As another hot West Aussie summer draws closer thoughts inevitably turn to ice-cold brews, chilled Chardonnays, beaches, and BBQs. However, with alcohol taxes spiralling upward – there have been 2 rises per year for the last 10 years – is it finally time to turn those vague DIY home brew ideas into reality? Start a new and enjoyable hobby now that retirement (and more time) is on the horizon?
Certainly, popping into the local bottle shop to buy any type of alcoholic drink these days, much less enjoy a round or 3 at the local pub, has become expensive. But – is making your own really any cheaper?
For occasional drinkers, probably not, especially once time, effort and learning curve are factored in. Regular drinkers on the other hand should come out on top once the art of home brewing has been mastered. This holds true with both beer and wine, but is particularly the case with beer, which is why the emphasis of this article is on beer rather than wine.
With wine, given how much reasonably priced, reasonable quality product there is around, making your own probably comes down to enjoyment rather than any significant cost savings in the end. Ditto for making your own spirits – you can certainly do it, but the learning curve and time involved may not make it all that worthwhile.
How Much Does Buying Your Beer Cost?
At the time of writing, a 30-can block, or 11.25 litres in total, of one of the major commercial beer brands is anywhere from $40 to $65. That’s $1.33 to $2.17 per can respectively. If you buy a pint (570ml) in your local (pub or restaurant), it could now cost you as much as $15. A schooner (425ml) is around $10. However, excise duty rates on alcohol are indexed twice a year in February and August so who knows what will happen come next February!
With this in mind, let’s look at just how much it will cost to set up your own DIY brewing outfit, and whether or not home brew vs buying retail really is worth it.
Home Brewing: Your ‘Basic’ Outlays
Most of the financial commitment in home brewing lies in the initial equipment purchase so once you’ve spent this money you’ll mostly only need to buy recipe kits and various ongoing consumables. You can also usually make both wine and beer with the same equipment and a few additional purchases for wine.
As with most things, there are cheap and expensive options, and you get what you pay for. Therefore, if you want your equipment to last for a while, be prepared to invest in good, or at least reasonable, quality equipment. It will repay itself. How quickly depends on how much you drink!
Home Made Beer – Extract, Partial Extract, Or All-Grain Brewing
Before you buy your equipment, decide on your preferred brewing method. Extract brewing requires less equipment, is quicker, less complicated, and usually where most home brewers start. All-grain brewing is what commercial, and many dedicated hobby brewers, do. Partial extract is a mix of both and is a good second step for novice extract brewers.
We’re focussing on extract here because if you do decide to progress to all-grain later, you should have a very good idea of your brewing costs vs buying retail by then.
DIY Extract Kit
There are a couple of ways to go about setting up your equipment. For the very budget (or space) conscious, making your own basic DIY kit is an affordable place to start, and can be upgraded later.
You’ll need:
- Large pot or brew kettle (you probably already have a suitably large stockpot or similar)
- Food grade plastic bucket with lid (20 litre ones are widely available from camping stores and Bunnings for $8 – $12. Bunnings also sell a 35-litre all-purpose storage barrel for around $30 but you can probably get something similar online for less.)
- 2 metre length of 8mm food grade vinyl tubing to act as a siphon hose plus a hose clamp ($6 – $7)
- Enough 2-litre plastic soft drink bottles with lids for the volume of beer you’re brewing, which is very eco friendly. You could also save glass bottles but make sure they are screw caps or you’ll need to buy caps and invest in a bottle capper.
- Hydrometer (~$7)
- Thermometer (~$10 although there are fancier, more expensive ones available)
You’ll also have to purchase consumables like your brewing kits, brewing sugar and so on.
Ready Made Extract Starter Kit
A ready to go basic home brew starter kit costs $100 to $200 and comes with everything – equipment and ingredients for your first brew. Just add water and a brew kettle. Kits with a 30-litre fermenting tank, which is most of them these days, will produce 23 litres of beer. This is the equivalent of 61 x cans or 30 x 750ml bottles + 1 x 375ml can, with some left over for ‘tasting’.
Extract Brewing Recipe Kits
Beer concentrates, or beer kits, typically cost between $20 and $30 for a standard kit (and a bit more for craft kits). These come as either a malt extract / hop liquid or dry concentrate, and may require the addition of brewing sugar ($5 – $15 a kilo). The advantage of these products is that they are designed to go with most basic starter kits and don’t require any additional equipment. They also work well with your DIY kit option.
Power
Your power costs will vary depending on your equipment, whether or not you have solar (and what type of system it is), if you have gas – how it’s supplied, your electricity tariff and so on.
Water
Although many experts recommend using filtered water, the consensus is that if you like the taste of your tap water, it’s probably fine to use as is. If you can use it, the cost will be absorbed into your water rates.
If you decide to buy filtered water, the big supermarket chains sell 10 litre containers for under $5. A 30-litre fermenting tank is designed to take 23 litres so that’s about $11.50 of water per 23-litre brew. This will add a minimum $0.19 per can to your costs.
Other Brewing Essentials
You may need to buy things like sugar, sanitiser, bottle tops and the like as you go depending on your brewing system and brews. We haven’t factored these into our costs because they will be variable.
Now for the figures:
| Per 375ml can | Per 30 can block
(11.250 litres) |
Per 425ml (Schooner) | Per 570ml
(Pint) |
|
| Tap beer: bars / restaurants / sporting venues | ~$10 | ~$15 | ||
| Store Bought (Liquor outlet chains etc) | $1.33 – $2.17 | $40 – $65 | $1.51 – $2.46 (if purchased at ‘can’ prices) | $2.02 – $3.30
(if purchased at ‘can’ prices) |
| Starter kit ($100) for beer concentrates*
* if using a basic DIY kit, these figures may be less depending on how much your equipment and ingredients have cost, and the size of your brewing bucket |
||||
| Using tap water | $1.64 | $49.20 | $1.86 | $2.49 |
| Using bought water
($11.50 for 23 litres @ ~$5 / 10 litres) |
$1.83 | $54.90 | $2.07 | $2.78 |
Recipe kits (using tap water) |
||||
| Beer concentrates / beer kits ($20 – $30) | $0.33 – $0.49 | $9.90 – $14.70 | $0.37 – $0.56 | $0.50 – $0.75 |
Recipe kits (using bought water) |
||||
| Beer concentrates / beer kits ($20 – $30) | $0.52 – $0.68 | $15.49 – $20.41 | $0.59 – $0.77 | $0.78 – $1.03 |
Looking at the table, several points immediately stand out.
- Your first batch will be within the same price range as a block of 30 x 375ml cans of a big name brand (XXXX, Carlton, etc) purchased at your local bottle shop chain.
- Even factoring in the cost of the kit, MYO is still far cheaper than going to the pub.
- Once you have your first batch out of the way, and only need to buy recipe kits moving forward, your beer (if made with tap water) should cost you around 25% of what you’d pay at a liquor store.
- Using bought water, even from supermarket chains, does add to your costs BUT is still cheaper than buying liquor store beer. However, if you factor in your power costs and time, it may well be closer to a break-even situation but what price do you put on a hobby?
Which brings us nicely to time –
Whether or not you choose to factor this into your costs is up to you. However, given that time is probably something you’re going to have a lot more of once you start winding down your working life, why not spend it doing something that comes with such enjoyable results!
You will likely spend around 6 – 10 hours ‘working’ on your brew. That includes preparation, cleaning and sterilising (very important), bottling, taste testing etc. Then there’s the initial wait before you can enjoy the fruits of your labour. However, once started, just keep a batch brewing so there will always be one ‘on the boil’ as you enjoy the one ahead of it.
Be warned however – many home brewers get hooked and spend a lot of money upgrading equipment, moving into all-grain, trying out more expensive brews and so on. This may well put the cost of brewing your own on par with what you can buy it for from your local bottle shop but at that point, it will have become a labour of love. Regardless, one thing is for sure – it’s hard to envisage a time when home brews will ever cost more than tap beers at your local pub or licensed venue.
