“Falletta Conducts ‘Pines of Rome'”
Omaha, NE—Omaha Symphony welcomes guest conductor Maestra JoAnn Falletta, and guest violinist, Blake Pouliot, for a performance this weekend in homage to Rome. Maestra Falletta, the only female conductor of a top 40 orchestra, will lead the orchestra in the works of Berlioz and Respighi.
Road to Omaha – Oral Roberts Golden Eagles
Omaha, NE – On today’s episode of “Road to Omaha,” KVNO’s Brandon McDermott spoke with Oral Roberts head coach Ryan Folmar.
Nebraska craft breweries thrive in tough economy
October 12th, 2011
La Vista, NE – It’s the one luxury that’s recession-proof, and the numbers show it: people are going to drink beer regardless of their income. While many beer drinkers may downgrade their brew of choice, American craft beer sales continue to go up. This national trend is reflected in Nebraska as well.
Listen Now
[audio:https://kvnonews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Breweries-NET.mp3]“The one area in beer that has been growing in the last decade has been American craft style beers,” said Hobert Rupe, executive director of the Nebraska Liquor Control Commission. The commission collects taxes on all alcohol that is made or imported to the state.
A glass of Lucky Bucket Lager, the brewery's most popular beer. Brewery Owner Zac Triemert refers to it as "drink-all-day beer." (Photo by Clay Masters, NET News)
“When you’re seeing a growth in those American craft style brewers, you’re seeing a decrease in imported (beer). Imports have really taken a hit the last couple years,” Rupe said. “They’re going after the same market share – the higher end beer drinker.”
Sales have been increasing for Lucky Bucket Lager in LaVista since it started in 2008 during the outset of what’s been dubbed the Great Recession.
“It was a little scary, but it didn’t slow us down any,” said Lucky Bucket President Zac Triemert.
Triemert started his career with agriculture company Cargill as a fermentation microbiologist, but moved to Scotland in the early 2000s to pursue a degree in brewing and distilling. His dream was to open a distillery.
“If you go back and look at the business plan, we were going to be a distillery that had a brewery attached to it, because the first part of distilling is brewing,” Triemert said.
In 2007 Triemert worked with Sen. John Synowiecki of Omaha to pass a law that allows Nebraskans to distill within the state. In that time he focused on beer.
Lucky Bucket Owner Zac Triemert started his brewery in 2008 when most businesses were failing. (Photo by Clay Masters, NET News)
“The brewery has just taken off like gangbusters,” he said. “We grew 400 percent last year, we’re growing another 100 percent this year.”
Hobert Rupe with the Liquor Control Commission said he doesn’t expect to see craft beer sales in the state go down anytime soon, despite talk of a double-dip recession. That’s good news for Trevor Schaben, who opened his brewery Thunderhead in 1999 in Kearney.
In 2008, Schaben stepped up his marketing and began distributing his beer in cans. When Thunderhead brewery started out, it was in the back of a restaurant. Now there’s a separate building for the brewery.
“We are pretty much from Colorado to Omaha on Interstate 80,” Schaben said. “We’ve got as much (distribution) as we can handle.”
Schaben said they’re still canning by hand, producing up to 200 cases a week. He said the new building was the first step in moving to automated canning, which will then allow him to focus on expanding distribution.
Comments are closed.
