Keeper Brewing founders Harry Sexton, Phil Sexton and Andy Dunn, which is located in the heart of Melbourne’s inner-city suburb of Brunswick, have made it their mission to revamp the craft lager scene by simply brewing just one style of beer, the Pilsner.
Fans of Australian craft beer will know Phil Sexton as the man behind Matilda Bay and part of the team that founded Little Creatures and then White Rabbit. Harry is his son, and Andy Dunn was part of the Matilda Bay team and the trio started working together on the Keeper Brewing project after Asahi closed down the Matilda Bay brewpub in Healesville last year.
Speaking to Beer & Brewer Harry said that it just made sense for the team to continue to work together.
“We were the last people standing, because they slowly laid people off. And it just made sense for us. We worked together well, and we would drink the most beer together. We’re really happy with the three of us and we are a great team,” he said.
Being a perfectionist is a personality trait of Sexton’s that Harry says has worked symbiotically when crafting the one style of beer.
“I’ve always had that as a personality trait of mine, which is to keep fiddling with something to make it perfect,” Harry said.
“It’s a hard style to get right, and I love that challenge. When it’s done right, they are the best beer. You just can’t beat them. There’s nothing more interesting, and there’s nothing cleaner than a good Pilsner.”
Harry also shared with Beer & Brewer, what he and the team consider to be key elements in crafting a truly great Pilsner. His philosophy is to give the beer as much time as it needs, to be the best it possibly can be.
“Time is by far the most important thing when it comes to Pilsner. We’re not really worried about the big brewers in Australia because they run on a clock. We don’t. We can take as much time as we need for our beer. The scale at which we want to brew beer and sell beer fits nicely with the size of this brewery,” Harry said.
“Freshness of ingredients is another thing. We’re using Australian malt at the moment because we can ensure it’s no more than a month or two old from malting to when we’re brewing with it.
“Care and attention are also important. Every little aspect of the Pilsner needs to be watched and controlled. And because we’re only brewing the one beer, we can do that. There are no distractions on other products.”
Harry says the team are not blind to the fact that maybe not everyone is as fanatical about Pilsner as the team at Keeper, and so the importance of including something for everyone falls at the heart of the Keeper experience.
Working with independent and local breweries and showcasing their products on rotation at Keeper Brewing means they can offer something for everyone.
“We’ve started off with a couple friends including Bodriggy and Kaiju. I love the guys that run those breweries, and their beers are excellent. There’s also Guinness. You can’t go past Guinness. We also have Willie Smith’s Cider from down in Tassie. They’re all incredible products, so we decided to showcase them,” said Harry.
Focused on being a community hub for Brunswick, Keeper Brewing offers spaces for music and art events among other initiatives that help to make Keeper Brewing a place for all to enjoy.
For smaller, independent breweries in Australia, Harry notes that the future does have challenges and has had since COVID.
“It’s no secret to people around the beer industry that we are living in a duopoly. We’re still seeing breweries shut down. We’re still seeing tough times, high costs, and people not drinking quite as much,” he said.
“Unfortunately, the Independent Brewers Association in Australia, is not having as much luck as we’d like with the excise rebates being favoured towards smaller guys, or any sort of support for the smaller brewers. I think it’s going to be a tough game for everyone, and we’re just going to have to find our niche”
Harry is however optimistic about the future of smaller independent breweries who endured these industry changes and market conditions.
“I think there’s a little bit of sunlight ahead. I think we’re seeing people be a little bit more open to going back to pubs and buying out of liquor stores. We’ve unfortunately lost so many craft breweries, however there’s now a little bit more fresh air for people who survived and the new people coming in.”
Harry says the biggest motivation behind Keeper Brewing is crafting the best beer the team possible can.
“The whole premise behind brewing one beer and doing it as well as we can, is the exciting driving force for us here. The first batch we’ve done is good and we’re happy with it. It’s not perfect. We’re going to keep tweaking it, but it really is a strong, exciting thing to be focused on. Seeing nice reception for it from other pubs and people coming through drinking our beer is so heartening,” Harry told Beer & Brewer.
He added: “Our goal is brewing an incredible Pilsner. That’s the most important thing about this whole business. It’s to make sure that the beer is as good as it possibly can be and is a good representation of who we are as founders.
“The market is asking for Pilsner more than I’ve ever heard. It’s very exciting time to be brewing just a Pilsner as people are starting to ask for them. I hope that’s where we see the market go. We are just going to keep shouting about it.”