After 68 years, Fitz’s is finally putting the beer in root beer.
Two St. Louis area companies with ardent followers — Fitz’s Bottling Co. and O’Fallon Brewery — are launching Fitz’s Hard Root Beer to tap into growing demand for alcoholic root beer.
On the second floor of Fitz’s restaurant and bottling plant on a recent afternoon, the owners and brewers at Fitz’s and O’Fallon Brewery sat around a table sampling final batches of the new beer that’s set to hit store shelves in late January.
Michael Alter, owner of Fitz’s, and O’Fallon Brewery president and CEO Jim Gorczyca each brought small plastic cups to their noses and sniffed to detect malted barley from the beer and spices from the root beer. Fitz’s bottling director Johnny Pashia and O’Fallon Brewery’s head brewer Brian Owens rounded out the group of taste testers.
“That’s the balance that we’re looking for,” Alter said, smiling after taking a sip.
Alter and Gorczyca embarked on their collaboration in the spring after employees at Grey Eagle Distributors, a St. Louis distributor that handles both companies’ beverages, suggested they work together as hard root beers were beginning to become popular with customers.
Both Alter and Gorczyca have collaborated with other local companies before. Fitz’s paired up Kaldi’s Coffee Roasting Co. and Pi Pizzeria in 2012 to develop signature sodas, and O’Fallon Brewery partnered with Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier on a seasonal beer, King Louie’s Toffee Stout, last year.
But taking on a long-standing product such as Fitz’s Root Beer presented a challenge to the brewers. Some other hard root beer beverages new to the category started from scratch, creating a root beer flavor not tied to an existing product.
The goal, Alter and Gorczyca said, was to find the right balance in flavor and sweetness and capture the perfect blend of Fitz’s Root Beer flavor in a high-quality craft beer.
“Preserving Fitz’s was important, and we’re striving for a flavor that’s true to Fitz’s,” Gorczyca said.
The Fitz’s Hard Root Beer that will soon be on draft at local bars and in grocery store beer aisles will undergo a seven-day fermentation process at O’Fallon Brewery’s new Maryland Heights brewery.
The beer base is made from malted barley, caramel malt, hops and yeast, and just before it’s bottled, root beer made with cane sugar, sassafras roots, vanilla and spices is added. Each bottle has a pry-off cap and labeling to ensure it’s not confused with a nonalcoholic root beer.
Fitz’s roots date to 1947 when the root beer was sold at Fitz’s Drive-In at Brentwood Boulevard and Clayton Road in Richmond Heights. Production of the root beer ceased in 1970 when the restaurant closed, but was revived in 1993 when Alter and partners opened a restaurant and bottling plant in University City using the original recipe. Alter sold the business in 1999 but resumed ownership in 2010 after feeling a pull to the business where he met his wife, Dana.
“People have been asking for a hard root beer forever,” Alter said. “But we knew it had to be done right or we weren’t going to launch it. To do it, we needed to find the right partner, and Jim’s that guy.”
Gorczyca also is shepherding the legacy of a brand that has deep local roots. The former Anheuser-Busch marketing executive bought O’Fallon Brewery from its founders, Tony and Fran Caradonna, in 2011.
Founded in 2000, O’Fallon Brewery has grown to be one of St. Louis’ largest craft brewers, on track to produce 10,500 barrels this year. In June, O’Fallon Brewery opened a new $10 million brewing facility that has the capacity to brew 25,000 barrels annually.
Just like customers can watch the bottling process of root beer at Fitz’s in the Delmar Loop, visitors to O’Fallon Brewery’s Maryland Heights brewery can watch the hard root beer being made.
“Everyone’s brought ideas to the table,” Gorczyca said about his collaboration with Alter and his team at Fitz’s. “Brewers are realizing that there are no boundaries in craft beer.”
Root resurgence
Root beer was introduced at the U.S. Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876 as an alternative to alcoholic beer but only recently gained popularity as an alcoholic beverage.
Not Your Father’s Root Beer, made by Wauconda, Ill.-based Small Town Brewery, which is partly owned by principals at Pabst Brewing Co., debuted in 2012 and expanded sales to all 50 states this year.
Through Nov. 1, Not Your Father’s Root Beer had $75.3 million in sales and is among the top 10 best-selling craft beers in stores in the U.S., according to IRI, a Chicago-based market research firm. Not Your Father’s Root Beer sells for an average of $43.29 a case, versus $22.40 for the overall beer category, according to IRI.
Small Town Brewery’s founder Tim Kovac said his interest in “gruit” brewing — an ancient method of using herbs and spices for flavoring and bittering agents — led him to develop his alcoholic root beer. The growing base of craft beer drinkers in the U.S. who are interested in trying new beers helped the product take off, he said.
“Creating a root beer beer was actually my son’s idea — we wanted to create a gruit-inspired version of an all-American classic, root beer,” Kovac said. “We are trying to make unique brews that give the consumer a real sense of nostalgia.
“Everyone’s eager to try new brews, and alcoholic root beer definitely resonates with a wide audience, even nonbeer-drinkers,” Kovac continued. The company recently announced the launch of another product, Not Your Father’s Ginger Ale, that will be offered nationwide within a few months.
Other hard root beer options also are making their way to beer aisles. Boston Beer Co., maker of Samuel Adams, debuted Coney Island Hard Root Beer in early 2015 and expanded sales nationwide in August. Through Nov. 1, Coney Island Hard Root Beer had $16.9 million in sales, according to IRI.
Anheuser-Busch, the St. Louis-based unit of A-B InBev, also is getting in on the boozy root beer trend. A-B’s new Best Damn Root Beer, a hard root beer ale that’s aged on vanilla beans, is rolling out nationally Dec. 14 in bottles, cans and on draft.
“We’re launching a new brand platform — the Best Damn Brewing Company — whose mission is to bring you the best damn thing you’ve had all day,” spokesman David McKenzie said in an email about A-B’s first foray into hard root beer, calling it an “easy drinking hard root beer.”
The competition doesn’t worry Fitz’s or O’Fallon Brewery.
“What we’re offering to consumers is another choice,” Alter said about entering an increasingly crowded category. “The fact the market has become crowded doesn’t dissuade us.”
Gorczyca said the fact that the world’s largest brewer, A-B InBev, and one of the country’s largest craft brewers, Boston Beer Co., are investing in hard root beer is a sign of the product’s potential.
“It reinforces that the category is legitimate,” Gorczyca said.
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