Thanks to Craig Cooper, Limburg’s majority shareholder, for responding to our piece (see comment section at end of “The grain drain”) on the migration of Hawkes Bay’s finest beer. Craig, we appreciate your candour.
Yet while a worthy parry, BayBuzz think the defence disingenuous, and more importantly, rather grim reading for any micro producer in the Bay: “The brewery [Limburg] in Hastings was struggling financially, it couldn’t meet volume requirements, and we were presented with an opportunity to contract brew [in Auckland] at a substantially lower cost”.
By virtue of setting up camp in the Bay, can like businesses only ever expect tepid success? Is any brewery outside a metropolitan area now an anachronism?
I’d guess there’d be many artisan producers at the Farmers’ Market that would beg to differ. BayBuzz think there’s a wincing failure of imagination here.