Carlsberg Group on Wednesday announced an all-cash deal worth $4 per share for all shares of Waterloo Brewing, which bills itself as the largest Canadian-owned brewery in Ontario and a pioneer of the current “craft brewing renaissance” in Canada.

The deal still requires court approval — and approval from TSX-traded Waterloo’s shareholders, although Carlsberg has already signed up Waterloo company directors and officers holding a combined stake of about 39 per cent, with “irrevocable” support and voting agreements.

A committee of Waterloo independent directors is also recommending the remaining shareholders vote in favour of the deal, on which the two companies expect to close early in the first half of the new year.

In business since 1984, starting as Brick Brewing and rebranding in 2019, Waterloo Brewing produces the Waterloo line of premium craft beers and a “value” brand, Laker.

It also holds the Canadian rights to Seagram Coolers and the LandShark and Margaritaville beverage lines, and already has been producing Somersby cider in Canada on Copenhagen-based Carlsberg’s behalf since 2020.

“One of the priorities of our SAIL’27 strategy is to grow our business in attractive markets where we are small today, such as Canada,” Carlsberg CEO Cees ‘t Hart said in a separate release Thursday. Buying Waterloo Brewing, he said, “significantly improves our growth prospects in the Canadian market.”

“This exciting opportunity will scale our business in Canada. The brand portfolios are complementary. Local sourcing will secure long-term robustness of supply, and increase commercial flexibility and speed to market for innovations, step-changing the way we operate,” Carlsberg Canada managing director Anders Rud Jørgensen said in the same release.

Waterloo Brewing’s portfolio of “long-standing co-packing relationships will benefit from these combined operations,” he added.

“We’ve enjoyed a close relationship with Carlsberg and are excited about becoming part of one of the largest brewing companies in the world,” Waterloo Brewing CEO George Croft said in Wednesday’s release, adding the the board “is confident that joining Carlsberg is the best long-term solution for our employees, partners, customers, consumers and community.”

Waterloo on Wednesday also announced results for its third quarter ending Oct. 30, reporting declines in both net revenue and gross profit in what Croft described in a separate release as “a challenging year for the industry.”

Waterloo said it’s “continuing to see consumers trade-down as a result of ongoing inflationary pressures,” which has led to sales growth for the Laker brand but has “negatively impacted the company’s premium beer brands and ready-to-drink products, which is putting pressure on gross margin.”

Waterloo has since raised the price on its single-serve 473-millilitre Laker cans, a change it said is “consistent with the balance of the industry and will have a significant and positive impact on gross margin in the fourth quarter.”

The company also reported renewals with “strategic” co-manufacturing partners, which it said will result in about $18 million of combined revenue over the extended terms of those contracts.

For its last full fiscal year ending Jan. 31, 2022, Waterloo had booked $5.803 million in net income on $180.825 million in gross revenue, up from $3 million on $156.8 million in the previous fiscal year. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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“The acquisition we are doing today is very important for the future growth of Royal Unibrew in the Americas region,” Royal Unibrew CEO Lars Jensen said in a statement.

“We are adding capacity in Canada, which is also close to our U.S. business and over time we expect to serve most of Canada and partly United States from Amsterdam Brewery,” Jensen added.

The vast majority of Royal Unibrew’s revenue is generated in Europe. In 2021, around 11 per cent of the company’s net revenue came from its international segment, which includes the Americas, according to its annual report.

Royal Unibrew, whose own brands include Royal, Lapin Kulta and Faxe, noted Amsterdam maintains a “solid position in on-trade in Toronto” through its two retail stores and two brewpub restaurants in that city.

Amsterdam was founded in 1986 as a Dutch-themed Toronto brewpub and expanded following its 2002 acquisition by Jeff Carefoote, who previously worked for major brewers Molson and Miller in Canada and the U.S.

The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of this year, paid on a debt-free basis, Royal Unibrew said. It expects the deal to be earnings-per-share accretive within the first year of ownership.

— Reporting for Reuters by Nikolaj Skydsgaard; includes files from Glacier FarmMedia Network staff.

CORRECTION, July 18, 2022: Royal Unibrew on July 17 published a statement of correction, lowering the acquisition value. The initial announcement on July 15 had valued Amsterdam Brewery at about 300 million Danish crowns (C$52.8 million).

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The changes, which took effect May 11, come at the request of the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture (NSFA) — which has said that owners of small farm-level processing facilities shouldn’t be treated the same as multi-million-dollar processing plants, in terms of the required fees and regulatory approvals based on larger volumes of waste to manage.

The smaller operations will now be regulated through standard wastewater approval requirements, the province said.

The province said its Office of Regulatory Affairs and Service Effectiveness estimates the changes will save each on-farm business $308 per year.

“These changes reduce red tape while ensuring that environmental standards are met,” Environment Minister Timothy Halman said in a release. “With input from industry, we are better aligning regulatory approvals to environmental and business needs.”

These activities include construction, operation or reclamation at sites “associated with small farm operations” involving:

• poultry, red meat, inland fish, dairy or dairy products, vegetable, or fruit processing plants;
• distilleries or wineries;
• breweries that produce 150,000 litres or more of alcoholic beverages per year;
• fish meal plants; and
• food additive or supplement manufacturing plants.

Regulatory changes such as these are occurring across the country to better align with smaller farm processing facilities, the ministry said via email.

“Other Canadian jurisdictions are, or are in the process of, moving to a model of regulation for these industries that better align regulatory approvals to the environmental risks,” ministry spokesperson Tracy Baron said.

— Liam O’Connor reports for Glacier FarmMedia from Saskatoon.

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“It will be an extremely tight and difficult year for the malt processors and ultimately for the brewers as well,” said Peter Watts, managing director of the Canadian Malting Barley Technical Centre (CMBTC) in Winnipeg.

“Not only did the hot, dry summer lead to a significant reduction in yields, it also impacted quality,” said Watts, noting higher protein levels were a big issue this year.

The rains that eventually came hit right at harvest time, “adding insult to injury” by leading to quality downgrades.

Total Canadian barley production in 2021-22, which includes feed barley, was estimated at 7.1 million tonnes by Statistics Canada. That compares with the 10.7 million tonnes grown the previous year.

Preliminary data from the Canadian Grain Commission show average protein levels for barley selected for malting in 2021 coming in at 12.8 per cent. That’s the highest of the past decade and well above the 10-year average of 11.7 per cent.

Maltsters typically like lower-protein barley, and Watts noted they are expanding their specifications in order to account for the higher protein levels. “Stuff that normally wouldn’t be accepted, will be accepted this year,” said Watts.

Higher-protein malt barley create processing challenges, including reducing alcohol extraction levels, altering water absorption, and leading to hazy beer.

The larger brewing companies may adjust their recipes to use more adjuncts, such as rice or corn, to compensate for the tighter barley supplies, but Watts said craft brewers don’t have that option.

The CMBTC is currently working with higher-protein samples to come up with modifications maltsters and brewers can use to adapt to this year’s crop, Watts said.

Some export customers do like higher-protein malt barley than is typically used in North America and would be a potential buyer for higher-protein grain in a year with more normal yields, but Watts expected export movement would be down in 2021-22.

“We’re just so short this year, there isn’t enough malting barley to go around,” he said.

“We’re in uncharted territory… people are not often forced to work with this kind of quality.”

While there will be challenges, one possible bright spot to come out of the year was the fact that maltsters will be forced to work with newer varieties that they may not have selected in the past, offering opportunities for those varieties to gain traction, Watts said.

Research into how the different varieties fared this growing season was ongoing, he added, with results and recommendations for 2022 to come shortly from the CMBTC.

— Phil Franz-Warkentin reports for MarketsFarm from Winnipeg.

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The explosion led to the highest acreage numbers of hops seen since “1996(ish),” says Evan Elford, new crop development specialist with OMAFRA.

“It is a much different market now than even five years ago with much higher acreage and volumes of hops available compared to when many Ontario growers started into production over the last 10 years.”

Why it matters: Hops were seen as a new value-added crop with good potential for Ontario growers.

Hop production continuously increased up to 2015.

“Up until about 2015 growers (and breweries) were looking for local hops. They saw local hops as a novelty. In the late 2000s a lot of our craft brewers couldn’t get the hops that they needed and so that’s why a lot of our local growers actually started into the business.”

Craft breweries were unable to get the hops required due to international production shortfalls from 2003 to 2007. This, combined with a warehouse fire in the largest hop growing region in the world, Yakima, in 2006 resulted in the largest hop shortage from 2007 to 2008.

As well, during this time the craft beer sector was increasing, along with the demand for “buy local”, all of which was positive for producers.

As larger growing regions recovered from the production shortfalls of the mid 2000s, hops volume has increased since 2015.

At the same time, proprietary varieties of hops, those giving a fruitier note to popular IPA beers, began to increase in acreage and use. These varieties are more difficult to grow in Ontario.

“These two changes in markets/market cycles are now starting to really impact our small-scale hop growers. The market many of our growers started in has quickly become very different than anything they’ve experienced in their relatively short time of producing hops,” says Elford.

As well, ‘local hops’ was wearing off as a sales pitch.

Many growers are now sitting on at least two years worth of inventory and have to sell old hops at discount rates.

“It’s definitely splitting the market for our growers because we don’t have the access to those proprietary varieties. Its not just Ontario experiencing this issue, it is a market change.”

Some farmers in Canada have decided to exit the industry.

“At the beginning there was a big allure,” said Brandon Bickle, an Ontario grower who has decided to leave the industry after farming for seven seasons at Valley Hops. He was quoted in a recent article in Modern Farmer.

Unfortunately growing hops takes a large capital investment and the plants take three years to develop a crop, adding to financial strain.

The Modern Farmer article says some growers are selling varieties for just $5 but producers require sales at $17 to $20 per pound to make a profit.

Some growers have been pushing for provincial governments to implement incentives for breweries who use local ingredients.

Elford says Ontario growers have greatly improved their hop quality, and hopes that breweries will begin to recognize them.

“Some of the growers are growing some of the best hops and pelletizing some of the best hops that I’ve seen on the market, and that’s comparing internationally.

“There are multiple factors that are involved as to why we have product sitting right now. It’s definitely a learning curve. A lot of the industry is still so new that we are still just gaining the growing pains I think within the industry as our local growers adopt to these market changes,” says Elford.

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“I don’t think there’s any question — without sporting events, and festivals, and concerts – that beer consumption will go down,” said Peter Watts, managing director of the Canadian Malting Barley Technical Centre.

While domestic retail beer sales were reportedly up, that business wasn’t enough to compensate for lost demand elsewhere, he said.

As a result, Watts expected to see a fairly significant drop in overall beer consumption this year.

“There’s no question that Canadian malting companies are seeing reduced demand from the U.S., given the situation,” said Watts. That will translate to lower demand from the domestic malting industry for barley.

However, while there may be a small shift out of seeding malting barley, he didn’t expect to see a large reduction in overall barley acres in Western Canada.

“Producers have had reasonably positive experiences with barley in recent years,” Watts said, adding, “I think we’ll see a drop in acres from last year, but I don’t think it will be significant.”

While malt barley prices may be under pressure, he pointed out that feed barley has shown some strength.

Also, “China seems to have been able to get their brewing industry back up and running,” he said, “so we expect reasonably good demand from China, which is a big market for malting barley.”

A Chinese levy on Australian barley imports will also inevitably drive some demand to Canada, though Watts cautioned there were still concerns that any Chinese retaliation against Canada over the Meng Wanzhou situation could spill into barley.

Statistics Canada currently forecasts farmers in the country will seed 7.25 million acres of barley in 2020, which would be down slightly from the 7.402 million acres planted the previous year, but still the third-largest acreage base of the past decade.

Updated acreage estimates will be released at the end of June.

— Phil Franz-Warkentin reports for MarketsFarm from Winnipeg.

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Beijing said on Monday it would apply an 80.5 per cent tariff on Australian barley imports for the next five years, a move expected to all but halt flows from its main supplier.

“This should benefit Canada and France that have plenty of stock this year,” Helene Duflot of French consultancy Strategie Grains said. “China won’t have any problems finding supply.”

Australia has shipped around two million tonnes of barley in the current season to China, about half of its expected barley exports.

Several cargoes of French feed barley have been sold this month for export to China, partly in anticipation of the tariff decision, traders said.

Canada and France could see extra demand for their malting barley in particular as China has fewer alternatives to Australia in that segment, whereas feed barley faces competition from other feed grains such as corn, analysts said.

However, the fresh prospects for exporters are limited.

China had already shifted toward Canadian, French and Ukrainian origins during an 18-month-long probe into Australian barley, and further widened its options by approving Russian and more recently U.S. barley for import.

“I don’t think it’s a magical shift but at least it’s some additional demand,” Dave Reimann, a Winnipeg-based analyst at Cargill’s MarketSense division, said of Canadian prospects.

China’s demand for malting barley may be less than in previous years, with Brent Atthill, managing director of RMI Analytics, a Swiss consultancy specialized in brewing ingredients, saying demand for beer in the country could fall by 15 per cent this year during the coronavirus pandemic.

Australia, meanwhile, is seen turning to the Saudi feed barley market.

— Reporting for Reuters by Gus Trompiz in Paris, Michael Hogan in Hamburg, Nigel Hunt in London, Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Mark Weinraub and Christopher Walljasper in Chicago and Dominique Patton in Beijing; writing by Gus Trompiz.

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Three years later, the centre is used by numerous farmers and businesses and it has helped them take their business to another level.

Why it matters: Value-added processing facilities are expensive to build and can have significant tax implications if built on farms, which makes a local facility of value.

Prince Edward County residents Catherine Crawford and her husband Edgar Ramirez of Pleasant Valley Hops in Hillier, Ont. and Ramirez Vineyard Services, branched out from wine grapes to hops six years ago.

Pelletizing their harvest has long been a challenge, since craft breweries only want hops in pellet form. And while they invested in good German machinery for picking and drying, they had to take their dried hops to Owen Sound for this final step – four hours one way.

This heightens the time crunch a hops grower faces since, once properly dried, hops must be pelletized within 24 hours. Otherwise, Crawford said, they start to lose their essential oils.

“The whole point of growing hops is to have that beautiful lupulin,” she said, referring to the yellowish powder found in the flowers of the female hops plant.

“Lupulin gives beer that bitterness and the flavour and the aroma,” she said.

The OAFVC was approached by the Ontario Hops Growers Association, which wanted to ensure their membership would have a place (and the hops-specific pelletizing equipment) to process their product.

Trissia Mellor, agriculture manager for the Northumberland County economic development and tourism department said a hops grower might invest in expensive machinery but might not be able to help other growers.

Crawford recalled the steep learning curve of transitioning to hops. In fact, she discovered, “It’s nothing like wine grapes.”

For example, hops grow on trellises like grapes, but — at 18 to 20 ft. high — a hops trellis is several times the height of a grape trellis. But they persisted.

“Edgar loves it now — he’s just enamoured of hops,” she said.

“Now that our yield is so much higher, we can make several trips to Colborne, if we have to, by driving for an hour. If we’d had to make several trips to Owen Sound, I’m not sure it would be feasible anymore.”

Crawford said that the quality of the hops is directly related to the quality of the beer.

“It’s got to be fresh, fresh, fresh. That’s why it’s so wonderful to have this facility an hour away. We can get them there quick, pelletize them, vacuum-seal them and put them in cold storage – and they do labelling. It’s what you call one-stop-shopping.”

Nearby processing enables crop growth

Some growers find the Colborne facilities have helped them take a very rewarding crop to an even higher level – like Joe Hayes of Popham Lane Farm.

Hayes’ black currant operation in Brighton is a fourth-career initiative (following stints in the Air Force, with the correctional services and an upholstery business).

When his eyesight lost some of its sharpness, two factors decided his next step – being British (with an enduring fondness for black currants) and owning a parcel of land on Popham Bay whose clay-shale soil was well suited for the crop.

The only Canadian grower he could find was on Vancouver Island, where he and his partner Priscilla Courtenay were able to purchase the plugs to plant for their new venture. Since 2015, they have planted more than 13,500 currant bushes.

With hopes of reaping 150 lbs., he found his first harvest brought in 600 lbs.

“The you-pick sign went up pretty quick, and we began making jam,” Hayes said.

They harvested about 6,000 lbs. this year and expect to reach 50,000 lbs. by the 2023 harvest.

They soon learned that a product has to be roughly 50 per cent sugar to be called jam. Now they make what they call a spread – 28 per cent sugar, about 60 per cent black currants, plus lemon juice, water and pectin. They also make a lower-sugar concoction they call a sauce. You can pour it on cheesecake, pancakes or ice cream, or mix it with water or soda for a beverage.

Hayes said that most people in Ontario (in fact, Canada) don’t know what black currants are, nor are they aware of their extremely high Vitamin C content (more than three times that of blueberries).

Hayes purchased Polish harvesting machinery to bring in the crop that they have to sort, wash, package and freeze.

These days, he gets the washing and freezing done at the OAFVC, where they put the berries in vacuum-sealed bags and store hundreds of pounds at a time for whenever he rents time for a cooking.

“I said to Priscilla, it’s almost like karma,” Hayes recalled.

“Here I am starting this, then I hear there’s going to be a centre in Colborne. I saw the writing on the wall that this would be a good thing, and it has been. They supply kitchen staff, freeze for me and do all this sort of thing. I’m hoping maybe next year to do a juicing press.”

An ability to experiment with new products

The centre is also used by one of the biggest commercial saffron growers in Canada, True Saffron, which is owned by Warkworth resident Martin Albert and his partner Eric Charbonneau.

A spate of recent publicity has put sales through the roof, Albert said, and they have created eight saffron-infused products just since July.

They’d always enjoyed growing edibles for themselves and friends – garlic, tomatoes, even shiitake mushrooms in a log in a forest. In April 2014, a friend suggested if anyone could grow saffron, they could.

Within two weeks, they had ordered 50,000 bulbs and had nowhere to plant them and no idea how to make them thrive.

They found a grower in Quebec who was scaling down to instruct them in planting depth, drainage, appropriate locations. They now plant 37 cm down, he said – deeper than any crop they know of, and deep enough for peace of mind in Northumberland’s bitter winters.

The second piece of the puzzle was locating sunny vacant land with no forest or other obstacles to obstruct the warmth of the sun. The unsprayed tract they located proved to be ideal for the organic methods they wanted to use.

The first year’s crop suffered for these delays, as well as the ones caused by regulations and inspections at both ends of the bulb purchase – in Europe and in Canada. They got only 65 blooms the first year, but that grew to 78,000 flowers in the second year.

They lost no time in having their product analyzed for authenticity, Albert said.

“Saffron is subject to so much fraud around the world. Seventy- to 90 per cent of the saffron on any shelf in the world is either fraudulent, transformed in some way, or not saffron at all.”

They aced the tests in terms of quality, flavour and antioxidants, which give it healthful properties in terms of fighting depression, early-onset dementia and eyesight issues.

Even though saffron from Iran or Spain is supposed to be superior, Albert pointed out that the crocus sativus linneaus bulb is universal. The key is in the processing.

They researched and developed a secret but very painstaking method that relies on just the right heat, and they keep hawk-eyed watch over their trimmers to ensure they keep the entire length of the red supernegin that provides the health benefits as well as the vivid colouring. Finally, 30 days of rest in the dark are needed to intensify and set the colour and flavour.

They package it in glass (because it can oxidize in plastic or metal) with a cork stopper to absorb oxygen, and sell it in a small black-velvet bag to protect it from light.

The idea of involving the OAFVC came to them last spring when they wanted to make saffron more mainstream. The mystique of saffron can work against it being an everyday cuisine resource, Albert said, but this means people are missing out not only on a flavourful product but a healthful one as well.

They applied for a grant, did some research and testing, then got to work on new saffron-infused products.

Their first was a mustard that combined Canadian mustard seed with Canadian white-wine vinegar for a product people are loving in everything from charcuterie to barbecue burgers.

Their saffron-infused crabapple jelly won best-crabapple-jelly honours at the Warkworth Fair, and they also have a saffron jelly that’s great with charcuterie and cheeses like Brie and sharp cheddar.

They have two saffron vinegars, a white-wine and an apple-cider variety, plus a new hot sauce with a long-lasting punch.

Saffron-infused maple syrup still tastes like maple syrup but packs an antioxidant wallop. And there’s a simple saffron syrup for people who want to discover the flavour.

Doing much of their work with the OAFVC made it so much easier, Albert said, even beyond access to equipment that would have been prohibitive to purchase (like a liquid-nitrogen flash freezer).

“You can rent a half-day, you can rent a full day, you can rent the prep kitchen,” he listed.

“You can hire two, three or four of their employees at $20 an hour. It allows you to know that people in the know are on your team and know the best way to do things.

“It makes you feel like you can lead a team in the production, and that’s how we felt confident enough to get out four products on the same day,” he recalled. And the staff’s professional clean-up between batches ensured that the flavours of one product wouldn’t mix into another.

A staffer with another kind of expertise worked with them via e-mail to produce their initial labels.

They appreciate how the centre is set up for shipping, and the fast and efficient employees always seem to be able to get the answers they need.

“We are lucky we live up the road (from the centre),” he said.

“For small commercial producers, it would be difficult to have any of these products without their help and their presence.”

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There’s the McCormick Deering antique tractor at the end of the lane, the idled hog barn you pass on the way to the brewery building and the 1933 Case C hanging from the wall above the bar when you enter.

Then there’s the name of Jim and Laura Soetemans’ and Joe and Mary Donkers’ brewery: Stonepicker. You can’t get much more farm-level than that.

Why it matters: As the popularity of microbrewing continues to increase, it’s not surprising that more of them are connected directly to farmers.

Joe and Jim and their wives have been friends “forever” and when Joe closed his farrow-to-wean hog barn south of Forest, he began concentrating on brewing beer. The two friends had started brewing beer five years ago. They ordered a hobby brewing kit that’s larger than average at 20 gallons. That meant they had lots of beer to give away, and people said they liked it.

What started out as some fun then led to tours of other breweries.

“Everyone was having a good time and they were doing decently well, so we decided to jump in,” said Joe during an interview at the brewery not far from the hog barn and the Donkers’ home.

The brewery offers about 12 beers on tap, six that will be produced constantly and six others that are seasonal.

The brewery opened during Labour Day weekend and so far traffic and sales have exceeded their expectations. The visitors have been diverse and sometimes unexpected.

A group of senior citizens visits on Thursdays for an outing and a drink. Cyclists from Sarnia and motorcyclists on tours have visited. On nice days, visitors spend time on the patio outside the brewery building, sheltered under trees and overlooking the farm fields. They are on the main route from Sarnia and the United States to the Grand Bend cottage area.

“City people like the farm stuff and they are not connected to it anymore,” said Joe.

They arrive, try a flight of beers (the name for a sample tray) buy some that they like and hang around for an hour or two. The beer flight is also punctuated by a farming symbol, with old baler tines protruding from pieces of wood that once separated a shipment of hog slats

The brewery could be an economically feasible way to get people to spend time on a farm.

Still actively farming

The hogs may be gone from Joe Donkers’ farm, but he’s still farming, now with an eye to creating added value in the brewery.

He put in 60 acres of malting barley this year, including Bentley two-row malting barley.

“I can malt it into anything I need,” said Joe.

He’s using about 30 per cent of his own malt to make their beer at this point. The plan is to create a malting plant in the old barn, which could also be an opportunity to tour people through to show them the whole beer creation process.

Hops are integral to the making of beer and there isn’t much of it grown in Ontario yet.

“We will use as much local hops as we can, but Ontario only has a limited number of varieties they can actually grow because they aren’t under licence,” said Joe.

The Stonepicker brewers get most of their hops from Washington and Oregon.

“The hop is pretty much the most important part of beer,” said Jim. “You need good hops for flavour.”

Jim continues to farm near Warwick Village, where he grows crops on about 1,000 acres and also raises broiler chickens.

The brewery is the first in its area, so unlike some areas, eastern Lambton County is far from saturated.

They would be happy to have another brewery nearby, to provide beer-lovers with multiple places to visit. There is a winery nearby, Alton’s Estate Winery and they have already found people who have visited both. There is also the Twin Pines Cidery not far away.

Equipment is easy to find, as long as you know what you want. There are lots of dealers in Ontario, said Joe.

The beer names are all tied to farms. They come up with them as they are brewing, attaching lists of potential names on the vats.

“One of our friends named Farmers Tan beer,” said Laura.

Stonepicker, the name of the brewery, started out as the name of a beer. That beer name originated because they ground the malt in a pail that was also used for picking stones that day. It eventually became the name of the brewery as well.

The Stonepicker beers are also on tap at restaurants in London and Sarnia and some places between.

“We’re never expecting to be nation-wide, but we hope we will grow a bit from here,” said Joe.

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