Cansition: Great Northern begins pouring beer into cans

Taking Great Northern Brewing Company’s beer on an outdoor adventure is getting a little easier.

The brewery recently completed an 18-month endeavor to switch over from bottling of its beer to offering it in cans.

Marcus Duffey, managing partner of the brewery, said the transition has been about four years in the making, but said the switchover was “seamless.”

“We have a long legacy of bottles, and we’re proud of that history,” he said. “We’ve put a lot of great beers in bottles and it’s served us well, but we had to look at the future in terms of where the wisest investments were.”

Duffey said from a cost perspective, canning their beer makes sense, and it also is what customers have been looking for.

“So replacing the bottling line, we could do that for a pretty penny. Or we could go with equipment that’s now more readily available for small brewers in the can area. And you look at our environment in terms of consumers and what their expectations are, especially in Montana and the northwest, they are looking for a beer in a can that they can have on the river or golf course or in a backpack. It just seemed like the right vessel.”

As Great Northern calls it, the “Cansition” officially began in November of 2017. The new equipment will increase production to 75 units per minute and use carbon dioxide from fermentation to carbonate the beer going into cans, significantly reducing the brewery’s carbon footprint, according to Great Northern. The new kegging equipment will also increase production 25 percent by canning beer 3.5 times faster than bottling.

Duffey says the four flagship beers — Going-to-the-Sun IPA, Wild Huckleberry Lager, Big Mountain Tea Pale Ale and Good Medicine Strong Red Ale — will be the first to hit store shelves in their canned form. A previous top beer, Wheatfish, will still be available on tap at the brewery, but not in a can.

Great Northern plans to hold on to its bottling equipment for special runs of some of their more unique beers, like the Bluebird Day Double IPA and others usually found only on tap at the brewery.

Canning beer has other benefits besides cost-saving, Duffey said. For one, it makes for better tasting beer over a longer period.

Despite old beliefs that beer from a bottle tastes better than beer out of a can, Duffey says technology has squashed those concerns.

“I think that was a very valid thought and concern for a long time,” he said. “Nowadays, from just a technological standpoint, that is becoming a misnomer. These aluminum producers are able to produce cans that actually have a microscopic polymer layer that actually separates the beer from the can. We have almost zero oxygen ingress, and that really is the most critical piece in shelf life.”

Niki Bates, manager of marketing and public relations for the brewery, said the better shelf life also ensures that beer drinkers are tasting the product the way it was intended.

“I think we’re also able to control what’s going into the market, the flavor of our beer and our brand, because we know that with a longer shelf life, people are actually tasting it how it was intended to taste and not because it was sitting in a bottle for a while and then they tasted it.”

Another benefit is in the actual weight savings of using aluminum.

While Duffey is reluctant to toss out buzz-words like “sustainable” when talking about the switch, he says the cost savings are in fact better in multiple facets of their beer-making processes.

“I think a good measure is cost. If we can reduce costs, we can reduce tangible impacts on labor or fuel, and ultimately the cost of doing those aspects of doing those aspects of the business, that’s sustainable,” he said. “Especially in Montana, we don’t have a glass recycling system in this state. Even if we did, from a weight perspective, the transport of recyclable glass versus the weight of recyclable aluminum — it’s dramatic.”

Duffey says he’s happy to celebrate what may be the biggest accomplishment in his time at Great Northern.

“We’re just really excited about this new chapter for the brewery,” he said. “I’ve been here 10 years and there’s ups and downs and exciting things that have happened, but this is probably the highest point for me.”

The brewery will hold a celebration of the “Cansition” on Friday, May 25, from 5 to 7 p.m. at the brewery’s location on Railway Street and Central Avenue.

Visitors will get to see the new canning line and be some of the first to enjoy the beer in its new form. Raffles and prizes will be part of the evening as well.