I was in Hillsboro, WI last month.. I was there to participate in the 10th Annual Wisconsin Hop Seminar. The seminar, which brings together craft brewers, hop growers, and university researchers was held at the Hillsboro Brewing Company. My role at the seminar was to give the keynote address on the impact of craft brewing on the American hop industry. Hops is a subject that I have written about in previous blog entries, which you can read here, here, and here.

Hillsboro is a ninety-minute drive north of Madison. I flew into Madison, where I spent the night, before driving with my colleague and University of Wisconsin-Madison professor, Steve Deller, to Hillsboro. Hillsboro is a town of just over 1,400 people, located in west-central Wisconsin. It is known as the “Czech capital” of Wisconsin. While the earliest immigrants arriving in Hillsboro came from Germany, the Czechs started to arrive in the mid-1800s. Attracted by a landscape that reminded them of home, the Czechs brought with them their culture, food, and traditions. Today, the town’s Czech heritage is celebrated with the annual Cesky Den Festival.

Hillsboro Brewing Company is owned by the husband and wife team of Snapper and Kim Verbsky. Hillsboro is a relatively new brewery, only being established in 2014. In 2018, the brewery’s success (production went from ~350 barrels in 2017 to ~1,000 barrels in 2018) meant that it had to relocate to a larger facility and it is now housed in a 28,000 square foot building, that was formerly home to a Carnation Milk plant. This is where the hop seminar took place.

I must admit I was impressed with what Kim and Snapper were doing with their new brewing facility. It is a two-level building. The upper level is in the process of being renovated to house an event space. Wedding receptions will be a primary target market for this space. As I walked around the soon-to-be event space, I thought about the fact that there are only a little over 1,400 folks who live in town. This is clearly a space designed to attract out-of-towners. That thought also made me consider the brewery’s capacity to attract beer tourists.

Brewing occurs on the ground level of the brewery. Hillsboro produced approximately a thousand barrels of beer in 2018. It has the space to grow its brewing capacity, should the need arise. What particularly impressed me was that the owners clearly had respect for their building’s history. On display, there is a collage with old newspaper articles and photographs highlighting the building’s former life as a Carnation milk facility. I like it when brewery owners have an appreciation for and celebrate their building’s history. At Hillsboro, they also brew a beer that recognizes the building’s heritage. Contented Cow is a Milk Stout. In 1907, the founder of Carnation, E. A. Stuart introduced the phrase, “Carnation condensed milk, the milk from contented cows.” I sampled Contented Cow while at Hillsboro, and have to say that I really enjoyed it.

There were approximately fifty in attendance at the seminar. The vast majority were hop farmers. There were a couple of brewers in attendance, including Dan Carey, co-owner and brewmaster of the legendary New Glarus Brewing Company. Dan was also one of the seminar’s speakers. My presentation focused on how the growth of craft brewing was impacting the hop industry. Among other things, craft breweries have created a demand for locally-grown hops.

In preparing for my presentation I discovered quite a few things about the Wisconsin hop industry, including its history. During the second half of the eighteen-century, Wisconsin emerged as a major center of hop production. Production peaked in 1870, when the state produced approximately five million pounds of hops (Figure 1). The center of Wisconsin’s hop production was Sauk County, in the southwestern part of the state. I passed through Sauk County on the drive from Madison to Hillsboro. Hops first started to be grown in Sauk County in 1842. The rainfall and good drainage made Sauk County and ideal location for growing hops. Wisconsin’s reign as an important center of hop production did not last long, however. By 1880, annual production in the state had decreased to two million pounds. Production continued to fall and by the turn of the century very few hops were grown in the state (Figure 1).

In recent years hop farming has returned to Wisconsin. Most of the demand for Wisconsin hops come from Wisconsin craft breweries. There are over one hundred and sixty craft breweries in the state, and a growing number of them are using Wisconsin grown hops as an ingredient in some of their beers. As noted by Erika Janik in an article in Edible Milwaukee, “interest in local ingredients for local craft beer is driving a resurgence in the cultivation of hops and barley for brewing in Wisconsin.” According to the Hop Growers of America, in 2018 there were 297 acres of hops harvested in Wisconsin. This placed Wisconsin sixth in the country, behind Washington, Idaho, Oregon, Michigan, and New York. There are a lot of challenges associated with growing hops outside of the Pacific Northwest. There are the initial start-up costs, which can run ~$10,000 per acre. In addition, there are harvesting and post-harvesting processing costs; the latter include the costs of drying, pelletizing, storage etc. For small hop farms, as most start-ups are, achieving critical economies of scale is close to impossible. This make it difficult to compete on price with growers from the Pacific Northwest, particularly when it comes to the more common varieties of hops. Hop farmers in states such as Wisconsin have to figure out which hops will give them a competitive edge. In the long-term this might mean developing hop strains that are unique to the region, or by leveraging the concept of terroir; the idea that local Wisconsin hops provide unique flavors and aromas that are influenced by local soil and climate. Wisconsin hop growers may also be able to capitalize on the geographic proximity they enjoy viz-viz Wisconsin breweries – this proximity allows breweries to receive whole-cone hops that are delivered within hours of being harvested. Upon arrival at the brewery, these so-called ‘wet hops’ can be incorporated immediately into the brewing process. Wet-hop beers allow you to experience the true hop flavor the hop and have been described as “mellow, delicate, and freshly vibrant”. By definition, wet-hop beers are only available during the harvest season, which generally falls in August and September.

The hop farmers that I met and chatted with in Hillsboro were an impressive group. It is clear that they are passionate about hops. All are new to the industry, but are keen to learn, and are determined to become successful hop farmers.

Further Reading:

Rumnay, Thomas H. 1997/98. Hops cultivation in Wisconsin: A nineteenth century interlude, The Wisconsin Geographer, Volume 13-14, Pages 49-54.