have a strong business plan going into it, but I’m not holding my breath. My over-riding philosophy with this project is not to be too disappointed if it doesn’t happen. Until it’s real and I’m hosting my grand opening party, Megalith Brewing is just a really cool dream brewery. And the next step to making this dream a reality is securing the funding to sign a lease and start applying for my permits.

In the meantime, I’m going to do the things I CAN do right now, like developing the branding and style guides for the business (which I want to also include with the business plan when I talk to the bank), and continuing to make more beer for the Tasting Party coming up later this spring (details to come soon!).

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Makers of hand-crafted small-batch English style ales, made from high-quality ingredients and with a Pacific Northwest sense of adventure and experimentation.

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  • RT @SquizBrew: @megalithbrewing Go secondary in keg and age in that vessel with oxygen purged out. 01:14:29 PM August 26, 2018 from TweetDeck ReplyRetweetFavorite
  • I still think it’s more of an Imperial Bitter Ale, but I’m totally okay with that. #IBA #BitterBeersAreBest #Homebrew 08:21:36 PM August 20, 2018 from TweetDeck in reply to megalithbrewing ReplyRetweetFavorite
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