Mar 30, 2020 · 1h 6m · how-i-built-this
Sierra Nevada Brewing Company: Ken Grossman
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of NPR's How I Built This, host Guy Raz interviews Ken Grossman about founding Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, tracing how he transformed a closet homebrewing hobby into a pioneering craft beer titan through self-taught engineering, rigorous brewing science, and staunch family independence.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Guy holds 32.4% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Guy as informed peer 2.0 Guest teaching 1.5 Guest disagreement 0.1 Guy pushing back 0.2
speaking balance: gold is Guy, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 21:55 Correcting Fritz Maytag's founding status
Ken promptly pushes back on Guy's assertion that Fritz Maytag founded Anchor Brewing, explicitly correcting him that Maytag bought and revamped an existing historic brewery.
Hardest push from Guy ▶ 18:10 Challenging the appeal of bitter homebrew in the 70sGuy presses Ken on why he was determined to brew bitter, complex beers when mainstream American tastes completely favored bland macro lagers.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 41:08 Hop botany, alpha acids, and breeding scienceKen breaks down brewing chemistry for Guy, explaining that hops are flowers with varying alpha acid profiles and highlighting how Oregon State's Cascade hop altered the American craft landscape.
Guy holds their own ▶ 39:58 Citing the German purity law and lager traditionsGuy brings up German brewing traditions and the Reinheitsgebot to contextualize how Sierra Nevada achieved intense hop bitterness from identical base ingredients.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Guy as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Guy pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Live Video Series Announcement on Resiliency | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Guy Raz introduces the episode recorded during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and sets up Ken Grossman's entrepreneurial background with brief introductory quotes. | |
| Childhood Inspiration and Early Scientific Brewing | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy inquires about Ken's early exposure to brewing through his childhood neighbor Cal Moeller. Ken explains Moeller's progressive, scientific approach to fermentation. | |
| Teenage Fermentation Experiments and Prohibition Legacy | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 | Guy jokingly asks if Ken risked brewing lethal toxins like botulism in his closet. Ken patiently educates him on how alcohol, pH, and hops naturally inhibit pathogens. | |
| Moving to Chico, Meeting Katie, and Managing Bike Shops | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy traces Ken's move to Chico, his chemistry coursework, meeting his teetotaler wife Katie, and managing bike shops in the foothills. | |
| 1970s Beer Consolidation and Homesteading Lifestyle | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Ken provides historical context on American brewing consolidation hitting an all-time low of 43 breweries by 1980, while detailing his own homesteading lifestyle. | |
| Launching The Home Brew Shop in Chico | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | Guy presses Ken on why anyone would want bitter, hazy homebrew in 1976 when mainstream lagers ruled. Ken details the alchemy of whole grain brewing and the evolving palate. | |
| Mentors and Inspiration: Anchor Brewing and New Albion | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 | Ken politely corrects Guy's assertion that Fritz Maytag founded Anchor Brewing, clarifying that Maytag bought and revamped it before inspiring Ken's own transition to commercial brewing. | |
| Drafting the Plan and Acquiring Fabrication Skills | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy and Ken review the initial $50,000 business plan and bank rejections, leading Ken to take community college courses in welding, machining, and refrigeration. | |
| Scrounging Scrap Metal and Repurposing Dairy Tanks | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Ken recounts scouring the Sacramento Valley in his '57 Chevy for scrap metal and decommissioned dairy tanks to build the brewery on a shoestring budget. | |
| Brewing Science at UC Davis and Industry Collegiality | 3 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Guy highlights Ken's extensive technical study at the UC Davis brewing library and asks about the surprisingly collaborative nature of commercial brewmasters. | |
| Relentless Hours, Tough Choices, and the Butcher Box | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Ken shares the psychological exhaustion of repeated cash shortages, culminating in scrubbing down a corroded refrigeration unit retrieved from an illegal slaughterhouse. | |
| Mid-Episode Intermission and Teaser | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy delivers mid-show framing while Ken describes welding a hop strainer and dumping early commercial batches of Pale Ale due to flavor inconsistency. | |
| The Chemistry of Cascade Hops and Bold Bitterness | 4 | 4 | 0 | 1 | Guy cites the German Reinheitsgebot purity law and questions hop bitterness. Ken educates Guy on alpha acids, varietal terroir, and Oregon State's Cascade hop breeding. | |
| Van Deliveries and Premium Bottled Distribution | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Ken explains the drastic bitterness contrast (38 IBUs vs 8-10 IBUs) and his decision to bypass bars in favor of 85-cent returnable bottles positioned against luxury imports. | |
| Early Publicity, Grocery Champions, and Grateful Dead Fans | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy and Ken discuss organic growth through early press features in San Francisco, an enthusiastic supermarket buyer, and Grateful Dead tour following. | |
| Scrapping for Capacity and German Equipment Expansion | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Ken explains traveling to Germany to purchase a shut-down brewhouse for scrap value and storing it for four years while running continuous brewing shifts. | |
| Co-founder Tension and Diverging Work Commitments | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | Guy probes into co-founder tension between Ken and Paul Camuzzi regarding unequal work commitments and growing equity value. | |
| Building the 60,000-Barrel Brewery and 24/7 Operations | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Ken recounts building the 60,000-barrel facility in 1988, quickly outpacing capacity and brewing 363 days a year around the clock. | |
| Leveraged Buyout and Surviving the 1998 Market Slump | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | Ken describes rejecting venture capital to execute a heavily leveraged bank buyout of his partner right as the craft industry collapsed into a 1998 plateau. | |
| Reflection on Longevity, Family Legacy, and True Craft | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Guy poses his classic luck versus skill question. Ken attributes longevity to relentless work ethic, cultural timing, and keeping the company family-owned. | |
| Community Relief: The Camp Fire and Resilience IPA | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Closing monologue highlighting the Camp Fire relief efforts and Resilience IPA, followed by episode production credits and NPR promo. |
Statements from this episode (27)
COVID-19 Onset Marked the Most Stressful Period in Sierra Nevada's History
“So it's, yeah, it's been you know, one of the most difficult and stressful weeks in our existence. I've had a lot of them over 40 years. You know, there's been a lot of sleepless nights, but this is sort of at the pinnacle of, you know, things for us to have t…”
Sierra Nevada Is the Third-Largest Craft Brewery in the US
“But today, his company is the third largest craft brewery In the US, after Boston Beer Company and Yenling.”
Ken Grossman and His Family Own 100% of Sierra Nevada
“And Ken and his family own 100% of Sierra Nevada, but making money and becoming rich from beer was far from Ken's ambition.”
Deadly Pathogens Cannot Grow in Beer
“Well, I guess one of the things about beer making is that things like that don't grow in beer.
[584] Guy Raz: I gotcha.
[585] Guy Raz: Okay, fine.
[586] Guy Raz: Good to know.
[586] Ken Grossman: The alcohol, the pH, and the hops are all inhibitory to
[591]…”
Ken Grossman and His Wife Cleaned Their Building in Lieu of Rent
“Well, we couldn't pay the rent some months, and so we worked out a deal where we'd be the janitors for the For the place in lieu of rent, so Katie and I did that for a while.”
In the 1970s, Homebrew Was Viewed Negatively as Murky and Acidic
“There was no knowledge of craft beer, and homebrew was you know, not necessarily viewed in a positive light, and, you know, based sort of on what most people had tasted, if they ever tasted homebrew, it was highly alcoholic acidic, and it looked murky, and whi…”
90% of Tasters Rejected Sierra Nevada's Early Beer as Too Bitter
“And it was even that way when we first started the brewery, you know, you'd go to a tasting, and 90% of the people were like, wow, this is way too bitter, I can't drink this, or I don't like this, and but then you'd find somebody who's like, god, I just love t…”
Boutique Breweries Must Offer Unique Products and Charge Premium Prices
“So he helped sort of create what is now the craft brewing industry by Realizing that if you're going to be a small boutique brewery in this country, you better, one, produce a unique product, and two, figure out how to charge enough of a price that you can sur…”
Sierra Nevada's Initial Business Plan Projected a $50,000 Startup Cost
“The original one, I think, called for 50,000 dollars total, and went to banks”
Grossman Had Zero Commercial Brewing Experience When Starting Sierra Nevada
“Yeah, who had no experience in the brewing industry. You know, we'd never worked a day for a brewery or a beer distributor or anything like that, so.”
Ken Grossman Started Sierra Nevada With Only $17,000 in Capital
“So we had assembled 17,000 dollars, and between the two of us. I had sold my home brew shop for, you know, 3000 or 4000 dollars And I had some savings, and my grandfather had given me some bonds to go to college. I cashed all those in, and Paul had similar, so…”
Grossman Secretly Jackhammered His Leased Warehouse Floor to Install Brewery Drainage
“So we went in, and unbeknownst to the Landlord, we jackhammered, ah, through the floor, sawed, and put in drainage, and then poured slope floors on top of that, and but we did all that ourselves”
Major Brewers Like Coors and Anheuser-Busch Answered Grossman's Technical Questions
“You could call up a technical person at another brewery, whether it was Coors or Anheuser-Busch or Miller, and ask a question, and they would talk to you.”
Grossman Passed on an Opportunity to Buy an Established Bike Shop
“And I had the, I guess, the early opportunity right when I was committing to build the brewery to actually buy one of the bike shops I had worked in. The owner was getting out of the business and he would have sold it to me probably preferentially if I said I …”
Sierra Nevada Dumped Its Early Test Batches of Pale Ale
“Realize we were not able to make batch after batch taste the same. They weren't bad. They were just you know, pale ale three was actually pretty good, I remember, and we were bottling a little bit and sharing it with friends, saying, I think we're there, we're…”
The US Hop Industry Lacked a Distinct Aroma Signature Before Cascade
“In this country, there wasn't really a aroma signature from the U.S. Hop industry until us and a few other brewers started to focus on a new variety called Cascade which was bred up in at Oregon State.”
Sierra Nevada Pale Ale Has 38 Bitterness Units Versus Domestics' 8-10
“Today, domestic lager beers might be in the eight to 10 bitterness units and there's outliers to that, but that's about the range. Our pale ale, when it came out, and still is is at 38 bitterness units.”
Sierra Nevada Tracked Grateful Dead Tours to Anticipate Surges in Demand
“And then the Grateful Dead, actually They somehow early on got hooked into the beer, and so when the dead would travel around we'd have to watch where their concert series were, and we'd get all these orders for beer ahead of them hitting town.”
Grossman Bought German Brewhouse Equipment for a $15,000 Scrap Value
“I bought their whole brewing side, so didn't get their packaging equipment, but bought the brew house, and paid
Basically the scrap value 15,000 dollars to buy all the equipment, and we spent more, more than that crating it and shipping it back to the U.S.”
Grossman Took Double His Co-Founder's Salary Due to a Workload Disparity
“At one point, it became a critical issue between us, and we did end up adjusting compensation, so I was making I don't know, double what he was making, and so we did try to address it, but, you know, as the business grew, and the value of the business grew, an…”
Brewery Valuations Hit $50M While Grossman Was Buying Out His Co-Founder
“The valuations across the industry were sort of all over the place, but also were going up pretty steadily and, you know, 30,000,040 1,000,050 million, and this you know, me buying Paul out took
Years to work through with attorneys”
Sierra Nevada Operated 24/7 for 363 Days in 1997
“I think it was 19 97, we brewed 363 days, 24 hours a day.
We took Christmas and Thanksgiving off, I think, and just, other than that, just kept going.”
Grossman: Venture Capital Forces Exit Timelines That Harm Long-Term Founders
“They're gonna have some really tough metrics that I've gotta meet to give them the returns they're looking for, and then they're gonna want out in five or seven years, and I'm gonna be right back where I am today, but in a worse place.”
Sierra Nevada Grew Double Digits During a Late 1990s Market Slump
“We pretty much doubled capacity that year in 97, and we were able to sort of immediately go into some of that pent-up demand. So we grew, I think, double digits when the rest of the industry was flat.”
Sierra Nevada Is the Sole Survivor of Its Early Craft Brewery Cohort
“When I opened, I mentioned, I think there were six of us, and the five other craft brewers that opened in that same era have all failed. Today, I'm the last man standing, so we all sort of had an equal shot at it, I guess.”