What does it take to start a brewery?
That was the question Pilot Project Brewing founders Dan Abel and Jordan Radke asked themselves while they were home brewing.
They’d soon discover barriers — such as the capital required to start brewing and industry regulations — that made breaking into the brewing industry challenging. All of which are more challenging for people of color.
According to the Brewers Association, almost 94% of brewery owners are white, 2.2% are Hispanic or Latino, 2% are Asian and 0.4% are Black.
Pilot Project Brewing was born as an incubator to try and lower those barriers to brewing for all brewers.
It might seem unlikely to some that the brewing industry has anything in common with the music industry, but the business model for Pilot Project Brewing is highly influenced by the latter.
"The beginning of my career, I was playing music as a singer-songwriter out in L.A., all of the cliches tied to you know getting up and running," Pilot Project CEO and co-founder Dan Abel says.
We meet at Pilot Project on North 9th Street in Milwaukee’s Brewery District so I can learn more about what makes the space a brewery incubator.
"But one of the greatest gifts that the music industry gave me is when I was going out trying to establish my career, I didn't have to be a business manager and tour planner and all these different things into one. I had a whole host of resources available to me as a musician to get up and running," Abel says.
Musicians don’t have to start from scratch. If they want to record an album, they don’t have to build a studio, they can just go to one. They can work with sound engineers and create the music.
The thought behind Pilot Project is, Abel says: "Let’s build out resources so that creative talent can come in use these facilities with us with our sound engineers or our head Brewers create their products and then ultimately syndicate their products. Like a music label would to radio stations, we syndicate their products to retailers and restaurants and all that stuff."
The Chicago-based Pilot Project opened its Milwaukee branch in November of 2022.
One side is the tasting room. There’s plenty of open seating lining the room; there’s a bar, and a lot of plants that really liven up the space. This side hosts trivia nights and parties.
The other side, where the magic happens, is the brewery.
While giving me a tour, Abel tells me more about what makes Pilot Project a brewery incubator: "It really means that Pilot Project acts as a foundation for other businesses to launch and grow, and ultimately thrive and be sustainable as their own viable businesses."
Brewers pitch their business through an online application — like Shark Tank — to the Pilot Project team, explaining what their goal is and how they envision launching their product. The Pilot Project team sifts through them, reaches out to a few and eventually some folks come in to audition.
That looks like presenting the concept, a financially supported business plan, marketing and branding concepts, and a sample of the product.
Imagine American Idol for brewers.
"It is a panel. I mean I’m not Mark Cuban, but it is definitely Shark Tank style. I’ll make American Idol jokes all the time about who wants to be Paula Abdul today," Abel shares.
So, how do brewers benefit from the incubator? Pilot Project will research and develop, brew and launch brewers’ products in its tasting room. Pilot project helps fine-tune recipes as well as assists with production, business development and distribution — from the tasting room to people across the country.
Abel says Pilot Project is helping level the playing field in the brewing industry and has been able to launch 15 brands so far, six of which are women-owned.
He says that’s impressive considering brewing is a male dominated industry, and it’s breaking the status quo.
According to Pilot Project’s applications to date, 25% of applicants have been women, and a little over one-third have been not white.
Pilot Project is especially beneficial to brewers of color entering the industry with the type of assistance it offers. Abel says with barriers that already exist — like the capital requirements and financial burdens — the deck is double stacked against racial minorities.
"In coming to us, it doesn’t mean that all of a sudden getting into market’s going to be easier, it’s just that you’re going to have essentially like an agency operating with you to really just help you manage the pitfalls of what this industry might throw at you," he says.
Abel says Pilot Project is a support system; it is not the creator of brewers’ futures — the brewers are.
Support for Race & Ethnicity Reporting is provided, in part, by Brico Fund.
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