Beer cost

Get advice on making beer from raw ingredients (malt, hops, water and yeast)
guypettigrew
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Beer cost

Post by guypettigrew » Fri Jun 04, 2021 11:05 am

In a cider thread we got a bit diverted into talking about how much it costs to brew our own beer. I thought it might be interesting to start a thread on this in the grain brewing section. Here's what I've just posted in the cider thread.

Just costed out the beer I'm drinking at the moment. 52p/pint to include grains, hops and electricity. This cost doesn't include water treatment (CRS and salts), yeast (re used WLP 001) or auxiliary and isinglass finings. These would push it to about 61p/pint.

And no allowance for equipment costs.

So, not quite as low as 10% of pub prices, but not far off. Plus it usually tastes better!

Have you ever costed yours? What does it work out at?

Guy

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Re: Beer cost

Post by Moley » Fri Jun 04, 2021 3:14 pm

Just dropped in for the first time in a year, having just brewed a Centennial smash last Monday.

5kg Maris Otter £5.60
100g Centennial £5.65
West Coast yeast £2.75
Approx. £2 for gas and leccy

Sixteen quid all in, 40p a pint.

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MashBag
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Re: Beer cost

Post by MashBag » Fri Jun 04, 2021 5:46 pm

Good shout Guy!

I am at 29p per pint. But I think that is 'cos I buy sacks of malt and 1kg hops (& recycle crown caps)

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Re: Beer cost

Post by WalesAles » Fri Jun 04, 2021 10:45 pm

MashBag wrote:
Fri Jun 04, 2021 5:46 pm
(& recycle crown caps)
Mash,
You tight Git! :D
Do the caps seal OK?
Obviously or you wouldn`t do it.
Hmmmmm, never thought of that, didn`t think it would work.


WA

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vacant
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Re: Beer cost

Post by vacant » Fri Jun 04, 2021 10:46 pm

Current six months ingredients 400g hops, 25Kg Golden Promise plus 3Kg crystal - £65 order from the Malt Miller gives around 215 pints = 30p, remember to include delivery. A couple of quid per brew for electricity and water adds 2p. I usually scavenge Proper Job yeast and step up with a litre of wort frozen after the previous brew (free). 90% RO water and 10% very hard tap water so only a bit of gypsum required,

I used shiny equipment for two years, bought second hand and sold for as much or a little more. I've done over 100 AG brews, mostly in a plastic boiler, Tesco kettle elements, BIAB. I guess I could sell that for half the new price - equipment write off can't add more than 2p. I must add the cost of running a fridge I was given, set at 18C when fermenting/4C cold crash/13C for beer storage. I bottle to donated PET bottles, loads of Starsan left that I bought years ago.

Let's say under 40p.

Good thread, I think I worked out my cost per pint when I started AG at 30p/pint. Remind me again in ten years time!

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Re: Beer cost

Post by MashBag » Sat Jun 05, 2021 7:05 am

Mash,
You tight Git! :D
Thank you. But I am now "eco-friendly" 🤣🤣

Surprisingly well. As long as you can get them off flat (some bottle openers bend then).

I flash boil them before use. If you recycle your glass too, you might find sizes vary. A nice click ensures a good seal. Test by inverting.
Probably recap 1 bottle per brew & chuck 1 or 2caps per brew.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by guypettigrew » Sat Jun 05, 2021 6:13 pm

Here's how I worked my cost out;
  • 4kg Fawcetts Maris Otter £6.48 (Bought from MM as 5 x 5kg)
  • 1kg Vienna malt £2.48
  • 300g Pale Crystal malt £0.57
  • 200g Flaked Maize £0.28
  • 20g Azacca hops £1.18
  • 30g Amarillo hops £2.25
  • 30g Williamette hops £1.79
  • 70g bitter orange peel £0.95
  • 30g Amarillo pellets (at flame out) £1.95
  • Electricity approx £3.00
Total cost £20.93p, or about 52p/pint for a beer getting on for 5.3% at 44 EBUs.

If I'd made a 4% beer at 35 EBUs it would have been a lot less!

Guy

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Re: Beer cost

Post by MashBag » Sun Jun 06, 2021 5:19 pm

Do you include yeast & priming sugar?

A few years ago when I started doing costings, caps, were very high on the list.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by guypettigrew » Sun Jun 06, 2021 5:42 pm

MashBag wrote:
Sun Jun 06, 2021 5:19 pm
Do you include yeast & priming sugar?
Yeast is WLP, which I reuse 3 or 4 times, so would add a couple of quid to each brew. I haven't primed my beers for many years. They go in the King Keg after a few days in the FV and have enough sugar left to condition naturally.

Also haven't included the cost of water treatment and finings. As in the first post, these bits and pieces would push the cost to about 61p/pint.

Guy

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Re: Beer cost

Post by Meatymc » Wed Jun 09, 2021 12:33 pm

Did an 'in depth' on this last month and panned out at between £0.40 and £0.60 per 500ml bottle depending on Yeast (scavanged/dry/liquid).

Included ingredients, treatment, heating/cooling, water (inc washing out etc), fermentation and bottling - only thing missing was equipment. I do save on bittering hops as I grow my own.

Water usage by the way - as covered in another recent thread - meant 3.5L to 500ml brewed but the vast majority of the 3L difference is recycled for watering the garden.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by LazyBrewer » Wed Jul 14, 2021 11:22 pm

I'd agree about 60p per pint for ingredients. If you add in the cost of equipment though - Grainfather, corny kegs, fermentation vessels, CO2 regulators, CO2 cylinders, soda stream cylinders, pipework, shed etc etc, I reckon I'm currently looking at about £30 a pint. I might get it down below £1 if I live to be 95 and sup 8 pints a day.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by Fingar » Sat Jul 17, 2021 7:49 am

I store all of my recipes on a spread sheet and have a 'program' which calculates the cost of each brew. I buy my base malt in bags of 25kg. In addtion to grains, hops and yeast, the spreadsheet also includes bottle caps, steriliser and water addtions, but does not include the use of electricity. Being a lucky boy, my water is on rates so that is also not included. As I buy over £70 of supplies at a time, delivery is 'free'. My brewing equipment is cheap as chips: plastic buckets and a cool box. Here are some of the typical costs which I have calculated:

- English Pale from Greg Hughes: 26p per 500ml
- Timothy Taylor Landlord from Wheeler: 33p per 500ml
- Proper Jobbish: 43p per 500ml
- Harveys-ish Best: 27p per 500ml
- Riggwelter from Wheeler: 30p per 500ml
- Kolsch from Greg Hughes: 50p per 500ml
- Chandlers from leedsbrew on JBK: 40p per 500ml
- Golden Pippin from somewhere on interweb: 30p per 500ml
- Schlafly US Pale Ale (4.5%ABV) from interweb: 41p per 500ml

Buying base malt in 25kg bags, as an example, the English Pale uses 3.7kg = £4.73. The Kolsch would have used 3kg or 500g bags of German grains along with a German yeast which bumps of the cost.

I planned to do a Dusseldorf Alt Bier from Greg Hughes: if I had used the hops (Spalt Select) as quoted in the recipe, that would have been £7.00, add that to a the cost of them exotic foreign Pilsner grains, and the brew would have cost 88p per 500ml. Now I have lived in Yorkshire far too long to be paying that sort of money for homebrew!

For British styles, I use split packs of Wyeast or good old dry yeast from Wilko. US styles will use Fermentis US05 yeast. I have not factored in the cost of DME for a starter.

Cheers... Fingar

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Re: Beer cost

Post by charlie » Mon Jul 19, 2021 1:02 pm

You should be buying your malt from a local brewery.
I pay £20 a sack and that's only because we can't be bothered getting change from a £20, I think that the actual cost should be £18.

Lovely people as well.

That and reusing yeast definitely keeps costs down.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by Rookie » Mon Jul 19, 2021 3:51 pm

guypettigrew wrote:
Fri Jun 04, 2021 11:05 am
And no allowance for equipment costs.
Guy
A lot of people see equipment cost and flinch, not taking into account that $50 for a brew pot is not $50 every batch and if the pot lasts for 100 batches it breaks down to 50¢ per batch and if it lasts for 1,000 batches it's 5¢ a batch.
I'm just here for the beer.

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Re: Beer cost

Post by IPA » Mon Jul 19, 2021 4:40 pm

I sell beer for one pound a pint and over the last twenty years since we have lived in France this has paid for my equipment many times over. I have more customers than I can supply. :lol:
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