Josh Landan is leading a craft brewery again.
Landan, who founded the now defunct Saint Archer Brewery in 2013 and sold it within two years to MillerCoors, is now the CEO of Great Frontier Holdings, the newly formed parent company of Ninkasi Brewing in Eugene, Oregon, and Wings & Arrow beyond beer offerings Ashland Hard Seltzer, Mucho Aloha Hard Lemonade, Villager Spirits, Voyager Hard Tea and Wings & Arrow Beer Co.
Talks between the two companies began more than a year ago, Landan shared, as his company had formed a contract brewing relationship with Ninkasi that saw 85% of its volume produced at the Eugene craft brewery. The business relationship led to a friendship between Landan and Ninkasi founder Nikos Ridge.
“We just started talking about it over beer, right? It wasn’t transactional by any means,” Landan said.
Those conversations culminated in this week’s merger in which the two companies rolled their collective equity into a combined entity, Great Frontier Holdings.
Landan spoke with Brewbound about the merger, the combined company’s ambitions, potential future acquisitions and the contract brewing business. (The interview was edited for clarity and brevity.)
Brewbound: How did this merger come together?
Landan: Nikos and I have had a relationship due to them making Ashland for the last almost two years now.
The last time that you and I were chatting about Wings & Arrow, the missing piece of everything was the option to control your own product, and then obviously margin and efficiencies. It’s really something that was almost a necessity at our size at about a half-a-million cases for Ashland, and the other brands that were just starting are another 75,000 cases right off the bat.
Joining forces and creating a much, much larger entity with a that’s really unique, right? I can’t think of anything else like this in the U.S. It’s common for two brands to merge together, maybe they’re struggling financially or they’re struggling to sell product, or whatever the answer is, but for two people to come together and do a merger out of opportunity and not necessity, I think it’s unique.
Brewbound: You’re going to be the CEO moving forward. How involved will Nikos and Jamie Floyd be moving forward?
Landan: Nikos will be really involved. He’s overseeing the financial and brand development and relationships with our two major co-packers. [He’ll be] focused on our relationship with Montucky [Cold Snacks] and deepening that relationship.
For me, we were obviously in much different situations with their brewery and then with our co-pack brands. I started thinking, what are we going to do? The co-pack business is not set up for folks to make money, right? You have to be so incredibly large to make money if you’re having your brand co-packed. You’re never really going to be profitable unless you have a really, really big staff.
I just saw the writing on the wall. You can’t raise money forever, right? I started thinking about that about a year and a half ago. I think the bottom has fallen out for a lot of folks that are trying to raise money right now. The capital markets the way they are, it’s been incredibly challenging for brands out there.
Brewbound: Is the plan to move all production in-house at Ninkasi? And before, what percentage of your production was there?
Landan: About 85%, but we were going to 100%. That would have been the plan no matter what to get everything up there. So not a ton changes really. It was just merging the staffs.
I’ve [also] done a complete rebrand of the Ninkasi business, which will be launched in August.
Between just our owned brands, we’ll do about 120,000 barrels, covering about six western states.Then our co-pack business will add another 40,000 to 50,000 barrels this year. It’s already a really large operation.
Brewbound: How much capacity does that leave you with?
Landan: Depends on the mix, but for sure, 250,000 barrels out of our facility, which I think we’ll hit by the end of ’24. Then, we can build out for a pretty low CapX hit to about a half a million barrels in our existing footprint in Eugene.
Brewbound: Are you actively seeking contract brewing clients?
Landan: The right folks, yeah. Montucky was the perfect fit for multiple reasons. We believe in what those guys are doing. They’re just running a great business.
Being profitable and having brands that are all growing, it’s afforded us to be picky about who we are brewing beer for.
Brewbound: You said you rebranded the business.
Landan: Aesthetically. The brand needed a refresh. I did a complete overhaul of the brand and we’re updating the liquid of a few of the legacy brands to be up to par with where some of the styles are today.
Brewbound: What was attractive about being the CEO of a beer business again?
Landan: I was most attracted to how they have a large facility that is already incredibly efficient, and set up for long-term success. Adding my kind of touch to a brand that is 60,000-, 70,000-barrels big here in the Pac Northwest.
The brand is growing after 16 years. We’re up this year already heading into the summer, which is exciting. There’s a lot of room to grow with our wholesalers up here, and I’m really excited about where Ninkasi is going.
I missed having the control of our own facility, and I miss selling beer. There’s really nothing like that. I was excited to get back involved in and have a brewery again.
Brewbound: You have the Ninkasi brand, but there also appears to be a Wings & Arrow Beer Co. that you will be launching? Why launch a second beer brand if you have Ninkasi?
Landan: Yep. The focus will be on Southern California with that brand, where Ninkasi’s stronghold is not California. So they’re really not competing with each other. We’ll be making that product in San Diego and in Eugene.
We’re actually kind of going through multiple distressed breweries in San Diego. So we’ll be acquiring a brewery down in San Diego in the coming months.
We’ve had maybe a handful of brands from all over the U.S. reach out to us about an acquisition or a partnership. We will be actively looking to acquire brands that we think fill certain holes or geographic holes. We’ll keep looking and be open to anything, really. It just needs to be the right fit. We’re not in a rush but if the right brand comes along and it’s in the right territory with the right product, then absolutely.
Brewbound: When you say acquire a brewery, is it the intellectual property and the production facility or is it just the IP?
Landan: There’s a couple of different options out there. There’s some that it’s just a facility. There’s some that a brand comes attached to it. So there’s multiple different options that we’re just sorting through now to see what the best fit for us will be.
Brewbound: I hear a facility that you’re pretty familiar with was available.
Landan: It’s not that one. That ship has sailed for me. Going back into Saint Archer, that chapter is closed.
Brewbound: With all these brands you have now, you’re hitting hard seltzer, hard lemonade, canned cocktails, you have this hard tea coming and then you have beer. Are there any whitespaces that you still need to cover?
Landan: We’re gonna be launching hard cider in the coming months in the Northwest only. So we’re going to be working on developing a cider brand. I always say it’ll be three or four months, which means six.
Brewbound: How many brands does Ninkasi contract brew for?
Landan: There’s about five brands that we’re working with right now. They’re all a little bit smaller. Mother Road in Arizona has been a great partner for us in the Flagstaff area. Really that’s a majority of the focus for us, them and Montucky. And they’ll do the lion’s share of that 50,000, 60,000 barrels of beer this year for contract partners.
Brewbound: For Ashland, how many barrels did the brand do last year and how did it compare to 2021?
Landan: We almost hit 40,000 barrels. We did about 36,000 barrels. And that was up, we doubled the business, which was great and it’s still going.
There’s been a lot of stuff said about hard seltzer, and we haven’t felt that yet. The brand is still growing. Eventually, sometime next spring, all the brands will be in the Pac Northwest. Mucho Aloha and our hard iced tea will be coming out in 24 oz. single-serves. That’ll hit the Pac Northwest market at the beginning of August. Other pack sizes and things like that will follow for the spring resets.
Brewbound: Has your vision for what Ashland can be shifted or changed as we’ve seen the maturation of hard seltzer?
Landan: If anything, I’m more confident in it. We’ve performed well in the chains in Southern California. So, no, we’re not losing any placements and just kind of keep going here.
I think there’s more opportunity and people are drinking hard seltzer. I don’t think people are stopping drinking hard seltzer. I think they’re just maybe focused on a few brands and maybe instead of trying multiple.