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From the taps to the stone

Oshawa beer brothers work to spread their passion for brew

Beer brothers

Matt Gibson, left, Jeff Dornan and Eric Dornan are the men behind Underdog’s Brewhouse, which makes the All or Nothing wheat beer, now available at the LCBO. The offering from the Oshawa beer aficionados is the first of many beers planned for the future. The group is also looking at establishing a physical brewery in Durham Region in the near future.

By Graeme McNaughton/The Oshawa Express

Two years ago, brothers Jeff and Eric Dornham were helping people make their own beer – now, they’re in the business of making the beer themselves.

And they have a cooler full of it in their Oshawa warehouse.

“My brother and I have been self-employed our whole lives. We had a sales agency that we owned that sold home brewing products to Lowes, Home Depot, Rona, Canadian Tire, Costco…pretty much every national retailer,” Jeff tells The Oshawa Express. “We were getting sick of that business after doing it for about five years, and said, ‘Let’s get into the beer business,’ so we started learning as much as we could.”

Then, in January 2014, Underdog’s Brewhouse was born.

After opening their Oshawa warehouse in March 2014, it was another four months before the brothers were selling their first beer in bars in Toronto.

The beer, All or Nothing, was born from a passion the Dornham brothers have.

“My brother and I came up with the recipe. We love wheat beers. We really love the German and the European aspect of it…we said, ‘How can we take that love for wheat beers, and kind of give it a new twist,’” Jeff says. “The Hopfenweisse is a good way of doing that because everyone loves these really hoppy (India Pale Ales) and pale ales, so this was kind of a way of blending a pale ale with a wheat beer. Only a handful of people have really done that in Ontario, so…it’s hard to be first in something, but we’re trying to be one of the newer guys or the earlier adopters of the style.”

Wheat beers are brewed using more wheat than a traditional beer, often giving it a cloudier appearance. The most popular wheat – or white beers, as they are sometimes called – are Rickard’s White and Hoegaarden.

However, Jeff says that compared to those larger beers, All or Nothing is more complex and, therefore, different than other products on the market.

“People will sometimes sip it and say that there’s a lot going on in this beer, and it’s kind of fun in that regard, as opposed to a more bland or less flavourable German wheat beer.”

From the tap to stores

When the Dornham brothers wanted to get their new beer out to market, it was far from an easy task.

To start, Jeff says they took it to several bars in Toronto to see if they would put it on tap to try to get some name recognition.

“It’s extremely challenging. You’re trying to convince someone…you’re brand new and they don’t know you from a hole in the wall,” he says, adding that 25 bars would later take them on.

Getting their beer into bars in Toronto was easier than it was closer to home in Oshawa and other places throughout Durham, Jeff says, as many bars in the area stick with the big name brands.

“The Durham Region had a lot of big beer bars, like the Molsons of the world, so it was very hard to crack that egg because it’s still a developing market out here, whereas downtown Toronto was easier. But a lot of those are rotational, so you’re not on tap for more than a few weeks at a time, so it’s hard to build a business around that.”

However, that later changed, with several bars in Oshawa now carrying the brew.

Underdog’s Brewhouse appeal would soon hit a wider market when, this past June, its beer began to be carried in more than 100 LCBO stores.

Again, like trying to get their beer into bars, it required a lot of footwork.

“(The LCBO has) an open call all through the year. They have different windows they buy for, just like any other national retailer. So we got in on a full-time listing, and we started that process at the tail end of last summer with them, so it took almost a full year going through their whole framework to get into the stores,” Jeff says. “Then for us, we actually have to go and sell to each LCBO individually, so we’ve gone and visited 125 stores so far.”

On top of that, All or Nothing is also now be carried in several Beer Stores through Durham Region and Toronto, with that number growing.

Looking ahead

Looking ahead, Jeff says the main plan right now for himself and his brother main plan is to move the beer’s production out of Etobicoke – it’s currently brewed on contract using the brother’s recipe and ingredients – and set up a brewery closer to home.

“The goal is to have an actual brick and mortar brewery in Durham Region in the next year and a half. It takes a little while to find a specific building,” Jeff says. “You either have a 1,000-square-foot unit in a strip plaza, or a 200,000-square-foot unit, and we need something in between.”

The brothers also plan to expand their offerings beyond just their All or Nothing beer, but still want to stay close to their favourite beer of all: wheat beers.

“We want to be known as Canada’s premier wheat beer,” Jeff says. “We always want to get creative with our beers, but we don’t want to get too crazy and do some obscene ingredients, but we wanted to give it a twist.”

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