Some people like beer. Some people love beer. Kevin Peil lives beer.

In late 2006, 44-year-old Peil announced that he was opening Tri-City Brewing in Bay City. Bay City already had a top-notch restaurant/brewpub in Lumber Barons, but for the first time in nearly 60 years, beer was going to be brewed and distributed in the Tri-Cities.

Peil lives in Auburn with his wife of 20 years, Laurie, and their two sons—Jeff, 15, and Nick, 11. The two began dating shortly after graduating high school and maintained a long-distance relationship throughout college. While Peil was earning a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the University of Michigan, Laurie was earning a bachelor’s degree in education from Central Michigan University.

“We never lived in the same city while we were dating,” Peil says. It wasn’t until they were married that Laurie left Bay City and moved to Pittsburgh. For the next three years, Peil did his doctoral work at the University of Pittsburg while Laurie taught school. After receiving his doctorate in chemical engineering, the couple returned to Bay City.

Peil took a position working in research and development at Dow Chemical and has spent the past 17 years working to develop new products and procedures. When asked about the work he has done with Dow, he admits modestly that he isn’t sure how many patents he holds (five, according to the United States Patent Office).

It was a Father’s Day gift more than 10 years ago that is shaping Peil’s life today. Laurie, now a preschool director and teacher at St. John’s Lutheran Church, bought him a home-brewing kit. With his background in chemistry, she thought it would make the perfect gift. She was right.

“I knew with that first batch—and this sounds cliché—but I knew that this was exactly what I was going to do someday,” says Peil. “It’s every home-brewer’s dream to have his own brewery.”

“I couldn’t get the brewery out of my head. I wasn’t going to go the rest of my life wondering, ‘What if?’ I knew I couldn’t do it alone so I created a private-equity sale,” Peil says. “I got 30 people to buy into the company. Once I let go of control, that’s when it really started happening.”

Paul Popa, who has been brewing for 15 years, works down the hall from Peil at Dow Chemical. He says that mutual friends mentioned Peil’s plans to open a brewery and after meeting Peil, it was clear that the brewery was more than a whim.

“Kevin had a good, solid business plan,” says Popa, who bought in and serves on the board of directors.

Knowing that opening a brewery with only home-brewing experience was not a sound plan, Peil spent months researching schools that offered brewing programs and settled on Doemens Academy in Munich, Germany. Most appealing about the program was that it offered classroom instruction and the hands-on brewery experience Peil was looking for.

By late 2006, Tri-City Brewing was up and running. In January 2007, it released Phoenix Golden Ale (named in tribute to Bay City’s long-closed Phoenix Brewing Company). The second offering, Phelan Irish Red, was released in May of 2007, and won a bronze medal at Frankenmuth’s World Expo of Beer—a major accomplishment for a new brewery.

Attending events like the World Expo of Beer gave Peil the opportunity to network with other breweries around the state. Peil says that the Michigan microbrewing industry is cooperative, not competitive. He doesn’t believe that people buying Tri-City Brewing beer hurt any other brewery, any more than buying somebody else’s beer hurts Tri-City Brewing.

“The more good beer that’s out there, the more they will seek out good beer,” Peil says.

“I was surprised by the amount of people wanting craft beer,” agrees Marty Rapnicki, who came to Bay City one year ago to take over as director of brewery operations with Lumber Barons. Rapnicki, an award-winning brewer with more than 10 years of experience as a professional brewer, serves as vice president of the Michigan District of the Master Brewers Association of the Americas. He echoed Peil’s sentiments about the local brewing community, “It’s a close, tight-knit community.”

Peil’s plans for Tri-City Brewing have set the course for a bright future. The brewery bottling line will be installed in fall of 2007 (beer was initially available in draft kegs only). Phoenix and Phelan will be available in six-packs and cases. The bottled beers will then be available throughout the region and the state in stores as well as in restaurants and bars where there are only a limited number of taps available. In addition, the company is selling half-gallon refillable growlers, which can be filled at the brewery with the beer of your choice. It also sells gift packs which will include Tri-City Brewing pint glasses, one growler, and a coupon for one free growler fill at the brewery.

With so much on the horizon, Peil cites limited time as his biggest challenge, but making time for his family comes above everything else. “My kids are at home and my sons play every sport imaginable. I still coach Little League,” he says.

Laurie Peil worries about the stress and strain that two full-time jobs bring, but she knows brewing is not a job to her husband. “When you love something,” she says, “it’s not stressful. It’s a release.”

“It’s the ultimate promotion…putting yourself in charge of your own company,” Peil says. “I’m the president, the marketing guy, and I sweep the floors.”

When asked about the unusual path his life has taken now that he is in his forties, he says, “Some guys dye their hair blond, buy a Corvette, and get an eighteen-year-old girlfriend. I opened a brewery. I kind of like this. I like what I’ve got here.”

 Article posted here with permission from publisher.  All rights reserved by publisher. (2007)