It's not easy to open a new brewery in New Jersey. But for Armageddon Brewing, it is taking an act of legislation.

The four friends launching the business in Somerdale want to make hard cider and mead -- two products that remain rare in a state where craft breweries are popping up like daisies.

That may have something to do with the fact that New Jersey had no laws governing the running of cider- and mead-making operations -- until the Armageddon partners suggested language for the legislation themselves and worked for years to get it passed.

"I had a party the following day," Christian Annese, 35, of Somerdale, said of the law's signing in May.

Then, the real work began for Annese and his partners --Matt Olsen, a teacher, Kyle Laird, an information technologist, and Gill Cornwall, who works for a company that does patent work in the pharmaceutical industry -- as they try to make their dream business a reality.

Armageddon Brewing launched a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign this month, hoping to raise $30,000 to start their business. They hit their goal with just an hour to go on the fundraiser Friday.

The partners were always planning to invest all their savings in the project with a goal of opening their tasting room in Somerdale as early as August of 2018.

While legislation in 2012 made it possible for dozens of microbreweries to open across the state, Annese said there are only two cideries and a big demand for the beverage here.

"Cider is where craft beer was 10 years ago," he said of the growing interest. "We're hoping since we made it easier, we'll see a lot more cideries opening."

Mike Kivowitz, founder of the website New Jersey Craft Beer and a club by the same name for brewers and enthusiasts, said he doesn't think cider and mead-making operations will ever be as numerous as the state's microbreweries. He also thinks breaking into the cider market might be especially hard.

"Mead will probably take off faster because, well, it's so unique," he said.

Anything you can brew, I can brew better

Annese, a web designer for Independence Blue Cross in Philadelphia, said he and his friends began homebrewing beer in 2011.

Then a doctor misdiagnosed him with a gluten intolerance. "So for like a year I changed my diet and stayed away from gluten, and that meant I couldn't drink beer," Annese said.

A friend suggested he drink cider instead, but Annese was not a fan of the super-sweet ciders he had tried in the past.

"I said I'd never had a good cider and he said why not try to brew it yourself," Annese said.

The friends, all from Camden County with the exception of Olsen, who halls from Atlantic County, also thought that they could make good mead. The ancient, alcoholic drink is made by fermenting honey in water and can be flavored with various spices and fruit juices.

After getting a great response to their free cider samples at a borough festival in 2012, they started considering turning pro. "That was when we found out about all of the road blocks."

There were no laws on the book about making cider or mead. Because cider is made from a fruit juice, Annese said, the only way to have a legal cidery at that point was to take out a winery license.

This is what the state's three cider producers, Jersey Cider Works in Newark, Oldwick Cider Works in Oldwick and Twisted Limb Hard Cider in Stillwater Township, have done.

But the rules about vineyards were written to help farmers and encourage agritourism. They include requirements that a winery must have at least three acres of vineyard and that 51 percent of the ingredients be grown in New Jersey -- something that Annese said would make it difficult to make cider during the winter months.

"And mead isn't even a thing," Annese said.

Before the law was changed, there were no legal provisions for making mead because it isn't made with fruit juice like other wines. The state's only meadery, Melovino Meadery in Vauxhall, has a special license from the Division of Alcoholic Beverage Control.

Annese said he and his friends went through the law looking for loopholes, but determined that they needed a new law in order to open the kind of urban cidery and meadery they wanted.

He met with Assemblywoman Pamela Lampitt and she told him to suggest the wording of the new bill, Annese said.

The legislators submitted a bill but it died in committee. The version of the bill that ultimately passed was submitted in 2016.

Lampitt's office said both Annese and the owner of Melovino Meadery, Sergio Moutela, were suggesting language for the bill as it evovled, and lobbied for its passage in Trenton.

While the bill was being considered, the Armageddon partners drew up a business plan for Armageddon Brewing. They found a space to rent in Somerdale -- though Annese doesn't want to reveal its location until the lease is signed.

They've also been perfecting their ciders and meads, Annese said. He drove "all over New Jersey" to find different kinds of cider to brew with, and started his own small orchard in Kutztown, Penn. of 50 trees to raise special varieties of apples, including French and English cider apples and American heirloom varieties.

Christian Annese grows 24 varieties of apples in his three-acre orchard in Kutztown, Penn. (Christian Annese)

While some big cider brands use concentrate instead of fresh fruit juice, Annese said they plan to use fresh juice and also buy and press their own apples once the brewery is up and running. They won't use any artificial flavors, he said.

They find most of the big-name ciders are too sweet and have an artificial apple taste, Annese said.

The flavors they've come up with instead, as they boasted on their Kickstarter page, range from "incredibly dry, almost champagne like, to sweet and juicy like you were taking a bite from an apple right off the tree."

Mead -- a drink thought to be one of the oldest alcoholic beverages on the planet -- can also have diverse flavors depending on the type of honey, spices and fruit juices added. Some taste like honey while others are more wine-like and complex.

They tried at first to buy local honey, but Annese said beekeepers don't sell it in bulk and he needed about 24 pounds per five-gallon batch.

He now buys from Dutch Gold, a big company in Lancaster, Penn., where he can get different varieties made by bees that pollinated blossoms of oranges, raspberries and wildflowers, among others.

But is there a market for mead in New Jersey? Annese said he thinks people will be clamoring for it, once they're introduced to the product.

An Armageddon Brewing glass and t-shirt that donors can get for giving to the Kickstarter campaign. (Christian Annese)

As for their name, Annese said Armageddon Brewing was born out of their dark humor and desire for an "edgy and memorable" theme. The names of their beverages draw from ancient mythology and even Adam and Eve, he said.

"It's not the end of the world so much as the end of you having to drink overly sweet, candy-like, mass-produced commercial ciders and meads," he said.

Rebecca Everett may be reached at reverett@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @rebeccajeverett. Find NJ.com on Facebook.