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Wynkoop Brewing Company

Tap Dancing: We Score Locally Made Tap Handles

21 Sep

Post Marty Jones in Brew Blog

For the past year or so we’ve been dreaming of new tap handles for the spots that carry draft Wynkoop beer. Yes, we’ve outgrown our classic, ceramic, British pub style handles.

But our search for a maker of those new handles brought us to a surprising realization: it seems every tap handle in America is made overseas, outside of the US.

As a small-batch liquid art maker that sells its art locally – and encourages our retailers to support such an outfit – that wouldn’t fly with us. We gotta walk the talk of our “buy local” mantra, right?

While searching for someone local who could help us, Lisa Gedgaudas at Create Denver came to the rescue while we worked with her on the Catalyst beer project last spring.

She steered us to The Public Works, a mind-blowingly creative group (housed in the Battery 621 building at 6^th Ave West & Kalamath) that, like us, dreams up creative wonders and builds them, too. (Thank you, Lisa!)

Using the Catalyst tap handle as a test/guinea pig project, we brainstormed the ideal tap for a Wynkoop beer. That work led us to the very cool Catalyst handle, and further brainstorming led us to a new handle design perfect for all of our Wynkoop beers.

What makes it the bomb? It’s handmade and sports a hand-hewn look & feel, and it’s built with steel and wood just like our glorious 1890 building. (The steel was cut here in Denver by DenCol, an ally of Public Works.)

The wood on the handles is Colorado-grown beetle kill pine, a reclaimed wood suggested to us by Frank Phillips, our tap guru at Public Works. Frank and his crew laser etched the Wynkoop name into the wood in their shop and assembled the handles there.

The taps are multi-purpose and work for all of our beers, thanks to blank panel at the top that we sticker with locally printed decals for individual beers. That universal feature saves our small-batch budget serious bucks, and gives us another chance to spend money in town.

Best of all, we’ve ended up with a tap handle that’s a counterpart to our beer. It’s made made locally. Not just in the US but right here in Denver. It’s crafted by scrappy, passionate people, in small, artfully crafted batches. By human beings who live in our town. Lovely!

Yep, these handles cost a good bit more than handles we could’ve purchased from some distant nation. But the extra price was worth it to us. And all of the dollars we spent on the handles stay right here in D-Town, and help hustling craftspeople who think and work like we do.

The finished tap handles look awesome, they are now showing up in our draft accounts. Our beer vendors love ‘em, we hope you do, too.

Marty Jones

A beer journalist turned beer evangelist, Marty's our brewery frontman and eagerly serves as our chief promoter, media tickler and mojo developer. He thinks great beer and a job you love are crucial ingredients for a happy life. He believes craft brewers are cultural counterparts of Johnny Cash and the Ramones. He writes left and drinks right. A working musician and songwriter, his most recent composition is entitled “The Power of Positive Drinking.” Reach Marty at marty@wynkoop.com

Website: www.wynkoop.com