Author: Marshall Schott

Regretfully, I forgot to do the General Homebrewer Survey in 2016, a project I started back in December 2014 and repeated in 2015 with the goal of repeating annually to track interesting trends in homebrewing. With talk of changes including an apparent decline in the hobby, I thought it’d be good start back up again now and would really appreciate if you could take the time to complete the survey linked below.

2017 SURVEY COMPLETE – COME BACK IN 2018!

There are quite a few questions, to be sure, but they’re simple enough that it shouldn’t take longer than about 10 minutes to complete. In addition to tracking trends, another purpose of this survey is to gather demographic information about fellow homebrewers such that we can all get an idea of places we align and perhaps differ. While all responses are completely anonymous, feel free to skip any questions you’re uncomfortable responding to.

I plan to leave the survey open for 2 weeks, after which I’ll analyze the date, put it in the most digestible form I can, then share it here on the site and likely on the podcast. Thank you so much for helping out!

Interview w/ Homebrew Academy

Billy Broas, who runs Homebrew Academy, has been influential in the homebrewing scene for awhile now, in fact it was his keezer tutorial that inspired me to make the keezer I currently use today. I sat down for about an hour with Billy a few weeks ago with the plan to talk about the basics of Brülosophy, though we ended up getting a tad deeper into certain things that I figured some of you might find interesting. The audio is what counts here, as the video is a bit choppy… who needs to see my fugly mug anyway?

Behind The Scenes of The Brülosophy Podcast

As I plan out the recording of episode 5 of The Brülosophy Podcast, it struck me that listeners likely have little idea what all goes into producing each show. Truth is, I’m new to this game as well, learning along the way as it were, and it hasn’t taken long for me to realize it’s not as simple as I originally thought it’d be. I’ve had a few people ask about our process and figured I’d lay it out as clearly as possible here, admittedly with the hope we also get some feedback and advice in return!

I’m not sure what it is about the lifting of curtains that makes me anxious, perhaps it’s my fear of revealing too much or something being taken the wrong way. Either way, while I plan to go over things in detail, my main point is to share how this all works for us. If it inspires you to want to throw some support or way, fantastic, we’ll take it, but if not, that’s cool too, keep on keeping on, we good.

1 | Equipment, Software, & Hosting

Indeed, anyone with a phone that has a built-in recorder can capture themselves talking, load the audio file on their computer, create an RSS feed, and start a podcast. It’ll sound like shit, but it’ll work. Just not for us. We actually care about sound quality, which requires an investment in gear that allows us to produce episodes that don’t make you want to gouge your eardrums out. Microphone, audio interface, cables, mic stand, etc– a pretty penny for just a single host, no doubt, and there are 6 of us. For my audophiles friends out there, our current gear chains:

Marshall: Shure SM7B mic > Cloudlifter CL-1 > Focusrite 2i2 > Garageband (iMac)

Jake: MXL990 mic > Pyle-Pro PAD10MX > Garageband (iMac)

Malcolm: Neewer NW-700 mic > M-Audio MobilePre (similar to 2i2) > Audacity (PC)

We’re currently working on getting everything going for Ray, Matt, and Greg, it’s just taking a little time. We are all using free audio recording software that seems to be doing the trick just fine, so that’s rad. Finally, in order to get what we record to the ears of those who want to hear it, we have to pay for someone to host our content. We’ve opted to go with SoundCloud for various reasons, one of which is their reasonable annual fee.

2 | Planning

Each episode starts with one of the other contributors and me settling on a topic, which thankfully we have many to choose from given the plethora of xBmts we’ve completed– nearly 140 at this point! From there, we spend a couple days hammering out show notes, which involves going over any relevant xBmt articles as well as researching other sources so as to provide more than just our angle on the topic.

3 | Recording

This is one area things tend to get a bit sticky, as coordinating a time when two of us have 1-2 free hours to record can be a pain in the ass. Family events, work travel, kids running around in the background making oodles of noise because I thought they’d stay holed up in my bedroom with the doors closed watching Karate Kid while mom is grocery shopping… you get the picture. Once the co-host and I have settled on a time, we’ll connect via Skype, run a couple tests to ensure everything is working properly, go over our notes together, then we both finally hit record. With a close eye on the time to make sure we hit commercial breaks (more on this later) at the proper points without things feeling too canned, we go through a few things then jump into the topic. We spend 1.5-2 hours on the horn for a full episode, after which the co-host exports their audio file and shares it with me via Google Drive. I download that file, plug it into my recording software, and move on to easily the most time intensive yet fun part of the process.

4 | Editing

I know there are some podcasts out there where the hosts just don’t care how things sound and others where they’re good enough that minimal editing is required to make each episode sound good. We’re far from both of those. As I mentioned, each recording session lasts over an hour, yet our shows have been clocking in at around the 50 minute mark, meaning I’m snipping quite a bit of junk, mostly “off-air” babbling. It’s the smaller edits that take so much time, as it requires listening to the entire episode from start to finish while keeping an ear out for things like a host coughing when the other is talking, dogs with collars shaking in the background, cars honking their horns, and the annoying lag between host responses that seems purely a function of doing this over Skype. After editing those 2 tracks, I have to make sure all of the many transitions line up seamlessly, place commercials in their proper slots, then mix down a “rough draft” that I listen to in full to ensure I didn’t miss anything. From there, I go back to my digital editing bay to make any necessary changes before mucking around with the master track and finally rendering the finished episode. All said and done, each full episodes takes me 4-6 hours, which I often complete after I put my kids to bed on the weekends so as not to interrupt family time. Despite the tediousness, I rather enjoy the editing process, there’s something sort of zen about it to me.

5 | Sharing

This part is actually pretty easy thanks to the way SoundCloud (and I’m sure other RSS feeds) work. Whenever I’m ready for the episode to go live, I upload the audio file to SoundCloud, type up a brief blurb about the episode that includes all relevant links, then make sure all the right boxes are checked before pressing publish. Within a few minutes, the different places people get their podcasts detect the new episode and make it public for your consumption. Since I usually do this before going to bed at night, I tend to let folks know via social media that a new episode is out the following morning.

6 | Responding

I love the homebrewing community and do my best to stay engaged as much as I possibly can, so responding to feedback and other comments isn’t necessarily difficult, though it does take time… time that could be spent writing articles, editing drafts, corresponding with sponsors, planning the next podcast episode, etc.

On Sponsors & Advertisements

Love it or hate it, paid sponsors are necessary to make The Brülosophy Podcast possible. There are aspects of providing as much content as we do in both written and podcast formats that costs actual money, like gear and hosting, but then there’s something that’s arguably more valuable than that– time. I was recently chatting with a friend about the amount of time I invest in Brülosophy, both the website and the podcast combined, and was somewhat taken aback when I realized it’s well over 40 hours per week and extends into weekends, unlike my “real” job. I am in no way complaining and believe my surprise likely had to do with the fact I’d never considered how much time this gig consumes because I love it so much. That said, it did give me some perspective, hence my unashamed reliance on sponsors who pay to have their ads played during the podcast.

Ohhh boy, here it comes, a rant…

I get that some people view advertising as the ultimate manifestation of evil, and I’ve also accepted that those people just don’t understand how all of this stuff works. If I were independently wealthy, spending 40+ hours per week doing what amounts to a hobby wouldn’t be an issue, but that’s not the case, we’ve all got real lives with families to feed and mortgages to pay. The fact we’re able to provide 2 articles per week plus a couple podcast episodes per month is due hugely to the support of incredible sponsors like Love2Brew, JaDeD Brewing, The Brew Bag, and Yakima Valley Hops. It’s incredible to me when people give me shit about the fact I promote these fantastic homebrewer-centric businesses so that I can keep providing them content… for free!

Whew, okay, rant over…

So yeah, big ups to our sponsors. If you have, or know someone who has, a company you’d like to advertise on The Brülosophy Podcast, hit me up and we can chat details.

How Can You Help?

The easiest thing you can do to support Brülosophy is go over to our Support page, scour the businesses we have affiliate links with, then bookmark and use those links whenever you do your shopping. You won’t notice any difference in your shopping experience, but we’ll get a small commission when you buy stuff. Cake.

Another thing you can do is use our link to become a member of the American Homebrewers Association, which not only supports us, but serves to strengthen the greatest voice for homebrewing in the world. It also gets you access to a ton of cool things like brewery discounts, Zymurgy magazine, special events, and best of all, the annual Homebrew Con– by the way, Chop & Brü Prefunk tickets are selling fast, get yours now!

If you’re not already a subscriber to Brew Your Own magazine, you can use our link to sign up. BYO is one of the most valuable sources of brewing information with regular contributions from folks like Michael Tonsmeier of The Mad Fermentationist blog, Gordon Strong, and many others.

There’s also Patreon, a neat platform that allows content creators like us to provide supporters rewards for committing to a monthly contribution as low as $1 per month. Get never before published contributor recipes, join the Brü Crew, sit in on a monthly video chat, or even work with us to design your own xBmt!

In Closing

Thanks to everyone who has helped bring Brülosophy to where it is today, I certainly never intended for it to become what it has. To reiterate, it wasn’t at all my intent to complain or send the message we’re in dire straits, we’re not and we’ll continue to produce the podcast and keep publishing articles because, frankly, we love doing it. Rather, I’m offering to produce more episodes more often in addition to maintaining our current publishing schedule on the website in exchange for your simple show of support. That’s it. Thanks again, cheers!

Support Brülosophy In Style!

All designs are available in various colors and sizes on Amazon!

Follow Brülosophy on:

| Read More |

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7 Considerations for Making Better Homebrew

List of completed exBEERiments

How-to: Harvest yeast from starters

How-to: Make a lager in less than a month

| Good Deals |

Brand New 5 gallon ball lock kegs discounted to $75 at Adventures in Homebrewing

ThermoWorks Super-Fast Pocket Thermometer On Sale for $19 – $10 discount

Sale and Clearance Items at MoreBeer.com

If you enjoy this stuff and feel compelled to support Brulosophy.com, please check out the Support Us page for details on how you can very easily do so. Thanks!

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