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Bee Well Meadery in NW Michigan - Someday

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T

tuumi

NewBee
Registered Member
Jul 15, 2010
54
1
0
Detroit burbs or up north
This has been a dream of my brother's for quite awhile. He is fortunate to have some very helpful in-laws who have donated a great location in Bellaire Michigan. It's a small town near Traverse City that has become increasingly popular over the last few years with foodies and beer lovers. Lulu's Bistro and Short's Brewery bring people to town along with great golfing and beautiful lakes. Northwest Michigan has some great wineries in the Traverse City area and my brother (Jeremy) thought a Meadery in the area would be successful. He has learned the craft of beekeeping over the last few years.

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He has learned a few lessons in the process. Horses like oxidizing paint!
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Here is the location donated by the in-laws.
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I only have one picture of the interior but will take a few more Thanksgiving weekend. Here is the starter fermenter.
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At the moment he has a rent free location that has an almost finished industrial kitchen. There is zero debt on this endeavor at the moment. He has been able to pay for everything with by working his ass off. No small feat with two kids. After a bit of a discussion we've decided to team up to tackle this project. I'm going to handle the paperwork/ordering/banking/marketing end of it while he handles the production.

I worked with a friend to create a label.
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Over the next few months I've got to sit down and figure out all the licensing stuff to get this official and from there we'l figure out what we need to begin production. And ideally all this will be done without a loan from the bank and reinvest profits into more equipment.

Of course we have to finalize recipes. NMC had a great class with local meadmaker Nels. We got some great ideas for recipes and will be making some test runs this winter.
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Got to love a class where you walk away with this.
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So just a few more pieces of info so you all can get the big picture here. Upon hearing and researching my brother's idea the his in-laws decided they wanted to start a winery. They planted grapes in the spring and broke ground on the tasting room. We would have a tasting room within 100 yards that won't cost us a cent!
Here is their building so far along with the view.
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The first acre of Pinot Gris planted.
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The view of Lake Bellaire.
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Wide shot of the area. The great thing about this spot is that we can source all the fruit from line of site orchards and farms. Strawberries, cherries, apples, and raspberries can all be gotten in the view you see.
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I'm really excited about getting this underway but also very nervous about correctly filing all the paperwork ahead. It's seems very daunting. I'm just going to take it as it comes and work through it.
 
Split into different posts because of the 4 pic limit. Is there any way for me to see oldest posts first? The way it's currently set up newest posts show up first and it's not what I used to.
 
Very impressive! I would suggest extensive economic thinking about investing in equipment, as wine and mead are different markets and the investment necessary may be different. Issues like competition, distribution, etc should be very different (for starters, mead is a niche product in most places).

Good luck to Bee Well meadery!
 
My post was probably confusing. To be clear, the Meadery will be in the red building and will have nothing to do with the winery. The winery will be in the two story building that is under construction. The winery is several years from opening the tasting room and several years from producing it's own wine. They are two separate projects sharing the same address.
The winery will be a great opportunity to bring attention to the Meadery and we'll have the opportunity to sell a few bottles via the tasting room.
 
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