For LGBTQIA+ Pleasure Month, we’re sharing tales of queer-identified cidermakers from throughout the nation. On this Cider Tradition function, meet Scott Katsma of Seattle Cider Co.
Most cider lovers have an “aha” second with one particular cider, a particular pour that provides an eye-opening, mind-expanding expertise into how thrilling cider could be. For Scott Katsma of Seattle Cider Co., that was Sea Cider’s Prohibition, which he tried whereas working one summer season after faculty at The Noble Fir, a bar in Seattle. Earlier than that, Katsma had been extra into craft beer, and was about to embark on a profession in particular schooling.
Nonetheless, the magic of cider stayed with him, and a decade later, feeling burnt out from instructing, he jumped on the likelihood to get in on the bottom ground of a brand-new cidery, Seattle Cider Co. That was totally 10 years in the past, and in that point, Katsma has worn so many hats within the rising firm. At present, his title is High quality/R&D Supervisor, and his tasks are many!
We had an opportunity to talk with Katsma about his experiences working at Seattle Cider Co., and to be taught a bit extra about a number of the merchandise, together with Seattle Cider Co.’s Love & Gentle Pleasure marketing campaign.
Cider Tradition: What had been these early days at Seattle Cider like? Being a part of an organization at its begin is usually a wild journey…
Scott Katsma: Shifting at breakneck pace not often permits for correct planning or sustainability, which is unlucky. Early on, it was all adaptation and problem-solving. You be taught large classes on the fly, and hope to implement modifications as you go. We realized loads of exhausting classes shortly, however that simply continued to permit us to enhance, innovate and develop quick.
On the core of it, what we excelled at was fairly easy – making dry cider that we knew we wished to drink that didn’t exist but on the grocery retailer shelf. And we had been unwavering in that imaginative and prescient. Not having a ton of craft cider choices on the shelf additionally meant we had been extraordinarily free to innovate with different elements. From the very starting, we simply experimented with attempting to co-ferment issues, like contemporary herbs, different fruits and teas, with apple juice – a way that’s now having a second – and that gave us loads of freedom to play. Ten years later, and with the fast development in each the RTD and the useful CPG house, there aren’t a ton of taste or ingredient combos that haven’t been explored, so it makes the duty of arising with one thing fully new and contemporary a thousand instances extra arduous. The early days weren’t too totally different from the previous three years, nonetheless, it’s nonetheless simply as wild a journey as ever. Yeehaw!
How did you be taught to make cider? What had been some early victories and/or studying moments you found alongside the best way?
As a rule, we grew to become consultants by trial-and-error. We realized to make cider, on a big scale, by making use of what we knew about business brewing, and determining moderately shortly that loads of these issues completely don’t translate to wine fermentation. For instance, harvesting and re-pitching yeast is an entire idiot’s errand. After shortly switching to a dry wine yeast, we went by means of a pair years of large development and had been largely caught with utilizing this yeast as our home yeast. Folks got here to like this taste profile and it grew to become synonymous with Seattle Cider, regardless of the yeast not being precisely best from a nutrient or temperature standpoint. Figuring out what we all know now, it’s even exhausting to say that if we might return and choose a special yeast from the start that we’d, as a result of the one we select additionally obtained us to the place we’re at the moment.
I’ve additionally realized by means of group and collaboration. The cider {industry} is in contrast to every other and thrives on people who find themselves generously open to sharing insights, experiences, and schooling. Along with making some dangerous cider, I even have a gaggle of friends, now shut mates, to thank for lots of my studying alongside the best way.
What’s the primary product you made for Seattle Cider Co. that made you’re feeling like, “Hell, sure!”?
There have positively been memorable batches alongside the best way, however I really feel like that feeling has existed from my very first day. My very first juice truck, my very first canning run, my very first time buying my cider out on the earth and sharing it with family and friends crammed me with pleasure and pleasure. I really feel very fortunate to have been part of one thing that we knew was thrilling from the very starting. Oh, and the Gentle Cider that we launched final 12 months is extraordinarily glug-able, and each can I drink remains to be a “hell, sure!” second for me.
As the corporate grew, how did your position shift or develop?
My first official title was “cider monkey” as a result of I used to be the one manufacturing/cellar worker, however that shortly progressed into turning into our Head Cidermaker in 2015. After which after we began constructing a tough seltzer model in 2017, I took on all the product creation and innovation roles that got here with that and have become the Director of Fermentation and Innovation for all our manufacturers. Regardless of making fairly a little bit of cider, we’re nonetheless a super-small firm with simply over 30 staff, so out of necessity we’re continually shifting and rising to fulfill the wants of the second.
What have been a number of the most rewarding and/or difficult components of the journey?
Essentially the most rewarding half has been the mentorship that has include constructing and dealing for an industry-leading model. All through the years, offering schooling and coaching to mates and associates as a way to assist them develop is super-fulfilling to me, and one thing I hope to proceed to have the ability to do. Seeing somebody begin on our packaging line, giving them the chance to step into management and develop their abilities as a fermenter, and to then turn out to be a head cidermaker, or begin their very own model, is definitely actually enjoyable and vastly outweighs the grind of discovering somebody new to begin on the packaging line. Serving to improve the standard and amount of cider on the earth solely helps to raise cider’s general notion as a class. The extra higher cider on the earth, the higher for everybody!
Scott Katsma on the Northwest Cider Cup
What does being in a extra R&D-focused place seem like? You additionally talked about that you simply’re accountable for innovating new merchandise. How does that part work?
High quality for us means unending coaching and schooling. Fixed empowerment and development. It’s one thing that looks like we by no means have sufficient time for, however it’s important in our development and evolution.
Creating new merchandise nowadays takes a lot alignment throughout all points of our enterprise that it necessitates somebody in a position to translate gross sales, advertising and budgeting inputs, and have it imply one thing on a product stage. There are additionally bigger questions of brand name technique to contemplate, and so most of my job entails making use of these filters, whereas concurrently overlaying manufacturing and operational constraints, with the final word purpose of sustaining a playground for our brewers and cidermakers to be artistic. For me, I’m at all times attempting to make the one factor that me and my mates would need to drink, however loads of that can also be impressed by journey, different cultures and different industries. I’m an enormous CPG [consumer packaged goods] nerd and am obsessive about attempting each new drink or snack on the shelf.
Although the cider {industry} has modified so much over the previous decade, there’s nonetheless not a ton of range, particularly in manufacturing. It looks like Seattle Cider is working to heart totally different voices and promote inclusion; are you able to discuss a bit extra about that?
Once I began at Seattle Cider, our firm was only a bunch of white 20-something-year-old boys, and I wasn’t even out to my household but. So yeah, a bit totally different! Rising up, I used to be hyper-aware that I used to be totally different from others and hid that distinction to keep away from being focused. And sadly, that was true, too, after I entered the craft beverage world in 2013. Whereas each the beverage {industry} and I’ve made progress, it’s not sufficient, and the demographics of {industry} insiders don’t match the demographics of our clients or the world we dwell in, and lots of teams are underrepresented or invisible.
I imagine that by being extra open about myself, I may create extra space for others who’re totally different from the norm. I can welcome them, amplify their voices and empower them to be themselves in locations the place they’ve been shut out. My private mission is to create areas that my youthful self deserved: to ask and encourage numerous views and construct a welcoming tradition. At one level, our cidermaking staff was 2/3 girls and a couple of/3 queer. That felt good, or no less than remarkably higher; it was a optimistic change, however nonetheless not sufficient. It’s by no means a field you test one time, and we’ve a protracted solution to go, particularly by way of racial fairness. We as an organization are actively working to signify all cider drinkers: creating our advertising belongings, bettering our hiring practices, amending our worker insurance policies, and many others. Getting it proper is multi-faceted and a staff effort, and we all know that this requires listening, studying and doing higher.
Let’s discuss concerning the Seattle Cider’s Love & Gentle Pleasure marketing campaign? Have been you concerned with this? If that’s the case, how and what was that course of like?
Once we had been constructing the preliminary marketing campaign for the launch of Gentle Cider final 12 months, we actually wished to reprise some traditional gentle beer tropes with a extra inclusive lens. We envisioned a “lawn-mower beer” business that didn’t function a white middle-aged man. We knew we wished it to be way of life targeted, however to additionally replicate the variety of our buyer base, such that everybody might see themselves having fun with this cider on the finish of a day or hike. This was the imaginative and prescient for Gentle Cider from day one, to be as inclusive in our advertising as attainable. So this 12 months’s Love & Gentle marketing campaign is a pure development of the spirit of Gentle Cider and a really thrilling encapsulation of how we hoped to signify the model.
For the previous 8 years, we’ve launched totally different iterations of pride-themed packaging within the month of June to spotlight the vital work of our group companions, together with the GSBA, Pleasure Basis, Middle on Halsted, Path Blended Collective; and this 12 months’s partnership with the Queer Mountaineers for Love & Gentle felt like a pure match as a way to assist assist the work they tirelessly do to make our group extra accessible to all.
Thanks a lot to Scott for sharing his story and insights on the {industry} with us! For extra about Seattle Cider, together with information about its tasting room, The Woods, go to its web site and comply with alongside on Instagram and Fb.
- Pictures: Courtesy of Scott Katsma and Seattle Cider Co.
