CBP Connects Tampa

Crunching the Numbers: Changing Business Models

Panelists: Christine Denny (First Magnitude Brewing Company), Phil Borgmeyer (Russian River Brewing Company)

Moderator: Kary Shumway (Beer Business Finance)

From distribution decisions to food programs to staffing, the breweries that are navigating this market aren’t guessing. They’re reading their numbers and making hard calls based on what the data actually shows.

This session is brewery owners and managers talking through the calls they made and the numbers behind them. What they track, what it told them, and what they did about it. Pulling back from distribution. Restructuring a food program. Cutting what wasn’t working. Doubling down on what was.

The tough decisions that allow a brewery to continue to survive and see success.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify and assess your most profitable business segments to prioritize where to focus time and resources.
2. Apply proven models to build actionable next steps and execution game plans for your brewery.
3. Implement key lessons and best practices drawn from real world brewery successes.

Christine Denny is president and co-founder of First Magnitude Brewing Company where she manages operations, finances, HR, strategic planning, cat herding, and community partnerships. She loves the craft beer world and the energy craft breweries bring to their communities. She holds a Masters in Forestry from the University of Florida. Prior to getting into the beer world, Christine spent nearly 20 years in environmental consulting facilitating projects related to Florida springs and water resources, public lands, and wildlife issues. In her free time she enjoys getting outdoors to hike, kayak, or boat with her husband, dogs, and two kids.

Kary Shumway is the founder of Craft Brewery Financial Training and the Beer Business Finance Association which offers online resources for beer industry professionals. He has worked in the beer industry for more than 20 years as a certified public accountant and a chief financial officer for a beer distributor and a brewery.

Craft Brewery Financial Training publishes a free weekly beer industry finance newsletter, offers online training courses on topics such as cash flow planning, financial forecasting, and brewery metrics.

Phil Borgmeyer is Director of Finance at Russian River Brewing Co. He brings more than 30 years of finance experience, including nearly 20 in the wine industry and leadership at the CFO level. Early in his career at Kendall Jackson Winery, he met Vinnie and Natalie Cilurzo, a connection that came full circle years later.

Phil grew up in a small Missouri town on the Mississippi River. He enlisted in the U.S. Army to help pay for college, served at Fort Wainwright, Alaska, and graduated with honors from Missouri State University in Accounting. He worked in Denver and San Francisco before settling in Sonoma County.

Hospitality from a Brewers Perspective

Panelists: Ashleigh Carter (Bierstadt Lagerhaus), Khris Johnson (Green Bench Brewing), Matt Rolfe (Deviant Wolf Brewing)

Moderator: Adam Howe (GoTab)

You can brew the best beer in the world, but if your taproom experience falls flat, guests may never come back to have a second pint. While beer remains the anchor of our industry, it is no longer the only thing guests remember or make decisions around. As breweries continue to compete for attention, hospitality has become just as important as beer quality in driving loyalty, repeat visits, and long term success. 

This panel will explore hospitality from a brewer’s perspective and examine why guest experience should matter across the entire brewery, not just within the front of house team. Panelists from different brewery backgrounds will discuss how brewing philosophy, company culture, and operational decisions influence the guest experience inside the taproom.

The discussion will review real world hospitality successes and failures, supported by observations and data gathered from brewery visits across the country. Topics will include communication between production and taproom teams, training staff to confidently talk about beer, creating memorable guest interactions, and identifying missed opportunities that impact guest retention and revenue.

Attendees will leave with practical strategies to strengthen hospitality culture, improve collaboration between departments, and create more intentional guest experiences that support both the brand and the bottom line.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the most common hospitality gaps between production and front of house teams and how to close them.
2. Develop practical strategies for training staff to create memorable guest interactions that drive repeat visits.
3. Recognize how brewing philosophy and operational decisions directly influence the taproom experience and bottom line.

Ashleigh Carter is one of the owners and is the Head Brewer at Bierstadt Lagerhaus in Denver Colorado. In her fifteen year career in brewing, she has gone from working in a homebrew shop packaging specialty malt, to an assistant brewer at Dry Dock Brewing (Aurora, CO), to the Lead Brewer at Prost Brewing (Denver, CO), and now is in charge of everything beer at Bierstadt. Her vision of a three malt, two hop lager brewery, replete with horizontal lager tanks and a hard-to-find outside of Bavaria flotation tank is firmly rooted in traditional techniques and patience. She was the technical editor and wrote the foreword for Modern Lager Brewing by Jack Hendler and Joe Connolly and has given talks all around the world spreading the lager gospel. 

Khris Johnson is the founding brewer behind Green Bench Brewing Co. in St. Petersburg, Florida, where he has helped build one of the state’s leading breweries through a focus on technical excellence, thoughtful hospitality, and community engagement. An active advocate for the Florida craft beer industry, Khris is passionate about brewer education, mentorship, and sharing practical lessons from building and operating a modern brewery. His experience spans recipe development, production management, technical brewing processes, quality systems, business strategy, and creating hospitality-driven beer programs.

Matt Rolfe is a co-founder and head brewer of Deviant Wolfe Brewing in Sanford, Florida. Known for its sours, community events, and welcoming taproom, Deviant Wolfe is a fixture of downtown Sanford’s walkable brewery scene. A software developer turned brewery owner, Matt works hands-on across brewhouse, facilities, and the taproom. He built many of the digital tools DWB runs on himself, including a guest loyalty program and leaderboard, digital taplists, and staff communication system. With almost two decades of brewing and software experience, his focus is the space between production and the bar top: making sure the best of what happens in the brewhouse reaches the guest.

Open to Innovation: What We Can Learn from Outside the Beer Industry

Panelists: Chris Dodds (Busch Gardens), Michael Tomassini (First Watch)

Moderator: Brian Detweiler (3rd Planet Brewing)

“Creativity is the focused combination of unlikely things. Your mind locks onto a certain element and then searches widely for something unexpected that fits with it. What can scuba diving teach you about agriculture? What can trees teach you about public speaking? There is always some connective tissue between disciplines. If you wish to be more creative, look for the connections between two previously unconnected things.”

That quote, by James Clear from ‘Atomic Habits,’ nails it. If we continuously look to each other as our only source of inspiration, we risk becoming an echo chamber of sameness.

In this conversation, we will hear from guests who do not work in the beer industry. We will learn their stories, hear their challenges, discover similarities, gain outside-the-box ideas, and ask unique questions to inspire you to greater success.

Learning Objectives:

1. Hear real-world stories and challenges from professionals outside the beer industry, providing practical examples of how overcoming obstacles and applying fresh perspectives can lead to success
2. Recognize and apply innovative concepts from unrelated fields to the beverage industry.
3. Break free from conventional thinking patterns by examining how unconventional practices and ideas from other sectors can inspire novel approaches in their work.

Turn Your Taproom Into a Destination: Building an Events Program That Keeps People Coming Back

Abby Gorman and Courtney Guggenberger (Guggman Haus Brewing Co.)

As taproom operators, we have the power to give people something to look forward to, something to celebrate “just because”. A great taproom is more than a place to grab a beer – it’s a place people actively seek out to spend their time and create core memories. In this workshop, we’ll explore how your taproom can use events to create memorable experiences for guests and build community while driving sales and repeat visits. Through discussion, collaboration, and real-world examples, we’ll examine strategies for creating events that align with your brand, developing a sustainable events calendar, and how to become a destination for new, and returning, customers.

Learning Objectives:

1. Learn the basics of crafting an event that turns “nothing” into something memorable.
2. Discover how to build a sustainable, on-brand events calendar that drives repeat visits and community engagement.
3. Apply low-budget marketing strategies to make your event successful.

Identical twin sisters Abby Gorman and Courtney Guggenberger, along with their husbands, opened Guggman Haus Brewing Co. in 2019 in Indianapolis, IN. First opening in a two-story house and then expanding on the same property two years later in a neighborhood with little walking traffic, Guggman Haus always had to be a destination brewery. Over the last seven years, Abby and Courtney have built and developed, among other things, an events program that utilizes their entire space, including a large beer garden, taproom, racing memorabilia garage, Festhall event space – while engaging regulars and attracting new customers along the way.

Before jumping into a risky, small business as a family, Courtney worked in product marketing for 10 years and Abby was a Speech Language Pathologist. Both are moms of three and know firsthand the juggling of small business ownership and family life. Along with their husbands and management team, the sisters have grown Guggman Haus from a small microbrewery to a sought-after destination with a robust calendar of taproom events, private events program, a growing self-distribution footprint, second taproom and one of their favorites: an on-site coffee shop.

People vs Ai: What Actually Works (and What Doesn’t) in a Brewery

Madeline McMahon (Madeline Fleethart Consulting)

AI is everywhere, but brewery owners don’t need another presentation about robots taking over their business. They need to know what is worth their time.

From marketing and customer communication to operations, documentation, and day-to-day efficiency, AI can help breweries reduce friction and reclaim valuable hours. At the same time, some of the most important aspects of running a brewery, including leadership, community, hospitality, and relationship-building, remain distinctly human.

This session cuts through the hype to explore practical, real-world applications of AI for breweries of all sizes. Attendees will leave with actionable ideas, a better understanding of where AI adds value, and the confidence to determine when the best answer is still a person.

Learning Objectives

1. Identify three practical ways AI can save time in brewery operations, marketing, and administrative workflows.
2. Evaluate which business activities should be automated and which should remain human-led to preserve culture and customer experience.
3. Develop a framework for responsibly implementing AI tools within a brewery without adding unnecessary complexity or cost.

Madeline McMahon is a Fractional Marketing Strategist and business development consultant known for helping organizations reduce operational friction through clearer communication, stronger workflows, and practical use of AI. With a background spanning craft beer, economic development, small business strategy, and systems-focused marketing, Madeline specializes in translating complex technology conversations into real-world business applications. Their work focuses heavily on the intersection of AI, workflow design, customer experience, and human-centered communication, particularly for organizations trying to modernize without losing authenticity. Madeline regularly speaks on AI adoption for small business, operational efficiency, marketing strategy, and workforce communication, with an emphasis on practical implementation over hype.

Forecasting Without a CFO: The 3 Elements Every Brewery Forecast Needs

Doug Cunningham (Crafted Ledger) & Drew Kearns (That’s Delicious Financials)

A solid brewery forecast comes down to three things: the right drivers, the right reports, and a monthly review process that keeps your model honest.

Drivers are the assumptions you’re actually making about your business, including covers per hour, revenue per tap hour, wholesale growth by package, and ingredient cost as a percent of batch yield. Reports are what’s already sitting in your POS system, brewery management platform, and accounting software waiting to be used. Most owners have the data. They just aren’t pulling it in a way that builds a real forecast. The monthly review is where it all comes together, a specific report you pull every close to compare actuals against your model and decide what to update.

This session also walks through how to build a dynamic Excel forecast model that handles what you used to pay a CFO to do, including layout, formulas, assumption inputs, dynamic outputs, and an accounting ready import format. No finance background required.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the three drivers that actually move your brewery’s P&L and learn how to analyze the historic trend of them as forecast model inputs rather than gut instincts.
2. Explore some reports to pull from your existing tech stack each month to pressure test your assumptions against real data.
3. Leave with a repeatable monthly review routine built around QBO actuals and the confidence to update your forecast model.

Doug Cunningham is the founder of Crafted Ledgers and former CFO of Denver Beer Company, where he spent nearly 10 years helping grow the business from one location to seven, navigating expansion, acquisitions, and the financial challenges that come with running a growing brewery.

Today, Doug works with breweries, hospitality groups, and other growing businesses, helping owners make sense of their numbers and work through decisions around profitability, cash flow, and growth. He brings a practical perspective from years spent on the operating side of the business.

Drew Kearns is the founder of That’s Delicious Financials, an accounting and fractional Controller firm built exclusively for craft breweries, taprooms, and artisan food and beverage operators. His firm works with $3M to $15M revenue operators across QBO, Toast, Ekos, xtraCHEF, Beer30, and MarginEdge. Before TDF, Drew served as Controller at Fort Point Beer Company. He lives in Arizona and spends most of his time in the financial of businesses that make things people actually enjoy.

What Your Team is Measured on and Why

Panelists: Brooke Malone (Walking Tree Brewery), Clay Keel (Keel Farms Agrarian Ale and Cider), Matthew Weintraub (Cerveceria La Tropical)

Moderator: Pulkit K. Agrawal (Beer30 by The 5th Ingredient)

Most teams aren’t short on effort. They’re short on clarity. This session looks at how breweries are setting clear expectations and using simple metrics to guide day to day behavior. We’ll discuss what actually gets tracked each week, how those numbers connect to performance and incentives, and how they’re used to motivate teams without overcomplicating things. And when it’s not working, how you actually fix it without just adding more rules or more tracking. Your people are your biggest asset, and this will help you get more out of the team you already have.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the metrics that actually matter for guiding day to day team behavior and how to communicate them clearly.
2. Understand how to connect weekly numbers to performance and incentives without overcomplicating your management approach.
3. Leave with a practical framework for course correcting when expectations aren’t being met, without adding more rules or more tracking.

Brooke Malone is known as the creative wizard behind the brand, company culture, and shenanigans of this award-winning brewery. She champions celebrating mistakes and failing forward, turning mishaps into the next great story. Helping spearhead a team that’s been together for years, and thrives on grit and determination, she is still alive to tell the tales of “Practice, Promise & People”, embracing the chaos along the way.

Clay Keel is a Plant City, FL native who grew up on his family’s farm just east of Tampa Bay. He holds a B.A. from the University of South Florida and an MBA from Saint Leo University, and recently retired from the Army Reserves after 24 years.

Clay is President of Keel Farms and Keel & Curley Winery, an agricultural enterprise producing Florida-grown fruit wines, craft beverages, and farm-based experiences. Since taking ownership in 2018, he has led significant expansion of agricultural production, wine manufacturing, and agritourism, helping Keel Farms become one of the state’s most recognized agribusiness destinations. Under his leadership, the company has quadrupled in size and earned statewide recognition including Best Place to Work in Tampa Bay, Tampa Bay Chamber Small Business of the Year finalist, GrowFL Company to Watch, and multiple USF Fast 56 honors.

Clay serves on the Winery Advisory Council for the Commissioner of Agriculture, the Board of Directors for the United Food Bank of Plant City, Friends of the Plant City Police Department and the CEO Council of Tampa Bay. He is married to Carmen Keel and has two daughters.

Matthew Weintraub studied Hospitality Management at Florida International University, focusing on Beverage Management, then studied brewing at the Siebel Institute of Technology before returning to FIU as a brewing instructor. After helping launch The Tank Brewing Company, he joined Cervecería La Tropical, a Heineken joint venture, as Plant Manager. He helped design, build, and launch the La Tropical Brewery in Wynwood and today leads brewery operations and innovation while overseeing TropiCrystal production with a contract brewing partner. A certified Heineken Master Brewer since 2023, Matthew brings hands-on production expertise and deep roots in South Florida’s craft beer community.

Pulkit K. Agrawal is the Founder and CEO of Beer30 by The 5th Ingredient®, a leading brewery operations management software aimed at enhancing beer quality and consistency. After graduating from Harvard College, Agrawal began working as a Process Engineer for Ballast Point Brewing, where he focused on packaging lines and nitrogen beer. In January 2018, Agrawal launched Beer30®, a brewery data management system that offers grain-to-glass process and quality data tracking, while expanding beyond the standard inventory tracking of other systems. Beer30 focuses on real-time brewing data input, raw material inventory, cost of goods analysis, quality and sensory tracking, sales and distribution, and accounting integration. Beer30 is currently in over 500 breweries globally, helping to #BrewMoreBeer and #BrewBetterBeer across the world. In December 2022, Agrawal was selected into the Forbes 30 Under 30, Class of 2023, in the Food and Drink category. In his free time, Agrawal enjoys traveling (36 countries and counting!), scuba diving, and doing entrepreneurship coaching.

Make 2027 Your Best Year Ever: 6 Levers That Drive Results

Aaron Tellier (Replay Brewing)

Running a successful brewery isn’t about making one big bet. It’s about making dozens of small, intentional decisions across every dimension of your business and watching them compound over time.

In this session, Aaron Tellier, co-owner of Replay Brewing in Fort Mill, South Carolina, walks through six levers that have shaped Replay’s operations and bottom line: beer, food, staff, customer experience, technology, and marketing. Using real examples from Replay’s journey, Aaron breaks down the specific decisions his team made in each area, what worked, what didn’t, and what he would do differently.

He’ll cover areas like: Hiring and motivating the right people. Dialing in a beer menu that reflects what your local community actually wants to drink. Building a food program that complements the taproom experience rather than complicating it. Designing a physical space that gives guests reasons to stay, come back, and bring friends. Selecting the right technology, from POS systems to loyalty apps, to capture guest data and drive repeat visits. And pulling it all together with a marketing approach that actually moves the needle.

The goal is not to hand attendees a perfect playbook. It is to show that meaningful improvement does not require a major overhaul. Small changes, made consistently across these six areas, are what create big results. Attendees will leave with a practical framework they can apply immediately in their own brewery.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify six operational levers (beer, food, staff, customer experience, technology, and marketing) that most directly shape your overall business outcome, and pinpoint where small changes in your own brewery could have the biggest near-term impact.
2. Understand how to use technology and marketing together to capture guest data, build loyalty, and turn one-time visitors into regulars, with specific examples from Replay Brewing’s own strategy.
3. Learn practical approaches to hiring and motivating staff, reading your local market to build the right beer and food program, and designing a physical space that drives increases in average check, return visits, and word-of-mouth.

Aaron Tellier is the co-owner of Replay Brewing, a retro-themed craft brewery located in Fort Mill, South Carolina. Founded alongside his brother JT and sister-in-law Leah, Replay Brewing blends quality craft beer with a nostalgic experience featuring pinball machines, classic arcade games, cocktails, and a welcoming taproom that makes Replay Brewing a destination that draws guests from around the greater Charlotte region.

Before opening Replay, Aaron was an officer in the US Navy and spent more than 25 years working with Fortune 500 companies in marketing and business strategy, an experience he now applies directly to the challenges of running a microbrewery. Besides the brewery, Aaron also owns two marketing agencies and a chain of climbing gyms in Colorado. In his free time, he enjoys running and spending time with his wife and three daughters.

Tap Talks: 3 18-minute sessions on critical topics

Setting Boundaries as a Business Strategy

Itaria Henry (Legacy bridge group) & Wes Mason (principle Strategies)

When every question reaches the owner, the business can become dependent on one person. Executive operator Wes Mason and HR leader Itaria Henry show craft beer operators how to set boundaries that speed up decisions and strengthen staff confidence. They introduce three clear paths for decisions: act within your authority, bring a choice to a scheduled check-in, or escalate an urgent risk now. In a lively “Boundary Huddle,” attendees work through familiar taproom and brewery situations, compare their calls with another operator, and write one decision rule they can use with their team tomorrow.

From Ideas to Empty Kegs

Christie Jackson (Transport Brewery)

What makes a brewery decide to brew particular beers—and what makes customers actually drink them? This talk walks through the entire process, from concept, batch size and cost to branding, social media, customer engagement, staff selling and ultimately getting the kegs kicked – all while navigating the different identities of 2 locations.

This Is a Long Game: Marketing With Patience, Purpose, and Discipline

Barry Elwonger (Allocated Media)

In this tap talk, we’ll look at a few breweries, both distributing and taproom-only models, that are deliberate about how they adapt and compete in the market without losing sight of their long-term strategy. Then we’ll work through a real-world example, taking a list of ideas and seeing if they align with the strategy.

Running a Brewery When the Market is Working Against You

Panelists: Adam Charnack (Hi-Wire Brewing), Greg Berbusse (Bay 13 Brewing), Matt Britton (Discourse Brewing)

Moderator: Kevin ‘Swirv’ Irving (Atlantucky)

The craft beer industry looks nothing like it did five years ago. Are consumers drinking less? Costs keep climbing. Competition is coming from directions nobody predicted. And the rules around emerging beverage categories keep changing.

This session will look at all the external factors impacting your brewery. Topics include tariffs, rising ingredient and equipment costs, supply chain disruptions, declining alcohol consumption, hemp beverage regulation, inflation, labor costs, and increased competition from wine, spirits, and non-alc alternatives.

But we’re not here to complain, our panelists will share how they’ve faced these headwinds and continued to navigate an evolving beverage landscape.

Learning Objectives:

• Identify the external forces currently having the greatest impact on brewery operations and profitability.
• Understand how other operators are responding to market pressures and what decisions they made to protect their business.
• Leave with a clearer picture of where your brewery may be vulnerable and what adjustments are worth considering heading into 2027.
  

Adam Charnack has pursued his craft-beer passion of producing approachable and balanced beers in the heart of Asheville NC since 2012. Hi-Wire Brewing can be found in bars, restaurants, and grocery stores across eight states, including their nine retail locations – in Asheville, Durham, Wilmington and Charlotte in North Carolina as well as in Knoxville, TN. We believe that the things that bring us together are stronger than the things that pull us apart. Our mission is to make the things that bring us together.

Greg Berbusse is a seasoned brewing and hospitality professional with over 20 years of industry experience, including more than a decade in craft brewing. Currently serving as Head Brewer at Wood Foot Beer & Pizza and President of the Florida Brewers Guild, Greg brings a unique perspective combining brewing science, operational leadership, and industry advocacy. With a master’s degree in Cell Biology, his approach emphasizes innovation, quality, and continuous improvement. Passionate about strengthening the craft brewing industry, Greg focuses on building sustainable businesses, fostering community connections, and developing collaborative initiatives that help breweries navigate an evolving hospitality landscape.

Crowdsourced: A Collaborative Hour of Problem Solving

CBP Connects attendees continually list the ability to connect and learn from others as a highlight from our workshops. We are excited to host a session dedicated to learning from your peers. In this session, we will field questions from you and then develop the best solutions together. Plan to walk away with strategies to problems many of us are facing and best practices to improve brewery operations. Together, we can grow stronger.

Learning Objectives:

1. Build new relationships that you can reach out to with future questions
2. Collaborate with your peers to solve problems faced by other Craft Beer Professionals
3. Discover new strategies and solutions to help you see greater success at your brewery