In Milwaukee Record’s “Meet A Brewer” series, we aim to introduce you to some of the professionals behind the scenes who are responsible for making your favorite local beers. The recurring series continues with New Barons Brewing Cooperative CEO and Brewmaster John Degroote.

Milwaukee Record: What’s your background in brewing? What brought you to where you are now?

John Degroote: It’s kind of a convoluted story, but it’s probably not the most atypical story. I graduated college during the recession of 2008 and 2009. I had a biomedical engineering background and I decided to go to grad school. I’m from St. Louis and I went to school down there, but I decided to go to grad school at Marquette to try to get a master’s in engineering. It worked out. I got a job after that, but I think I just always had a bad taste in my mouth about corporate life. It was just boring. I didn’t love sitting at a desk all day. You can imagine where it goes from here.

I was a home brewer hobbyist. I got bit by the hobby and once I had an income where I could start spending money on said hobby, then it exploded. It started in my kitchen, then moved to a garage in West Allis. Then my wife finally pushed me into starting a business. So that’s what I did. I took pen to paper and wrote this business plan that I don’t think anybody read, but it got my thoughts together. This idea of a co-op—a community-owned brewery—came to me. It occurred to me that I was a good brewer, but I knew nothing about marketing, nothing about running front-of-house, nothing about finance. But I had friends around the area who did know that stuff. So how would I reward my friends for helping me with this? Well, they could be part-owner of this brewery. All of a sudden, we had a bunch of different owners, so I was like, “let’s make this a group ownership-type situation.”

We finally had raised enough money through selling shares of the co-op. We had like 100 member owners and we had enough capital to make something happen. We started talking to some of the local brewers around town. James [Larson] and Tommy [Vandervort of Enlightened Brewing] were here at the time and they had a three-barrel system. I did a contract arrangement with them to use their equipment to keg our beer so we could sell it to bars around town. It was great because even though I was a decent home brewer, I had really no commercial experience. James showed me the ropes of how to brew and translate my home brewing skills to real brewing. For two years while they were still here, I did that. When they moved out to the bigger place down the street, then we took it over. We had built enough of a following in the area with beer we had tested out in the market and we got considerably more owners of the co-op at that point. The last step was getting financing. We got some loans taken out from other member owners and we got this place started.

MR: What are some of your favorite beer styles. What do you find yourself reaching for when you’re out or at the liquor store?

JH: We’re decidedly a lager-focused brewery. About 80 percent of our production is lagers—so pilsners, schwarzbier, IPLs. I like classic, clean, and crisp beers. I do like Belgian beers also. My last name is Belgian and I’m only second generation American because my grandparents were immigrants. So I like saisons and witbier. On the macro side, Old Milwaukee is surprisingly good. Miller High Life and Pabst are good too, but I really like Old Milwaukee. It goes down easy. And being from St. Louis, I have to give a shout-out to an A.B. product. I think Busch is really underrated.

MR: What are a few of your favorite local breweries?

JH: I have so many brewery crushes. I really love Supermoon. Rob just kills it with all of his farmhouse beers. Ron at Amorphic does a terrific job with the kind of out there dry-hopped Czech lagers and hazies he does. They’re tremendous. And of course, Enlightened. Rest in peace. They were my mentors. I learned how to brew from them and I loved all of their beers.

MR: You mentioned that brewing used to be a hobby. Now that it’s your line of work, what are some of your other hobbies when you’re not brewing?

JH: My new hobby—and I’m not turning this into a business, because you need a hobby that just stays a hobby—is making pizza. During the pandemic, my project was I built a woodfire pizza oven in my yard. I bought bags of cement, I built a foundation, and did a brick oven. So once a month—even during the winter—I try to do a pizza party at my house. You have to make like a dozen pizzas because if you’re going to burn half a tree worth of wood, you need to make sure you make a lot of pizzas.

MR: What are some favorite bands, musical artists, or even just your favorite genre of music?

JH: We go through every genre here, but recently, I’ve been really into the new Kendrick Lamar album, GNX. And Jack White dropped a surprise album earlier this year that I’ve been listening to a lot. I have a guilty pleasure for Chromeo. We listen to country music here, hip-hop, everything. We also went through an Ice Cube phase recently.

MR: What are some hangouts around town? Do you have any favorite local bars, restaurants, retailers?

JH: I still love Wolski’s after all these years. Me and my wife lived on the East Side for six or seven years. Brady Street has changed a lot, but Wolski’s has not changed at all. Restaurant-wise, I love Mexican food, so if I’m going out for keep-it-simple Mexican food, I love Botanas on 5th Street. For fancier Mexican, La Dama rocks. And for pizza, I have to give a shout-out to Transfer Pizza right down the street. And I like Zaffiro’s.

MR: With brewing being in a tough spot right now, what are some things we—the general consumer—can do to help the industry and to help limit the losses of more breweries?

JH: That’s a loaded question. Brewing spaces are inherently communal. We’re not late night spots or places where people rage. We’re a place where you gather with your friends and family. So come here on your evenings or on Saturday afternoons. I don’t know where the traffic has gone. You can guess a lot of things and I won’t delve into those, but supporting your taproom is the biggest thing people can do. When the pandemic hit, a lot of people put beers into cans because it was the only way to make money. It inundated grocery stores with a lot of packaged product. As a result, I think a lot of people are just consuming craft beer in that avenue. We make pennies on the dollar [from canned beer sales]. The margins are terrible. So I just encourage people to go to their local taproom. We bank on your in-person patronage.

Another way brewing can get back on track is we have to think of ourselves as a part of the hospitality industry as a whole. For so many years, craft brewing was this thing that was growing and it was new. But it’s not really new anymore and now there are so many of us. It’s as competitive as restaurants are. To stay relevant and fresh all the time, one of those key components is having great service, great staff, and great hospitality. We’ve been fortunate to have such a great staff here that’s helped with that.

MR: Do you have any favorite shows? This could be any comfort shows you come back to over and over or something you’re watching right now.

JH: Recently, me and my wife watched The Sopranos for the first time. It was so good! I had never watched it because I was too young at the time and there’s no way I could’ve appreciated it. Now that I’m a father of two kids, I think it resonated a little more than it would have if I watched when it was airing. We’re about to start Shogun, too. I’m excited for that.

MR: With you originally being from elsewhere, what are some things you feel makes Milwaukee a special place?

JH: I love Milwaukee. This is my home now. I’ve been here for 15 years as of this month. I’m not leaving. My wife is from here and obviously I’ve set down roots by starting a brewery here. It’s so cool to be a Milwaukee brewer. There’s literally a baseball team named after my profession. How cool is that? The history of brewing is so celebrated here. And I came from a place that was well-respected for its brewing history as well. Experiencing both of those worlds, it’s a treat to be a brewer in this city. And it’s just such a real community. “Smallwaukee” is a real thing. You’re always one or two degrees of separation from someone.

MR: Finish the sentence. Brewing in Milwaukee is…

JH: For me, it’s community.

About The Author

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Co-Founder and Editor

Before co-founding Milwaukee Record, Tyler Maas wrote for virtually every Milwaukee publication (except Wassup! Magazine). He lives in Bay View and enjoys both stuff and things.