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About BrewUnited

Once upon a time, a thirtysomething guy from Alabama got into homebrewing. He had so much fun with it that he found himself thinking about brewing for a socially unacceptible percentage of the day.

So, in an effort to constructively channel his enthusiasm, that guy decided to open a blog about his newfound hobby/passion/addiction, and he named it "BrewUnited". Before long, he began directing his programming skills into making calculators and other utilities for other brewers to use.

Then, in the summer of 2014, he got a silly idea. The guy had been actively conversing with other brewers online, and (obviously) loved to talk beer and brewing. However, he had never found a community that had everything that he really wanted in a homebrewing website. What if I founded such a community? he wondered.

And so, he reached out to a small group of brewers scattered all across the USA and Canada - brewers he knew to be not only knowledgeable about the craft, but also geniunely good people - and he pitched this idea. The idea of an extensive, inclusive community that encouraged collaboration and the exchange of brewing knowledge.

There would be a recipe database - and not just some collection of whatever ideas that might have popped into someone's head, but a way for members to effectively rate recipes they had brewed or drank, and a way for award winning recipes to be easily found. The database would be easily searchable, and would allow users to not only key their recipes, but to share them via BeerXML.

He would continue to personally blog, but more than that - any member would be able to post their own blog entries whenever they liked. What if that person already had a blog? Great! They could make a guest post and cross promote it!

There would be a message board, of course; what community doesn't have a way for members to communicate? But this message board would be welcoming and friendly, dedciated to respectful discussion about the hobby, and free from the petty politics that so often plague internet forums. There would be a place for newbies to share their infection worries, a place for vets to discuss the finer points of water chemistry, places for members to promote their ongoing projects/blogs/interests, and places for brewers of all stripes to share and converse in a troll-free setting.

Of course, the utilities would continue to expand. More calculators, more tools, more ingredient references - these would all find their way onto the site.

The possibilities kept presenting themselves. There could be an exchange for yeast strains, for swapping homebrews. Perhaps one day, an app or two would be doable?

But at some point, the guy had to move from dreaming to doing. The group of brewers were supportive of the idea at its core, and so, development and testing began.

And now? Well, now, BrewUnited has grown and changed. The site is no longer about one guy and his brewing. The site now truly is a community of homebrewing - by homebrewers. There are no membership dues, no premium content hiding behind paid portals.

If that sounds like something that you'd like to be a part of, what are you waiting for? Join today!