News

August 6th from 6 p.m. to midnight at our Elk Rapids Production Brewery

Join us during Harbor Days in Elk Rapids for the 2nd Annual Short’s Fest. We created this event last year and it was a huge success… so this year we decided to make it even better. Features include: free admission – all ages welcome; 20 Short’s Brews on tap, include 3 real ales; natural, alcohol-free soda brewed by Joe Short; food from the Blue Pelican; unveiling of the S.S. Honey Badger (Short’s new beer truck!); plus live music by Valentiger from 7:30 to 11 p.m. Short’s Fest will also be a great place to watch the Harbor Days Fireworks! Be sure to embrace the “Short’s” theme by wearing your favorite cargo shorts or cut-offs! To view a map of the festivities, click here. Here’s the full list of what you can expect on tap:

○ Huma Lupa Licious
○ Soft Parade
○ Nicie Spicie
○ Controversi Ale (formerly Hangin’ Frank)
○ Prolonged Enjoyment
○ Kolsh 45
○ Agave Peach Wheat
○ Beach Wheat
○ Strawberry Short’s Cake
○ India Spruce Pilsner
○ Crunchy Grooves
○ Pontius Road Pilsner
○ Alter Spalter
○ Captain Fantasy – Collaboration Beer with Half Acre
○ Cornholio – Collaboration Beer with Dogfish Head
○ Key Lime Pie
○ Howlin’ Chinoski Dortmunder
○ Pandemonium Pale Ale
○ Magician
○ Bellaire Brown
○ Bludgeon Yer IPA (cask ale version)
○ Golden Rule (cask ale version)
○ Anniversary Ale (cask ale version)

We’ll see you in Elk Rapids!

– SBC Brew Staff

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Each year the response to our Great American Beer Fest booth and our beer grows, putting Short’s Brewing Company among the most popular at the festival (over 457 breweries and over 49,000 attendees!). We want to continue to return to Denver, and we want to represent Bellaire and all of northern Michigan to the best of our ability.

The expenses associated with this trip are pretty hearty, so to help buffer the load, we’re offering limited Short’s GABF Sponsor Beer Licenses. Sponsors pay $150 to cover the cost of one entry and to qualify you for $1.50 beers for one year. This year’s beer license start date is September 29th, 2011.

To become a 2011 Sponsor, please sign up with a pubtender at our Pub, or email Pub General Manager, Bryan Banfield, at bryan@shortsbrewing.com. We already have a lot of interest in this year’s sponsorship program, so don’t delay.

HERE’S THE FINE PRINT: Your “beer license” is for your use only. One sponsor = one license and no sharing. $1.50 beers are for regularly priced pints only. No gourmet pours, bottles, etc. If you want less than a pint, you still gotta pay the $1.50. Mug club mugs and $1.50 beers don’t mix – you should probably pick one great deal or the other. Tax does apply. This sweet deal is non-negotiable and non-refundable. No bitching and no refunds if we change hours, stop serving your favorite beer, close the brewery, start selling bud light or lock the doors so we can tour with Ween. We’re working to give our biggest supporters a great deal on awesome beer, and to help us get to the GABF to blow some minds. It’s a win win deal, so help us keep it that way. No unnecessary headaches, yeah?

View the promotional poster here.

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Michigan Brewers Guild 14th Annual Summer Beer Festival – Friday July 22nd and Saturday July 23rd

Join Short’s and many other Michigan Breweries at Riverside Park, located in historic Depot Town, Ypsilanti. Short’s is bringing an all-star lineup of 15 beers, including India Spruce Pilsner, Strawberry Short’s Cake, Cornholio (the Dogfish Head Collaboration Beer), Captain Fantasy (the new Half Acre Collaboration Beer), Freedom of ’78 (last year’s Half Acre Collaboration Beer), and many more. Purchase tickets here.

2nd Annual Short’s Fest – August 6th from 6 p.m. to midnight at our Elk Rapids Production Brewery

Join us during Harbor Days in Elk Rapids for the 2nd Annual Short’s Fest. We created this event last year and it was a huge success… so this year we decided to make it even better. Features include: free admission – all ages welcome; 20 Short’s Brews on tap, include 3 real ales; natural, alcohol-free soda brewed by Joe Short; food from the Blue Pelican; unveiling of the S.S. Honey Badger (Short’s new beer truck!); plus live music by Valentiger from 7:30 to 11 p.m. Short’s Fest will also be a great place to watch the Harbor Days Fireworks! Be sure to embrace the “Short’s” theme by wearing your favorite cargo shorts or cut-offs! To view a map of the festivities, click here.

We will continue to post details about these events and other upcoming festivals, including Great Taste of the Midwest (Madison WI, August 13), Suds on the Shore (Ludington, August 20th), and the 3rd Annual Traverse City Microbrew and Music Festival (August 26/27). We look forward to seeing you there!

– SBC Event Staff

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We just bottled Beach Wheat for the first time ever! In case you’ve never had it at our pub, Beach Wheat is a light, clean, easy drinking Hefeweizen. Esters of banana and clove are evident in the nose. Simply put, it’s totally yummy and refreshing and will leave you hankering for more when your pint glass is empty. We recommend that you take a 6 pack to the beach sometime soon! Life is Short’s, ya know?

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Join Short’s on July 15th at the 1st Annual “Sip of Michigan” sponsored by Drink Michigan! All event profits go to Homefront Hugs, a Michigan-based organization dedicated to taking care of troops stationed overseas, wounded heroes, and military families.

The Rattlesnake Club will host this event, which will take place from 8 p.m. until midnight. Features will include an all-Michigan lineup of beer, wine and spirits, plus specialty food pairings and live entertainment. The event is $35 and includes 35 tasting tickets and all appetizers and entertainment. Tickets will not be sold at the door, so advanced purchase is required. You must be at least 21 years of age to attend.

For a limited time, you can win a pair of tickets to this event! Here are the rules:

1. “Like” Short’s Facebook page before Friday, July 8th.

2. Before Friday, July 8th, email a picture of yourself to drinkmich@shortsbrewing.com. In the picture, you should be “representing Short’s” by wearing our apparel, enjoying a Short’s Brew (responsibly, of course), or showing your Short’s love in some other way! By sending us your picture, you agree to let us post it online as being a dedicated Short’s Fan!

The person who “likes Short’s” and sends the best picture, as determined by SBC staff, will be given a free pair of tickets to the event. This is intended to be fun, so please no headaches!

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We promised to keep you posted on the status of one of our most anticipated specialty beer releases: India Spruce Pilsner. As the people who have been anticipating this beer know, the “popping” of the spruce tips needed for this beer happened late this year, pushing the brewing date back about a week and a half. But today is the day, and the beer has been bottled. We took some to the pub today, so it is currently available for sale at that location. It should hit stores next week.

If you love this beer, be sure to stock up because it won’t last long. However, due to demand, we brewed almost 3 times as much this year as we did last. To read our earlier post about Spruce Pils, click here. To view all of our 2011 Spruce Pils production photos, go here.

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A couple weeks ago, Short’s had the opportunity to attend SAVOR, the nation’s premier beer and food pairing event. While in D.C., Short’s took its message of beer liberation to Congress, partnered with Churchkey to bring 30 taps of Short’s Brew to the people of D.C., and networked with many of our friends in the craft brewing industry. Since we know many Short’s fans would have loved to attend these events, we made a short video to document our experiences. We hope you enjoy it!

-Short’s Beer Liberation Staff

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There is a softball field on Torch Lake, just south of Alden, where stars are born. Many of these stars brew or serve beer by day, but also possess superior athletic talents that can only be witnessed on the softball diamond. These are the men and women of Short’s.

It all begins at 6:30 on Tuesday nights. As the sun tips lower in the sky, Short’s employees, patrons, and friends begin to arrive. Coach James surveys the group and, with a keen eye for talent, divides the group into two teams. No one even dares utter a “pick me, pick me” because Coach James would be unswayed in his decisions. He knows. He just knows.

There is no score in Short’s softball, nor is there a strike count. The only rule is that three outs ends an inning, and if a team overthrows a base (which happens just about every time we make a throw to a base), the base runner only gets to take one free base. Sometimes we look pretty good, other times we look like little kids at their first day of little league practice. But at the end of the day, what other team in America has growlers of experimental new Short’s Brew in its dugouts, or a Torch Lake Beach as it’s outfield fence?

If you happen to be in the Antrim County area on a Tuesday night, and are interested in playing softball with us, just let us know. We are a welcoming group, we have extra equipment, and no particular talent level is required! To see pictures from one of our recent practices, click here.

-SBC Employee Wellness Staff

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[June 6, 2011] Short’s Pub in Bellaire will not be closing early on Monday, June 6th after all!  We are scheduling a few finishing touches to our remodeling project, but have decided to wait until a later date!  We’ll keep you posted!

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Last year we brought back one of our favorite beers from the 2007 Imperial Beer Series: India Spruce Pilsner. It sold out almost instantly and everyone started asking for more! However, like so many of the beers we produce, Spruce Pilsner can only be brewed once a year because a key local ingredient, in this case spruce tips, can only be harvested once a year for a short time.

Here in Northern Michigan, the harvest window changes from year to year. Last year, the spruce tips popped early due to warm temperatures. This year, Joe has been checking the trees every morning, but the tips haven’t been ready. However, this morning we got some great news via video message from Joe. The spruce tips have finally popped. This is great news for Spruce Pilsner fans… it means that we can begin harvesting spruce tips and brewing this beer right away.

Last year, Draft Magazine chose Spruce Pilsner as a “Pick” in the November/December issue. Editor Chris Staten described it as follows:

Robust hop bitterness accentuates the base pilsner’s crisp finish, while a hefty dose of Northern Michigan blue spruce tips deliver the forest to your glass. With bright lemon and grapefruit notes singing through the swallow, this beer is about as refreshing as it gets.

We will continue to update you on the progress of this beer as the season continues! You won’t want to miss it!

-Short’s Brew Staff

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A few years ago, Joe was washing dishes in the pub while talking to patrons Dan and Marcie Grabruck. Knowing Joe’s love for woodworking and the craftsmanship that went into building barns many years ago, Dan mentioned that he had a 100 year old barn on his property that had become unsafe and in danger of collapse. He wondered if Joe knew of anyone who could disassemble the barn and might make use of the aged hemlock wood.

Joe soon visited the Grabruck’s barn and was taken with the way the hemlock wood had aged. Looking up through the rafters, Joe realized that the 100 year old barn wood would make perfect building material for the 100 year old hardware store in which our brewpub resides. Joe promised Dan that he would take the barn down himself if he could keep the wood to use for future building projects. An idea was born, but would take a few years to fully develop.

Over the past year, Joe and the maintenance crew from Short’s, along with some barn specialists, lovingly disassembled the Grabruck’s barn and began preparing the hemlock wood for new uses. The weathered wood is beautiful in a way that lumber purchased in a lumberyard could never replicate.

As Short’s has grown, we have an increasing need for a more efficient seating plan in our Pub. We have spent a great deal of time envisioning how to improve the design, while retaining the original character. Finally, Joe has decided to renovate our Pub seating to include new tables and booths built in large part from the barn wood restored from the Grabruck’s barn. We feel that the hand-built nature of these tables will be a wonderful fit in our Pub.

The new pub seating renovations will replace much of our existing pub furniture, including our Cadillac Couch, the high-top tables and chairs, and many of the miscellaneous tables in the stage-side room. As we no longer will have a need for these classic Short’s items, we have decided to make several of them available for purchase in the near future. This will be a unique opportunity to own a piece of Short’s history. If you are interested in purchasing any of these items, we are collecting your information now so that we can contact you with details. You may sign-up here to let us know if you are interested!

We are excited about our renovations, which will take place over the next month. As you see the new furniture come into use, remember that it is not so “new” after all, but rather 100 year old wood handcrafted by Joe and other Short’s employees.

– Joe & the Short’s Staff

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When we aren’t hard at work brewing, summer is a time for us to enjoy water skiing, softball, and Nicie Spicie. There’s nothing more refreshing than Nicie on a hot afternoon! We just completed our first bottling run of Nicie for 2011, so look for it in stores soon!

Nicie Spicie is a wheat ale made with a 50/50 blend of malted barley and malted white wheat. It is infused with fresh citrus zest, then spiced with coriander and a four peppercorn blend. This light bodied ale is very easy to drink for being as complex as it is. Exemplified by its gorgeous golden color, this beer is crisp and refreshing.

-SBC Brewing Staff

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