Flying Monkey Brewing Company -- When It Rains, It Pours
Brewery bounces back from flood that left it five feet under water
August, 1999by Brian Gustafson
In the brewing business, a simple commodity such as water can either be a treasured asset or a serious liability. In Flying Monkey's case, it turned out to be their worst nightmare. T'was a dark and stormy night. Rain lashed most of Kansas City in solid sheets. Merriam, Kansas, home of Flying Monkey was not spared. The water fell in record-setting amounts for so short a period of time. The water rose higher, higher, threatening the brewery, untilÉ
Flying Monkey is the brainchild of two old friends from Wichita, Robert Isler and Drew Jones, who worked together in Kansas City a few years ago. One day Robert left to join Breckenridge Brewing in Colorado. A few years later, the two friends reconnoitered and reunited to see if they could make a success of brewing back in Kansas City. At that point, the Kansas City area had only one brewery (Boulevard) and a large thirsty market just waiting for more craft brewed beers. So Robert moved back into town and opened up the brewery.
Brewing started in March of 1996, and by June, Flying Monkey was appearing in draft form around the Kansas City area. This continued for six months until a new bottling line was operating. Bottled beer started in 22-ounce bottles as an introductory promotion, and soon after the line started was turned to 12-ounce bottles, with the exception being a Holiday Ale, which is shipped in 22-ounce bottles.
"We had plenty of room to grow," noted Brewer John Jordan. "We were about to turn the corner and it was time for us to start growing. We could do about 4400 barrels a year, and we were about to bump that up. When we were first opened up we were carried by the Anheuser-Busch house, and later they decided to focus on AB products only so we were dropped, and that set us back a couple of months. But we started up again and have never shut down since -- until the flood hit"
"The flood happened on a Sunday night," Jordan explained, "right during a Chiefs game. You could see on the TV all the rain that was coming down. I happened to be at the brewery because I had to brew the next day, and I was harvesting some yeast while watching the first quarter of the game. After that I got in my car and the parking lot was just starting to get leveled with water. I didn't think anything about it so I left. I went home, watched the rest of the game, heard this noise in my basement, went down there and my basement was flooding. Right at that time Robert called me up. It was about 11:30 at night. He said, 'you need to start looking for a new job.' I asked him what he was talking about. He said 'I do not know if we're going to recover from this.' The brewery was five feet under water. He was standing at the end of the parking lot watching water gush out the garage doors. I can't even tell you what I felt -- it was just unbelievable. The bright beer tank was lying on the keg washer. It was pretty devastating. Then Robert called late that night and said he was over at Drew's house, where they were drinking some Monkeys, and they decided that they were going to be at work tomorrow to clean the place up."
"It is easy to say you are going to clean up after a flood," continued Jordan, "but it's hard work, and there was mud everywhere. What surprised me was that some people heard about it and they showed up -- people who I have not seen in months, and they showed up to help clean up. It took us a month to get up and brewing again and another three weeks to get product back on the shelves. Every motor went under water so we've had to take them in to get serviced while still getting the beer out. Every time I turn a pump on I wonder how long it will be until this one blows."
The beer certainly is good. Flying Monkey brews four brews all year, a Wheat, a Stout, a Pale Ale and an Amber, and brews a few seasonals including a Pilsner and the Holiday Ale.
"We went for a little sweeter beer on the amber," continued Jordan. "This is our flagship. It's pretty light. We use two caramel malts. We've gotten more accounts with our amber than any other beer. But our stout and our wheat are starting to grow in popularity as well."
The Pale Ale is Flying Monkey's hoppiest brew. It is brewed with Munich 10, Caramel 20 and a lot more pale malt than most. "We use mostly Perle hops, with some Willamette and East Kent Goldings," Added Jordan. "We use a lot more finishing hops than we do for the rest of our beers. It's got a real nice finish."
Flying Monkey labels are quite distinctive. They feature a reddish-brown monkey with wings and a wildly wicked Cheshire cat kind of smile. The Holiday Ale features the monkey with a white beard and Santa Claus hat. The Tomahawk Chop Ale has the monkey in a Chiefs uniform. The Wheat Beer has the monkey in farmers overalls. "The label on our Stout is a tribute to Jerry Garcia," explained Jordan. "He was missing his middle right finger and so is our monkey, and he has Garcia's beard. That's why it is called Four Finger Stout. We have a pretty good logo. We can do a lot of things with it."
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This story has a "bad news, good news" ending. Shortly after Brian submitted his copy, the Flying Monkey guys decided that the flood had been too much and sold out their entire operation to nearby Pony Express Brewing Company. The good news is that Pony Express will continue the Flying Monkey brands. We wish them all well in their future endeavors.
