“One of the reasons we started a craft brewing company in the first place was due to the lack of accessibility of premium craft beer in communities of color,” explains Teo Hunter, COO and head of brewing operations for Crowns & Hops Brewing Co.
他说这很容易发现精酿啤酒t Whole Foods, Bristol Farms, and Trader Joe’s but, “as soon as you start going into the inner city, you don't see any of those establishments. You barely see grocery stores, and those grocery stores are inundated with mass marketed beer that don't have the quality attributes we would hope people would identify the same way Beny and I did.
“It’s amazing to see what has been accomplished over the past six years. Our efforts to push and truly achieve racial equity in the craft beer industry are being realized on so many levels—from Black beer influencers promoting the industry, to business owners that are now opening craft beer establishments from breweries to bars. We’re honored to be at the forefront of this movement. Black people have contributed to the beverage industry for generations. It’s like a full circle moment for us to now shine a light on these contributions along with leading the charge on cultural ownership in craft beer.”
Duo的Crowns＆Hops于2015年成立于2015年，与CEO和联合创始人Beny Ashburn，位于加利福尼亚州的Inglewood，目前在Santa Rosa和Inglewood中的一个酿造了两个设施。到年底，他们的目标是集中在尼尔伍德的所有努力直接向消费者出售。
Teo Hunter, COO and head of brewing operations, and Beny Ashburn, CEO and co-founder of Crowns & Hops Brewing Co.
Packaging aligns with mission
Hunter explains that they package solely in 16-oz aluminum cans to align with current craft beer trends and to ensure the beer has the best protection and opportunity to survive. Full sleeved cans are fromR.B. Dwyersupplied by球. Their next goal is to transition completely to sleeved cans versus labeled cans to boost efficiency and remove a process from the fulfillment stage.
凭借他们的包装设计，Crowns＆Hops旨在与传统上被忽视在工艺啤酒市场的消费者共鸣。猎人笔记“我们从视觉角度来看，我们的目标是沟通文化 - 在所有不同品种的中，我理解它到工艺啤酒社区，以便我们的黑人和棕色顾客开始在一个行业中识别自己是看不见的。“
On Elevated Cypher IPA, the design features script—like someone writing verses.这意味着将黑色文化整合到优质工艺啤酒包装中。“我们可以以超出它的方式执行这一点，只是一个涂鸦或罐头的嘻哈诗。我们的目标是以独特的方式真正展示我们如何不仅仅是这种整体的人，“亨特说。“所以我们使用与怀旧的绰号保持一致，无论是我们的击败信使Pilsner上的盒式磁带录像机还是城市异常粗壮的英格尔伍德的地形。在升高的Cypher IPA中，我们实际上使用脚本，就像有人写作经文一样。
“我们即将进入其他符号，以一种框架的方式对我们的文化很重要，但不会扯掉别人的知识产权，这在我们的行业中是一个巨大的问题。我们认为这是懒惰的创意。很多时候它是利用和挪用文化，因为它没有内在的所有权。但我们当然希望确保您可以在包装中识别黑色和棕色文化。我认为重要的是 - 如果你看到爱尔兰啤酒，你可以立即讲述它是爱尔兰啤酒。这是一个墨西哥啤酒，你可以告诉。“
Labels are designed by Matt Taylor fromVarnish Studio, whom Hunter met 15 years ago through their backgrounds in packaging. Hunter explains, “At the time, he was doing a lot of design work for Warner Brothers music. He’s a Grammy Award-winning designer who’s designed for Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Roots…some phenomenal groups.”
两人有一个“疯狂的想法”,他们会在craft beer industry one day. “Fast forward to today he designs for Mountains Walking, Coda Brewing, Eppig Brewing, Roadhouse Brewing, and Erosion Wine. He is probably one of the more impactful packaging designers I've ever met in my life,” says Hunter.
由于消息传递起到如此重要的作用，因此皇冠和啤酒花计划最终切换到印刷罐与袖子罐，以最大化Company Ethos和每个食谱的复制的打印区域。
Packaging is performed in-house at the two California facilities. Currently, they package approximately four recipes a month, 250 to 300 cases per recipe.
When choosing contract partners, it was key that they had packaging in-house to remain as cost-effective as possible. “Craft beer is not cheap, so as many things that we could keep in-house just really allowed us to redirect those funds to phenomenal creative and digital marketing,” he says.
Digital marketing
Ashburn推动了创造性的战略，在Dre和Sonos的节拍中带来了创造性的努力，更多。One striking thing about Crowns & Hops is the production value and frequency of its social media posts and videos. (Check out @CrownsandHops.) While both Ashburn and Hunter contribute, Ashburn’s extensive background in marketing production serves as the cornerstone. Hunter notes, “She helped build the internal creative team at Beats by Dre, worked at Sonos, and prior to that, she produced commercials for major marketing and advertising companies. So consumer products—framing them and presenting them to the community—is something that she's always been a part of.”
对于猎人来说，在家庭娱乐包装中为华纳兄弟，普遍，倾向等工作，他是他注意到他的注意，包装，预先出版社和完整的项目管理。他说：“我认为大多数人第一次与我们合作时，他们认为他们会得到家用的酿酒者，不知道如何定位或项目自己。但仁慈和我是非常有意的，具体的，并尽力在内部创建一个过程，允许该执行来联系人。“
Accessibility and opening doors
目前,所有的销售是通过他们的分销商and retail partners, partly because of COVID-19, but also to keep products accessible to communities of color. A transition to e-commerce will take place first, in Q2 of 2021.
Crowns & Hops holds its “8 Trill Pils” initiative, focused on achieving racial equity in craft beer by opening doors for the next generation. The8 Trill Pils Grant, supported by Brewdog, is a grant program that awarded a total of $100,000 to five Black-owned craft beer businesses, to provide financial support in the areas of business development, growth, and sustainability.
Teo’s journey to packaging and beyond
Hunter speaks fondly of his packaging journey. He started as a salesman at Kinko’s, selling so many copies that a small commercial printer took notice and hired him. He sold color copies during the day, learned commercial printing and pre-press in the afternoon, and went to school at night. He adds, “I was presenting to a group, and I'd run outside and go over these proof corrections, then I'd go back in and do a presentation then go back out and do more corrections. One of the guys in the class had been watching me and he pulled me aside one day saying, ‘We have a company that does entertainment, pre-press color correction, and printing, we could use you.’ With one meeting and about 30 days later, I was the new Universal Home Entertainment representative.”
Hunter relays a story of success despite the lack of diversity in the packaging industry during his time in home entertainment packaging. “I would bring my proofs to go over with the vendors. None of the other reps knew who I was—they assumed that I was the delivery boy,” he says. “It worked out great for me because I ended up going in and getting right into the client first every time. I would end up getting the next project before the other vendors came in because they didn’t realize I was talking to the client. And it took maybe about a year before they all realized that I was taking all their projects. By that time, I had expanded to Paramount, Fox, and Miramax, but I had a pretty good run due to the ignorance of some of my fellow salespeople in the printing and packaging industry.”
Hunter gives credit to Patrick Seeholzer (formerly of彩色服务in Monterey Park, CA) for taking him under his wing. “He and his brother, Ken, showed me the ropes of printing and packaging, things that I still carry with me today. I'm happy to say that he was one of our first investors when we were doing a crowdfunding campaign. Talk about emotional—when I saw Patrick’s name on our investor list, it rocked me. He taught me not only values in curating and keeping relationships and really honing my skills as a packaging professional, but also a ton of life lessons as well.”
