Welcome to our “Meet The Brewer” series! Where we interview brewers in Pennsylvania, from breweries small to large. Let us know if you know anyone who should be featured, email us at info@breweriesinpa.com.

Suburban Brewing Company first opened in February of 2018 at 2536 Conestoga Avenue in Honey Brook, PA. They utilized a 1 BBL brewhouse and had 8 beers on tap. In June of 2021, Suburban opened a brand new location just 5 miles down the road on 322 in Honeybrook at 3041 Horseshoe Pike. In this new space, they have a brand new 10 BBL brewhouse, a kitchen, 2nd-floor lounge, patio, and 12 taps of fresh beer.

Corey Ross is co-owner and brewer at Suburban Brewing Company. Read more to find out his introduction to craft beer, where he sees the craft beer industry heading, and more!

What was your introduction to craft beer?

My intro to craft beer exposure probably started with my family. We lived outside of Reading, PA and my family were real big Yuengling drinkers when there wasn’t much craft beer available to them in the ’80s. Then as I got older and went to Grateful Dead shows in the late 80s & 90’s I discovered a ton of west coast craft beer that was being sold in the lot. Sierra Nevada, Pete’s Wicked Ale, Sammy Smith, Rogue were all eye-opening, tasty & made the whole Dead show experience really special. I got spoiled at an early age & when microbreweries in the greater Philly area started opening up in the mid 90’s I was primed to enjoy all that great beer. Yards, Victory, Iron Hill, Dogfish Head, Stoudts & Troegs really brought that craft beer magic I experienced at Dead shows to my living room.

How did you get started as a brewer?

I got started as a brewer in ’96 when a buddy got me a job at a brew-on-premise/brewery. I started off as a brew coach helping customers understand the brewing process and ingredients then helped brew for wholesale. The brewery I worked for opened a BOP/brewery in Kansas City, MO so I moved out there and helped build the brewery & brew beer for restaurants & bars in KCMO.

What style allows you to be the most creative, and why?

I tend to find creativity in every style of beer which probably isn’t a good answer to the question. I think with the variety of brewing ingredients that are available, there’s opportunity to be creative in every beer we brew at Suburban. We’re constantly looking to challenge ourselves as brewers and to challenge our customer’s tastes. I guess that’s why there aren’t too many styles we haven’t brewed in our 4 years at SBC. We’ve been extremely lucky to have kept our 1bbl system as we upgraded to a 10bbl last June & our brewer Justin keeps churning out some great & unique small-batch brews.

What was the first beer you ever brewed, and what did you learn from it?

I’ve been fortunate to have a lot of “firsts” brewing. Homebrewing my first beer was after the brewery I worked for closed & I still needed that creative outlet, plus I needed cheap beer too. I brewed on my small apartment stove. The learning experience there was if you do 5.5 gal boils on a small apartment stove, eventually, it’ll collapse the top of the stove & you won’t get your security deposit back. When we initially opened the original brewery/taproom with Suburban we brewed Willy our Scottish Ale. Fortunately, Willy turned out great and was a flagship we had on tap. Then with the new brewery, scaling from 1bbl to 10bbl was a first. We went all-in and brewed Awesome Larry our double IPA. I turned out pretty well. I wasn’t exactly where I’d want it but it was still good and I was probably the only person who could tell the difference since Awesome Larry is my baby.

Where do you see the craft beer industry heading in the next few years?

I wish I had a crystal ball to see where the craft beer industry is headed. But I think a lot of boundaries have shifted in the past 2 years just looking at the pandemic and what had to happen to survive the initial shutdown. A lot of great breweries who you’d never expect to see on the shelves in distributors & grocery stores in PA have appeared & I think that ultimately puts some pressure on the PA craft beer scene in terms of staying up to date on hips styles & more importantly consistent quality. It’s always interesting to see how certain market changes last long term (or not) in the world of craft beer. That’s just the brewing side. On a larger scale, I hope to see the continuation & acceleration of diversity in the craft beer industry. There have been some improvements but there’s still a lot of progress ahead.

Describe what it’s like to be a brewer in Pennsylvania.

Brewing in PA, especially in SEPA, is something that we’re really proud to be a part of. There are so many breweries to collaborate with & get to know personally and visit. I think we’re also pretty fortunate to have a great organization in the Brewers of PA who really have the interest of all sized PA breweries in mind as they fight for us in Harrisburg & beyond. There’s also a strong social media presence that’s constantly on the side of PA craft beer which is crucial as PA is looked at as a favorable landing spot for out-of-state brewery distribution.

What is the inspiration behind your beer names?

We’re not too creative with our beer naming conventions unfortunately but it’s something we’re constantly working on. Most of our beers are named after the music we listen to in the brewery. Most of them are Dead, Phish, Moe. references but we’re mixing in some Rush, ZZ Top & Tragically Hip references too to keep it diverse. We also give nods to our local surroundings out here in Western Chester County.

What is your favorite beer to drink right now?

My favorite beer? That’s a really tough one. I just love beer so I like to try a lot of different stuff. I’m rarely drinking the same beer to qualify as my favorite. Here at SBC, I’m really digging our Interstellar Keller Kellerbier. That’s a crusher. There’s also a collab we did with Artifact Brewing called Crosstown Haze IPA that’s another crusher. There are so many good local beers and PA beers that when I stop at the distributor I always have something great to select depending on my mood. There are too many breweries/beers to mention but I love the diversity of styles in the area around Downingtown, West Chester, Malvern, Exton, Coatesville area. But with that said, I have a 6 pack of 2018 Sierra Nevada Bigfoot that I bust out a bottle or two around the holidays.

What is the most important lesson you learned in the beer industry so far?

The most important lesson I’ve learned in the beer industry is to remain flexible and to plan, plan, plan. Especially in the current climate of commerce & shipping planning is critical. With that comes a degree of flexibility that’s needed to survive. Then there’s obviously the lesson of being grateful. Grateful to the team here at SBC, grateful for our brewery friends, grateful to be in a very collaborative industry.

Thank you to Corey for talking with us! Make sure you visit Suburban Brewing Company’s website to see all the latest beers, and what they have going on! Also, follow Suburban Brewing on Facebook and Instagram.