2018 Baltibrewer Survey Results

What is Baltibrew?

A homebrew club dedicated to the discussion and exchange of fermented beverages!

Who is Baltibrew?

Great question!

Having never conducted a membership survey we decided to put a small set of questions to our brewers to get a bit of sense of who Baltibrew is.  With a response rate from dues paying members of slightly over 50%, we received 23 complete surveys (1 of which only provided the written feedback).  All percentages are based off the sample of actual responses.  Let's dig in!

What age range do you admit to?

• 48% - 30-40
• 24% - Under 30
• 14% - 40-50
• 14% - Over 50
• 1 person admits nothing!

While homebrewing is fairly strong in the 30-40 demographic, Baltibrew skews young with 72% in the 20-40 range (the 2013 AHA Survey had 60% in the 30-50 cohort).  Our membership is somewhat less skewed when compared to the results captured by the Brulosophy online survey in 2017 (65% in that under 40 cohort, 44% 30-40 & 21% <30).

Profession

• The survey categories were too granular to bucket in any meaningful way.
• Well over 50% were in the sciences, engineering, or technology related fields.
• Other industries are represented, including publishing, broadcasting, retail, manufacturing, construction, the arts, servicing, education, finance, real estate, marketing, legal.

Experience

• 50% - 5+ years
• 45% - 3-5 years
• 1 person in the 1-2 year range

What types of fermented beverages do you produce

Half of our membership dabbles with funky brews.  We have many more sour brewers (50% vs 30%) than the Brulosophy average.

How often do you brew?

• 41% - Monthly
• 18% - More than once a month
• 18% - Quarterly
• 14% - Not actively brewing
• 10% - A few times a year

What is the average volume of wort produced during a typical brew day?

• Almost 70% do 5+ gallons, 20% doing 10+ gallons, and the remainder doing 2-4 range.  No 1 gallon brewers.

Which is your primary method of wort production?

• 73% are all grain brewers, the rest are evenly split between extract and partial mash.  Which means we’ve more partial mash brewers than the Brulosophy survey captured.

All Grain Brewers: Which of the following best describes your methods?

• 47% us batch sparge, 30% Fly Sparge, 23% BIAB (either full volume of w/ a sparge)

What is your average pre-boil efficiency?

• 75% hit that 70-80 % efficiency, and all but 1 of the rest is above that.

Which of following readings do you take during brew day?

Which of the following readings do you take during/after fermentation?

Which describe your use of secondary fermenters?

• 27% always use a secondary, 27% never use a secondary, and the rest use it for specific things, the most common being extended aging.  

What best describes you preference for yeast?

• 40% have no attachment to dry/liquid/starters/direct pitch/rehydration/pitching from the cake.
• Among those who do have a preference, liquid yeast is king, with only 3 brewers in camp dry.

How do you most commonly package your finished products?

• Two keggers for every bottle conditioner in the club.

The prototypical Baltibrewer is….

• A mid-thirties, STEM inclined brewer who’s been at it for 5 or more years.  They produce multiple types of clean and funky fermented beverages via all-grain fly or batch sparging and kegging the final product.

And lastly, why do we brew?

• Common theme in the responses is because we like to!
• Enjoy making or creating things
• Mixing art and science, experimenting
• Enjoying the company of other homebrewers/beer drinkers
• Oh course, drinking the finished product