Website

hashigozake.com (or hashigozake.co.nz) is up and running. Give it a go.

News

It's been a while since I posted. Lots of stuff in motion, not many results. Here's something at least - some artwork done by Sean Golding. Part of a pile of work he did including interior design concepts, branding and even a T-shirt design.

Tokyo

I just blew a pile of frequent flier points and visited Tokyo. It was mainly for personal reasons but it did give me a chance to visit the Baird Nakameguro Taproom during its first anniversary celebrations and talk to Bryan about making Hashigo Zake his first outlet in the southern hemisphere. I got to try the Colombus IPA, Four Sisters Spring Bock and Temple Yuzu Ale. No disappointments.

More Beer Tourism

I'm just back from Xxxxxx, where I met the local importer of yyyyyy, zzzzzz, qqqqqq and of course kkkkkk. Finding a decent beer in Xxxxxx was just about impossible, unless you were in the know, which I guess is true of most cities in this part of the world. Once I did get solid information about a well stocked bar I made my way along at around 8pm on Friday night and found it closed for a private function. Bit of a pet hate that. Take all your regular and prospective customers and tell them to fuck off in one go. For the record this is something I promise to never do at Hashigo Zake.

Speaking of Hashigo Zake itself, it's been a couple of weeks of dire warnings and scares. Rents for hospitality businesses in Wellington are going up just when they should be going down, the accountant and the bank and talking like undertakers and the ideal location just isn't appearing. Meanwhile distribution opportunities are lying there waiting to be pounced on. So it's increasingly likely that the next step will be to do that - import and distribute. It was always part of the plan to do this on the side and maybe let it grow, but it now looks like a useful stepping stone and sensible business move.

The Freehouse

This is a brand new Nelson bar whose "soft opening" I snuck into. Two things are notable about the place. One is that they are, as the name suggests, a free house. The second is that they are occupying a former church. It's certainly a visually striking place, although with only a few tables and a few customers it felt a little empty when I was there.

Progress

The company has been registered, with me as the sole shareholder and director. Registering the trademark is under way but it sounds like that takes several months.

Yesterday I went on a one day course as preparation for gaining the "LCQ" qualification, which is a prerequisite for getting a bar manager's certificate. Although apparently I can't get the bar manager's certificate until there's a real bar to manage, which seems a little circular.

Off for preliminary talks with the bank tomorrow.

Lighthouse Brewery

Dick Tout is still making beer, 200 litres at a time, under the Lighthouse name. Although he has moved from Nelson to a kind of industrial estate in Stoke. The pilsener was much as I remembered it and he also sold me a bottle of "Nelson Victory Ale", a very English pale ale with a distinctive biscuity malt flavour. In spite of the tiny batch size - or maybe because of it - he also does some contract brewing for 666 in Blenheim.