True Vine Brewing Co. begins canning, distributing beer in local stores

Published 6:08 pm Thursday, May 12, 2016

True Vine Brewing Co. filled its first cans on Thursday – the fulfillment of the original dream of the company, said Ryan Dixon, one of its founders.

True Vine has always been about community – something to share between friends, he explained.

“This has been the vision since the beginning of True Vine, the idea of enjoying good beer at your home, at a friend’s home, at the lake,” he said. “That’s what it’s all about.”

The cans of Rose City Pale Ale and Mermaids & Unicorns (a blonde ale) will soon be available at local beer and wine stores, as well as some grocery stores.

“We’ll definitely have some six-packs at liquor stores and some convenience stores by the end of next week,” Dixon said. “And the goal is to be everywhere, including FRESH and Brookshire’s, by the end of June.”

Unfortunately, six-packs will not be available at the brewery itself, which has a weekly Open Taps event on Fridays starting at 5 p.m., or the Saturday Open Taps event slated for May 28.

State law prohibits a brewery from selling beer for off-site consumption.

“That’s an antiquated law that some other states are already moving away from,” Dixon said. “We hope the Legislature takes a look at that (in the next session).”

Canned beer is the second success of an innovative crowdfunding effort the brewery undertook last year. Their customers asked for a larger beer garden area and for take-home beer. But the company had sunk so much capital into a recent expansion that realistically, those improvements were years away.

So the owners launched a Kickstarter campaign called “Pints & Bombers.” Supporters were able to donate toward the goal of $10,000, and if the goal was reached within 30 days, they would receive some gift items (glasses and shirts). More importantly, supporters would help the brewery expand toward the tap room (the “Pints” portion of the campaign) and take-home beer (originally planned to be “bombers,” but now the more convenient cans).

“That was a huge benefit to us as a company,” Dixon said of the Kickstarter campaign, upon its success in February. “It gave us some working capital to get those things underway.”

The brightly colored cans (purple for Mermaids & Unicorns and red for Rose City Pale Ale) were designed by local artists and are filled onsite at the downtown Tyler brewery.

“We just feel very, very blessed,” Dixon said.

Twitter: @TMT_Roy