Blood, Sweat and Beers-
“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, schlemiel, shlimazel, Elysian Brewing incorporated!”
The other day I got the opportunity to help out Elysian Brewing and box the mixed 4 packs of Pumpkin ales. So why not help, get out of the house and see the inner working of the back end of the bottling line and the finished product of boxing. Sure I love to see it all. Oh wow what a difference a day makes. Never did I realize the amount of work that goes into packaging beer. By the end of the day I was so beat I could hardly move. Oh sure I got to take a 4 pack home but hell I was beat.
So let me set the scene. It was a nice fall September day Elysian was brewing beer, the bottling line was spiting out beers as fast as it 
can. Then there I was loading these large crates up with beer. 330 beers per stack 4 stacks high and the large crates never seemed to stop. Oh but wait when that did finally end and my shoulders where on fire it was time to move to another part and help finish the loading of each bottle into the boxes. So this is how it works. You first make the packing box, you load each with 4 bottles then fold and bend the lid, tape the lid then load 4 boxes per smaller carrying box then onto a pallet. That’s 48 cases per level 5 levels high and 22 pallets it was all done. So what am I saying? That’s 5,000 cases or 20,000 bottles or 440,000 ounces of pumpkin beer. My old bones, muscles and brain were tired. Watch out your hands will get paper cuts.
When it was all said and done I now have the biggest appreciation for the bottlers and box packers at the end of the line. This is not Laverne and Shirley stuff this is hard freaking work. I can tell you this I wish I could do this more I would be one skinny BrewDad doing this all the time.
We did this packing party with a crew of about 20 of us and wow we all worked hard. So this fall if you see a 4 mixed pack of Pumpkin beer from Elysian just know they where packed by BrewDad. As I write this I am drinking an awesome new Elysian – Hansel & Gretel Pumpkin Spiced Pilsner.
Thank you to all I worked with and can’t wait till next time. Oh by the way leave a message I will return that call much, much later.
