1. Where is your brewery?

We have 3 locations, the first was our original spot at Peg's Cantina in Gulfport, we still brew half of our beer out of there for now. The brewery at Peg's will be transitioning into our version of a side project called Orange Belt Brewing, headed by our lead brewer Eric Trinosky, in early 2015. The main tap room is the other half of current production called Cycle Brewing located in downtown St. Pete. The 3rd spot is our small warehouse currently under construction, we are expecting to increase production slightly but mostly focused on spirit barrel-aging, we do have a different warehouse for wine and brett barrel-aging as well but it is truly storage. Both warehouses are in or near the Dome industrial park in central St. Pete. By March 2015 we should be running 3 complete breweries.

2. What was the first beer you had that made you realize craft beer was going to be a bigger part of your life?

I would have to say that craft beer didn't draw me in so much as macro beer pushed me out. There was no epiphany and in fact I was very reluctant to try brewing. My interest in craft grew out of college parties with something that I liked to drink rather than choking down whatever cheap beer we could find, 30 'stones for 8 bucks anybody? I drank a lot of Guinness (a favorite of shotgunning) and Saranac, going to school in Potsdam, NY, that was what was available. I grew up in Iowa, lived in extreme Northern NY and then moved to Florida all at times when those were craft beer wastelands. When I traveled I would always look for something new to try and from there I would say I started really exploring craft beer without realizing that it was part of a trend or the movement it has become. The reason we turned Peg's into a brewpub was because I had a part time job at Starbucks working the drive thru and needed the extra money, it didn't become all about the beer for me until I was working full time at Cigar City bottling barrel-aged beers and drinking fresh IPA. After that it became a personal challenge to make my favorite beers and it was a bitter struggle for years, double IPA is still destroying my ego on a regular basis.