Steve Russell’s state-of-the-art brewing production centre could offer benefits for the state’s small brewers.
Pasteurisation has long been a dirty word in Western Australia’s – and the world’s – craft beer scene.
The big brewers all do it because it provides a longer shelf life for their products and cuts down on transport costs, as their beers can be trucked and shipped at ambient temperature.
To many small brewers, however, the practice is anathema to their mission, with the stabilising process believed to interfere with flavour profiles.
In Western Australia, Steve Russell is on a mission to change that perception.
“If we were, for example, sending our beer across the Nullarbor … in the middle of summer and that transport breaks down, there’s less likelihood of the beer degrading in the same way as it would if it was non-pasteurised,” Mr Russell told Business News.
“This gives people assurance [they] are going to have a more stable product for a longer period of time.
“You can do tunnel pasteurisation or you can do flash pasteurisation, like what we do, which is gentler on the product.”
Mr Russell has put his money where his mouth is and used the process to produce his own award-winning beers.
The Blasta Brewing owner recently cut the ribbon on a 6.5-million-litre brewhouse near Perth Airport.
The brewery’s software resembles programs Mr Russell may have used in his former life working for Chevron.
The facility’s floor features high-tech gadgetry including a brew kit from Germany, a robotic packaging arm, and the flash pasteuriser, which promises all the benefits without the drawbacks of more traditional systems.
“Some of the top breweries, from craft all the way through mainstream, use this type of technology,” Mr Russell said.
“It gives the assurance that we can make the same thing each and every time.
“It is highly automated. It has very low wastage and a fully integrated packaging line under one control system, so we can be very efficient.
“The extra pieces of equipment we’ve got, such as the pasteuriser and things like centrifuges and yeast propagation plants added to the brewery, allow us to manufacture in a different way.”
The drive to go big stems from curry nights with mates, family tragedy, and a desire to leave a legacy.
Mr Russell said his journey down the rabbit hole started when he hosted curry nights with friends in years past.
“It got to the point where I was literally buying tandoors from India, having people come around and making all of these base curries, naan, pakoras and onion bhajis; everything from scratch,” he said.
That fastidious approach to process has spilled over into beer making.
Since its founding in 2018, Blasta has grown to become the state’s fourth-largest brewery by annual production, according to Data & Insights.
The current capacity of the Perth facility is 6.5 million litres but has space to grow nearly threefold, to 16.5 million litres.
That would bring Blasta close to the kind of numbers pumped out by the state’s largest brewer, Good Drinks Australia, owner of Gage Roads.
Mr Russell hopes his new kit will enable him to chart a course similar to that taken by Good Drinks after Woolworths sold its Gage Roads stake in 2016.
Growth plans Buoyed by the success of his original Burswood brewpub, which Blasta outgrew, Mr Russell now has his sights set on building a national brand.
“We were very, very bullish because of the success we had; it helped mitigate any risks in our mind,” he said.
“The brewery is significant in terms of its capability but hasn’t really been pushed to its limits, so we are now looking to grow more volume into the brewery.
“The best-case scenario for us would be manufacturing our own, where you can really grow your brand and grow our own products.” Contract brewing is also part of the mix, with six contracts making up about 40 per cent of Blasta’s production.
Mr Russell said he was seeking local and international deals to brew and package beers, fruit juices, water, literally anything at the facility.
“The more we can utilise the brewery, the more the base cost comes down,” he said.
Mr Russell told Business News energy prices were the major obstacle to Blasta achieving its objectives.
While appreciative of government support, he would like to see more efforts to reduce wages pressures, payroll tax, and power bills for manufacturing businesses.
The often-maligned excise tax, he said, was only a small part of the issues facing brewers.
