A Letter to the Alma Mater

Below is a letter written in response to a request for a few things, including some summer internships for some Bates College students.  Before anyone who knows me gets too excited, it's not that kind of letter.  I had been known in a past life to sometimes write overly...animated...letters to some of the staff at Bates, including one particularly heated exchange I had with a certain person referenced in the following letter.

Those letters aside, as I was proofreading this behemoth, I realized I should post it here because I stand behind what I said and could use any support I can get.  If any former or current students are reading this (Bates or anywhere else), I strongly encourage you to make your voice heard if you're heading down some sort of entrepreneurial road.  Shout it from the rooftops and make a scene, because that's the only way your institution of higher learning will maybe learn something themselves.

*side note - In the following letter, 'short term' is in reference to a program we had to take at least 2 years at Bates.  It was 5 weeks in duration, after the school year was over in May, where your liver was tested up to and far beyond its limits while your mind was massaged by something they called "class", where you would show up to a place where the lights we dim and you were allowed to do art, listen to music, or "learn" about something not considered important enough for a real class.  Don't tell anyone in administration, but the students actually found a way to use this time to partake in some less than exemplary experiences.

LETTER:

Sounds good <name>.  We'd love to get some Bates kids thinking about entrepreneurship.  Which brings me to a related question/offer.

When we were seniors a couple years ago, we came up with this idea to start a hard cider company sometime late fall/early winter, at which point there was no question what we would be doing upon graduation.  We held meetings at night in that giant lecture room in basement of pgill where we made charts and graphs and plans and dreams.  When it came time for short term, words can not explain how ready we were to start our business.  We figured that for our short term class, with all of us already having our mandatory credits taken care of, we could do a (group) independent study with the guidance of any number of professors from bio/chem on the product side (we've brewed beer in class to learn about the fermentation process) to econ on the business side.  When I approached a certain department chair about this, she told me that Bates doesn't do business class, and to basically take a hike (which, coincidentally, was a short term offering (seriously, you went on hikes and took pictures)).

My first two short terms were scenic painting, where I sat on alumni walk and painted for 3 hours a week, and soda firing**, where I messed around on a pottery wheel for a few hours a week.  I thought it was pretty backwards that I was required to do these art classes, for which I had no passion and just wanted credit for hanging out with my friends for 5 weeks in the spring, and when I did have a passion for something, and sought help and tutelage from those who are paid to do so, I was flat out denied.  Instead, we worked on our own.  I didn't take a class and instead chose to be a campus hermit, getting let into my house by roommates to sleep, and sneaking into Commons for meals (sorry...).  Needless to say we could have been more productive with some guidance.

Anyways, I'm not sure if this is even in your domain, but I'd like to do my part in making sure this doesn't happen to anyone else.  We'd love to be there for any future students who are in our position.  I know we're not exactly qualified to teach in any traditional sense, but drawing from my experience, I would have jumped at the opportunity to have the guidance of someone with a couple years under their belt, rather than being forced into a class for which there is no passion, or even worse, bumming around campus with zero responsibility and too much free time  (I believe 24/7 qualifies as too much). 

My point is, I STRONGLY recommend getting some sort of option for those with an entrepreneurial spirit.  If that's not possible, let us help.  I have learned more over the past 16 months than any other time in my life.  If this were to go down in flames, I have already taken enough from this experience to give me the confidence to go do anything I want.  I think it's not only fair that other Bates students should be afforded this opportunity, I think it would do great things for a lot of people.  In a perfect world, Bates would have a budget for an Entrepreneur class over short term where students could actually get a chance to make a difference on their own, create jobs, and at the very least, gain some semblance of real life experience.

Anyhow...penny for my thoughts I guess.  If you find this rambling cohesive and sensible, but maybe you aren't the person to make this call, could you do me a huge favor and forward this along to someone who might be able to do something?

Thanks for reading my novel, and go Bobcats!
Ross

** secondary note about soda firing that I didn't include in the letter.  My friend and I would show up to this class, mess around on the pottery wheels for a little bit making weird shapes with the clay, then toss it in the compost mix when we were done, never actually making anything to be sent to the kiln.  Near the end of the semester, our professor called us into his office for private meetings.  We were individually informed that both of our performances were shockingly unproductive and in turn, we would be unhappy with the grades we were likely to receive unless we turned it around.  Those grades were C-.  Our professor was apparently unaware that short term is pass fail.  Anything above an F got us our credit.  We didn't turn it around.  And for those counting, if you take the amount Bates costs for 4 years ($258,000) and divide it by the number of classes taken, 34, you get a value of $7,588.23.  For pottery class.  Also the reason my children (girls included)  will be punting footballs from the day they can walk.  Two words: full ride.

--DOWNEAST

Sediment and Fill Height Answered

We have gotten a few questions about sediment at the bottom of cans and fill heights.  Hopefully I can explain both sufficiently.  Feel free to give us a call (207-200-7332) if you have any further questions.

SEDIMENT:  When there's some sediment at the bottom of the can, it is simply apple particles that have fallen out of solution.  In looking at filtered vs unfiltered, we had to weigh two options.  Using a filter, we could have a "perfect" looking cider, where all the small particles were strained out, although half the flavor would come with those particles, or, we could leave it unfiltered, and get a full-on flavor but have to deal with the sediment.  We chose the latter, with hopes that you, the consumer would appreciate the sacrifices that go into leaving a product unfiltered.  Believe me when I say it would be much easier to use a filter, and not have any questions/concerns regarding sediment in cans, or the occasional sludge keg.  But this, along with our decision to use real juice, is the reason that many people love Downeast Cider.  Authenticity can not be faked, especially in the mind of a discerning consumer.  We love hearing "this tastes like it came right off the farm!" rather than "this is some sterile shit!"  One day, when we have (a lot) more money, we can pay a team of food scientists to solve this problem without harming quality, but that day is still well ahead of us.

FILL HEIGHT:  This is a problem that hopefully we've fixed, although I'm sure there are still some of the "high fill" cans out there.  Our current canning equipment is VERY low tech, and the fill height is determined by us and a little knob/stem.  The high fills were just a novice move.  We filled those things to the brim and then capped and sealed.  After making a few hundred cases like this, the reports started coming in, so we brought the fill height down.  Those good fill heights should be hitting the market soon.

--Downeast

Full Cans and PBR's

First things first, let's address the full cans.  We seem to have sparked a new group that I'll call "the fill height is too damn high" party.  It's pretty funny, but yes, the fill height for our first cans was too damn high.  We've lowered it, so there's no need to worry about cider spraying out any more.  But hey, at least the biggest issue right now is that you're getting more than you paid for.  That's not so bad...right?

Now to the more important issues...we need a company chef really bad.  Or a live-in mom to make us lunches.  Tyler's mom bought us 4 huge tubs each of peanut butter, peanuts, jelly (strawberry, not grape bc we're not communists), and Ritz crackers.  That's all we eat now.  To have the best part of your day be the 15 minutes of eating the same peanut butter and Ritz (PBR) sandwich that you've had all week is not a way to go through life...not a way at all.

On a positive note, people seem to really enjoy our cider, thanks for all the positive feedback!

I'm too tired to be witty or interesting, so here is a big hat.  It's funny.

--Downeast

Awesome Failure

Roller coaster of a day today.  Got into the mill before our target 6:30 this morning, which rarely happens thanks to the traffic in Somerville, and partly Cambridge, then we tanked...hard:

• Realized we left our glycol chiller plugged in, condenser is burned out, no chiller.
• Open tank valve, no flow, we realized the condenser has burned out very recently and left behind frozen lines.
• After reconfiguring the tubing, we start canning, making amazing time for our first few cases.
• I believe the last words before the canning machine broke were, "time me on this case, I think we're crushing"
• We spent the next 2.5 hours taking apart the machine (unlike Watchusett, we have no engineers), going to Home Depot, and getting very ornery.
• Finally got going just before 11.
• Canning line breaks again, 30 min. delay
• All 4.5 CO2 tanks run out at once, have to go to gas store, 45 min. delay.
• When we eventually got going, we invented a new technique for canning, saving 1-2 seconds per can, which is a couple hours per session...

All in all, a fantastic day.

15 hours from end to end on the day, 120 cases, new record.  Going for 150 cases tomorrow to open up Friday afternoon for golf and shenanigans. Anyone wanna join?  Call us.  We have a company phone number now.  207 2007 DEC (get it? DownEast Cider).

as some friends once said,
Peace, Love and Cider
--Downeast

Can Update

Remember when we said we were going to have cider in cans in June?  Very naive.  Big swing and miss.  Not even close.  Let's chalk that one up as lesson # 324 on over-promising and under-delivering.  Message received: when planning any project, triple the cost, quadruple the time, raise the number of expected headaches to the power of 10, and then count yourself lucky if you can even hit that mark.

Our current status is:

We have our new canning line (VERY, VERY, and I cannot express enough how VERY underwhelming our output efficiency will be with this bad boy,  but we still have a little drool going when we look at it).

We have our new keg filler/cleaner, which should cut a 12 hour fill session down to 2.  Words don't begin to explain how much of an improvement this is.

We have a massive pile of cans (that's less than half of them).

We have a fresh batch of cider just dying to suit up and get in the game.

The last step is having a rep from our can supplier come by (Monday or Tuesday) to make sure everything goes smooth with the seaming (If you don't know, the can comes in two parts, body, and end, with the end being the top of the can.  The can is filled, the end is put on, and the two are seamed together).  If that is successful, we will spend the next week doing nothing but canning cider.  Just writing that makes me giddy.

We hope you're thirsty, because it's coming...

-Downeast

Kegging: The Extinct Method

I was just writing an update of our can situation, and I got really sidetracked explaining our process for kegging up to this point (hopefully it's been replaced by our new keg filler/cleaner).  It got really long, so I figured I'd give it its own section.  Without further ado, this is the story of our stupid, disorganized, poorly thought-out, ill-put-together, and all-around terribly constructed method for cleaning and filling kegs:

1:  fill a small tank with water
2:  hook up a large hose through a pump, and down an absurd number of (very slightly) incrementally smaller hosing to eventually pump into a keg through a sort of broken (just broken enough to make you swear at it, but not enough to buy a new one) coupler.  *Note: make sure the hoses are attached ever so delicately, so the slightest brush or kick knocks one of the peices apart, sending whatever is in the hose flying around the room like an angry snake.  One person will jump on the hose, the other will panic uncontrollably before figuring out how to shut off the pump.

3:  Shake now-heavy keg violently.  *Note: make sure to use a lot of back, as everyone knows a strong core is key to a fit body.
4:  repeat with 100 kegs
5:  Attach hose to carbon dioxide tank, fit kinda broken coupler onto keg, flip heavy keg upside down onto a couple of wobbling standing kegs (note* make sure to let the 50 lb keg fall on your fingers every now and again so as to keep your senses sharp), turn on CO2, wait a couple minutes for keg to drain, turn off CO2, flip over again, remove coupler, grab new keg, reattach coupler, repeat.
6:  Once all 100 kegs are filled and drained, repeat entire fill, shake, drain process with caustic cleaning solution that you have mixed up in another tank (note* the caustic solution is like soap on steroids, and will slowly eat through your skin, so make sure to wear gloves to trap the caustic water in your marinating mitts so as to be sure you are getting full chemical exposure all the time)
7:  Now you're done
8:  Just kidding, do the whole thing over again with water.  Every damn keg
9:  NOW you're done
10:  Just kidding, do the whole thing over again with sanitizer.  Every damn keg.  Also, make sure that every once in a while you accidentally put your head over the concentrated sanitizing solution and take a big, hearty breath.  This way you'll have a rough approximation of what it might feel like to suck a balloon full of glass shards into your skull.
11:  Enough's enough, you're done
12:  Nope.  Do that whole thing again with water.
13:  Now you're fingers are bruised, your hands are oddly slippery and feel like they're covered in soap (don't worry, they're not, it only feels that way because the caustic has burned through your dead skin...and live skin), your back is as strong as Larry Legend's, you've sweat through your clothes, and you're covered with all sorts of cleaning chemicals because the hose fell apart 10 times.  You're ready to fill!


Without going into detail, filling is slightly less frustrating (you're covered in delicious hard cider instead of cleaner), takes just as long (6-8 mins per fill for 100 kegs), and while your fingers get a break, your back just picked up landscaping duty because a full keg weighs more than Tyler.  Try picking up Tyler 40 times, moving him across the room, flipping him upside down, and balancing him on a pallet. 

Who wants an unpaid internship!

We're going to do this more

Sooooo....we completely stopped writing blog posts.  Not really sure why, but we just did.  I could blame it on being busy, but that's a lame excuse.  Unless you are doing essential tasks from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep, which no one does, you are saying "everything else in my day is more important, including the good hour spent looking at weird stuff on the internet, like pictures of girls with Steve Buscemi's eyes"  So I say to you all, yes, at some point I made the decision to watch this honey badger video rather than tell people what we're doing.  I'm sorry.

To catch everyone up on what's been happening with Downeast Cider House would take longer than I'm willing to write, and longer than you're willing to read, so I'll be brief:

Cans

Now that you're caught up, let me give you a sampling of how simple of a task we have in achieving what we have been referring to as our next "platform" of production.  We have a certain amount of fermentation capacity.  We want to take that cider and put it into kegs and cans.  There is more demand than we can supply.  We have cider ready to go, 500+ kegs, 130,000+ cans, a keg filler/cleaner, and a canning line.  Simple, right?  Then why aren't we at the canning line, selling cider, cashing checks, buying more cider, and repeating?  At the moment, three simple words: single phase power.  Due to power requirements on some of our equipment, we need to adjust some of our electrical work.  I won't say how much it costs, but the last time I felt such a swift, symbolic kick to the groin was February 5, 2012.

Anyways, like always, we remain optimistic that we will have cans available in August.  We couldn't be more excited to spend 12 hours a day doing this.

Last but not least, I made a very serious promise last night.  If at some point in my life my net worth is 7 figures, I promise to drop everything and devote my entire livelihood toward the charitable improvement of what might be the most crucial aspect of quality of life as we know it.  I'm talking of course about developing a washer/dryer that does not require a manual switch to the dryer.  Over 40 years ago we put people on the moon, but I'm still dropping my clean clothes on the dirty floor during the transfer.  If we have this, these, and this*, I think we deserve an all in one washer/dryer.  If no one else will do it, I will**.

* - I'm not a hard-boiled egg guy, but I'm not sure how I've made it to this point eating egg-shaped eggs.  I'm a cuber from here on out

** - Does it exist, because I can't find it.

UPDATE - http://www.homedepot.com/buy/appliances/laundry/lg-electronics/4-2-cu-ft-iec-capacity-front-load-washer-dryer-combo-24371.html