It seems like residents can’t fling a rock in any direction without hitting a good brewery in Richmond. Yet it didn’t happen by chance.
It involved an area blessed with an ideal water supply, a spirit of collaboration and years of passion and trial and error in a quest to create the best tasting beer possible. The real starting point, however, was the home brew kit.
After Prohibition, the craft went dormant for close to 50 years. That changed on Oct. 14, 1978, when President Jimmy Carter signed a bill into law that included a provision legalizing home production of beer and wine for personal use. Then in May 2012, Virginia Senate Bill 604 was passed, allowing retail sales and sampling of beer on the premises of Virginia breweries.
After the bill’s passage, close to a dozen breweries sprang up in the area in the span of a few years, with more to follow. Many of those founders got their start by refining their craft at home.
However, interest in home brewing in Virginia might be cooling.
The majority of home brew shops in Richmond and Virginia have closed their doors within the past 10 years. Artisans Wine and Homebrew in Midlothian, The WeekEnd Brewer in Chester and The Brew Shop in Fredericksburg have all closed. Around the state, BrewLoco in Leesburg, MyLocal HomeBrew Shop in Falls Church and Southern Hills Homebrew Supply in Roanoke are also gone.
One of the last home brew supply shops in the Richmond area is Original Gravity, located at 6118 Lakeside Ave. It adjoins Final Gravity, a brewery that opened in 2012. Both are owned by Erin and Timmy Miller, who bought the business in November from former owners Tony Ammendolia and Jessica Harris and took over operations in January.
Timmy Miller says that every staff member but one is trained in homebrewing. Three staffers work on a rotating basis between the brewery and the home brew shop.
In addition to brewing equipment, Original Gravity also sells kits for making wine, mead and kombucha, all of which are increasingly offered at area breweries. But that doesn’t mean that the shop is bombarded by customers.
“Like all hobbies, it has its ups and downs,” Miller says. “Occasionally it levels off.” Seasonal weather is also a factor, he adds.
Despite the decline, home brew clubs in the Richmond area still hold meetings. The most well-known clubs in the area are the James River Homebrewers, which meets at Mekong on the second Wednesday of the month and Midlothian’s MASH (Mentoring Advanced Standards of Homebrewing), which meets on the second Thursday of the month at Extra Billy’s. But attendance has dipped in the last decade, some members say.
William Spiesberger, a Midlothian resident and a member-at-large of the James River Homebrewers for 21 years, says the club had 80 to 100 members at its peak before the craft brewing boom here, and 30 to 40 members now. A decline in membership occurs because some lose interest and some get busy with other aspects of their lives, he says. Another reason: the area produces such quality brews that people would rather buy them instead of making them.
Notable alumni of the James River Homebrewers who have helped build the area craft brew scene include former club president Chad Ritter, who founded Hidden Wit Brewery in Moseley. Another member, Bill Cavender of Black Heath Meadery, is opening his own brewery in February. Ammendolia, of Final Gravity and Original Gravity, was also once a member.
Spiesberger remembers how Artisans Wine and Homebrew, once located a half-mile from his house, went out of business during the pandemic. The owners began to take orders over the phone before eventually closing altogether.
“It’s a tough business, with very tight margins,” Spiesberger says.
While the store gets its share of out-of-towners, the relationship Miller has built with the locals in the 10 years he has worked at Original Gravity has worked in the store’s favor, he says. The discounts he gives club members help strengthen business — especially during “a brewing emergency,” as Spiesberger puts it, where a vital ingredient may have unexpectedly gone bad before a brew day.
“It makes me happy that customers keep returning, because it means that they’re refining their craft,” Miller says.
Nationally, the business model appears to be shifting toward online ordering, as larger companies can order products in bulk and sell them more cheaply. Spiesberger explains how, because much of their money is spent on equipment, home brewers try to save on the ingredients by ordering larger quantities online, or by purchasing grain from a dedicated store such as Murphy and Rude in Charlottesville.
Miller, meanwhile, prefers the personal touch. He believes the store’s advice on recipes and equipment, which has guided some of the area’s startup breweries, can help newcomers purchase the right sort of equipment for their price range and interests. Ordering through the store can also help customers avoid shipping costs.
Still, “many people will go online to look for a deal,” he says. “I don’t blame them.”
Miller, who bought his first home brew kit from Original Gravity after hearing an ad on the radio, finds it’s much easier to pick up the hobby than it was before. He cut his teeth on an “extract kit,” where the grains have already been rendered into sugar as a brown, sticky liquid contained in a plastic bag. From there, home brewers move on to “all grain brewing,” where they extract the sugars from the grain themselves after it’s milled and boiled.
“When I started, it was a real DIY process,” he says. “Now, the equipment is all-in-one. It’s really changed things.”
Regardless of the technological changes, Miller believes that the thrill of experimentation in creating one’s own beer is the magic ingredient that will keep home brewing relevant.
“It’s a hobby similar to golf, I think,” Miller says. “You can buy fancy clubs if you want, but you don’t have to. It can be as simple or as complicated as you want it to be.”
Original Gravity (6116 Lakeside Ave. B ) is open Tuesday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. and Sunday 11 a.m.-6 p.m.
