LISBON

Blue Ox Malthouse unveiled its 7,500-squarefoot traditional floor malting operation in Lisbon on Friday, marking the culmination of a three-year endeavor that even saw entrepreneur Joel Alex living out of his car for 18 months.

After a ribbon cutting with state and local business people and elected officials, including Sen. Angus King, Alex spoke to the crowd of supporters, many from various agencies that helped plan and fund the Blue Ox Malthouse.

The announcement about the opening states that since 2013 Blue Ox Malthouse has been able to bring more than $750,000 to the project in a combination of grants, loans and private investments, with the biggest financial commitments coming from Coastal Enterprises Inc., Maine Technology Institute and private investors within the Slow Money Maine network.

The malthouse “is really a business that is a Maine brand,” said Alex, Blue Ox founder and malster. “We started this business really to connect all the exciting things that were happening in craft beer to all of the exciting things that are happening in local agriculture, and be a market for local grains and help brewers put out unique products that can help push where they bring their beers.”

Three years ago, the 30- year-old Old Town native was on his way to graduate school looking to study rural economic development, but got sidetracked after a conversation with a craft brewer. They talked about the four basic ingredients of beer — water, malt, hops and yeast — and the challenges of sourcing those ingredients locally.

“I was talking about how great it would be to start a craft brewery and he’s like ‘No, no, no, don’t do that. Everyone’s starting a craft brewery. You should start a craft malthouse because no one is doing it and we all would love to source our grains locally,’” Alex said. “That’s a grand idea. Someone has to do that because that would be really fun.”

Now, he said, “we are standing in a 7,500-squarefoot facility that is probably (among) the top five largest regional craft malthouses in North America — the malthouses that are trying to take back this commodity product and make it into something special and unique that can really help not only our local communities and economies, but also the local craft brewers we all enjoy to push their products further.”

Sean Sullivan, executive director of the Maine Brewers’ Guild, said there were about 35 breweries in the state three years ago when Alex began his malthouse project. Today, he said there are 68 breweries in Maine and there will probably be more than 75 in the next six months.

“These breweries are creating jobs, they’re renewing the manufacturing sector and they have tentacles and connections to not only other manufacturing industries and other manufacturing opportunities like you see here, but also the agricultural sector as well,” Sullivan said. “Our brewers are very eager to be using local products and Maine is quickly putting itself on the map as one of the top three destinations in the United States” for its craft beer.

Craft beer is already about a half a billion-dollar industry in Maine, Sullivan said.

“When you start to add in these agricultural opportunities, the positive economic impact here is truly impressive and at a scale that is well beyond just drinking a beer to help Maine,” Sullivan said.

Alex said Maine grows more than 20,000 acres of barley annually in rotation with potato crops and more than 40,000 acres of small grains — wheat, rye and others

— which makes it the largest grain-producing state in the Northeast.

“It’s an enormous opportunity to provide a new market for a product that is being grown on rotation with a cash crop and often sold as feed or into commodity markets in Canada or elsewhere,” he said. “So we’re trying to recapture that, provide in-state markets and also provide opportunities for smaller farms to help diversify their markets and make a living doing what they do.”

Blue Ox Malthouse uses traditional floor malting to process raw grain into malt, the ingredient used in brewing and distilling beer. The company is certified by the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association for both organic and non-organic production, and this season is working with both barley and wheat. Still brand-new, it is working to add to its product line in the future, possibly with Vienna, Munich and crystal style malts.

Alex said the company is starting to diversify its barley malts. Base malts make up 80 to 100 percent of the beer and specialty malts usually add color or flavor.

He could have gone in another direction, but Alex said he’s never regretted his decision to establish the malthouse, even though it’s been hard. He got rid of his apartment and lived out of his car for 18 months, hitting the ground making connections with growers, brewers and financers and, of course, had to learn to malt.

There are only three programs in the world to study malting and Alex said he attended one in Winnipeg, Canada; and also visited other operations.

“Now we have one of the most sophisticated craft malting systems out there,” Alex said.

They moved into a space next to Harvey Metals on Capital Avenue which met their requirements, was affordable and well-located near customers. Now it’s all about partnering with breweries to show them what Blue Ox can do while supporting them and their objectives.

Blue Ox has sold malt commercially only for about a month and a half, but they will have at least six professionally brewed beers coming out in the next month using their malt.

“If you don’t work hard for something, it won’t be as rewarding” to see it come to fruition, Alex said.

According to a press release, Blue Ox Malthouse nearly doubles Maine and New England craft brewers’ access to locally sourced and produced malts. Until recently, Maine grown grains had to be exported for processing before being imported back for brewing. With a capacity to produce more than 500,000 pounds annually, Blue Ox Malthouse is in the top ten largest facilities of its kind in North America and provides an instate market for up to three quarters a million pounds of small grains.

Blue Ox Malthouse is located at 41 Capital Ave. in Lisbon and can be reached at (207) 649-0018 or visit blueoxmalthouse.com.

dmoore@timesrecord.com