I planned my visit to Emporium around an unrelated event in Waipara, shooting up to Kaikoura a day early to check out the new bar.  It was January 22, and arriving after midday I had about enough time to park up and reach for the sunblock before my phone was buzzing…

The Covid red-restriction boogaloo was back and it was time, once again, to shut up and dance.  Events were going down like dominos (including Emporium’s own Kegkoura festival) and after a few incredibly bleak phone calls it was, manifestly, time for a beer.

Dejected as I was, I couldn’t help but smile as I found Emporium’s location.  A long, unsealed driveway, a scuffed-up caravan turned kitchen, and a cat sleeping on the cool concrete in front of the wide open, welcoming doors of the bar.  This was already my kind of place.

Emporium brewery

The coastal North Canterbury town of Kaikoura has historically been a destination for all kinds of seaside action — famous for whale watching, diving and world class seafood.  It even had a winery for a brief period.  But local craft beer?  Not so much.

That was until Paul and Laura Finney made their exodus from Christchurch and founded Emporium Brewery in 2016, finally putting the township on the New Zealand beer map.  Fast forward to the present where they’ve just opened the doors to a new brew bar, and the future for craft beer in Kaikoura is looking bright.  Easy to forget now, that those intervening years spanned some of the most challenging times for any region in recent history.

Liberty diversify

Finney, as Paul prefers to be called, has always described Emporium as a hobby that spiralled out of control, an origin he shares with a great many of our successful craft brewers.  A thirst for the British ale styles from the old country that he couldn’t find here drove him to homebrewing, which led to the creation of the Christchurch Home Brewers Club and Finney’s Homebrew Emporium, the namesake of the future brewery.  Once voted best in the country by SOBA, the home brew shop was a mainstay of the Christchurch scene, and typified Emporium’s connection to the beer community, which is still core to the spirit of the brewery today.

After some years of contract brewing at Christchurch’s Stainless Brewery (now Beer Baroness) the time had come for the real thing.  The brew shop was sold and a site for the new Kaikoura brewery (complete with overgrown minigolf course) was seized upon.

The doors opened on the October 2, 2016, and everything was looking good, apart from the timing, which couldn’t have been worse.  Mere weeks later the earthquake struck, causing massive geological upheaval in the area and, crucially, destroying the highway to Christchurch.

Now finding itself at the terminus of a very long dead end, business in Kaikoura ground to a halt.  The repairs to the highway, despite optimistic official estimates, dragged on for exactly one year, one month and one day before the road was reopened.  Even then it was only drivable in designated time slots and would remain an excruciating slog through stop-go areas for even longer.

With things the way they were, the brewery had to be put on hold and the Finneys were forced to lean on their pre-beer skills and hold down jobs in Christchurch while they waited for the light at the end of the tunnel.

The light (and the tunnel) was at last fully visible by 2019, and with a few upgrades and some crucial know-how from the wandering brew-master Mike Cheer, the brewery was kickstarted back to life and Emporium beers were finally back on tap.  Holding onto that impetus, the plans for the bar were quickly put back into action.

Martin Bennett (aka @ProfDodds on Twitter) of The Laboratory brewery in Lincoln gave some words of advice that anyone familiar with navigating building consent processes will be grimly familiar with: “Three times as long and twice as much”.  That turned out to be excruciatingly accurate, with the building plans for the bar slowly grinding their way through the council process, treading on an expensive car park consent landmine along the way.  But they got there; and the open flag now flies proudly on the side of State Highway 1 to welcome all those in need of a rare North Canterbury craft beer.

The bar’s aesthetic is somewhere between festival taproom and shearing shed, constructed with recycled materials including the wide doors that open the building right up onto the nearby farmland.  It’s a low-key, functional and airy design that embraces the open space around it and gives a sense of breathing room that I greatly appreciate if I’m holding down a spot in a bar for an extended period.

Twelve taps span the core Emporium range, interspersed with seasonals and one-offs (some conspicuously huge Belgian styles were on offer during my visit).  Big five-glass tasting paddles make the variety easier to navigate, and there’s stunningly good by-the-litre prices for rigger fills when you’ve homed in on a favourite.  Food is provided by Slam Club via the satellite kitchen, where their slow cooked BBQ menu is applied to more pub-portable burgers and hot dogs (excellent, by the way).

The minigolf course out back might seem kitsch in a more metro establishment, but as part of such an honest place it fits right in, and along with the two escape rooms provides fodder for families or anyone just looking for a quaint diversion from the beer.  For someone who’s never swung a real golf club except to knock down apples, I have a great fascination with minigolf, so I’m pleased to encounter it in any setting.  My partner (soundly beaten) continues to protest that her performance was affected by the beer.

As the sun set on the day and the last few cancellations blinked on the phone, I felt resigned to my fate, but doubly glad that I was here. With yet another year of uncertainty ahead and all our large events in flames, it’ll be the small places like this that keep us all going, and we in turn them.  So, if you’re in the area, be sure to stop off at this most local of locals.  Play a round and raise a pint to dreaming big while living small for just a little while longer.

 

Liberty Diversify Into Burgers & Gin

Liberty Brewing are diversifying at speed, today launching their gin range under the banner Liberty Distilling. And last month they opened an American-style burger joint next to their taproom in Helensville. There’s a sad backstory to the burger joint — previously it...

Powerhouse Collab Launches Swifty

A new beer is not usually enough to justify a story but when you’re talking powerhouse brand names Nadia Lim and Garage Project, a beer called Swifty might be in a different league. I was wondering only recently when New Zealand might see a celebrity-driven beer that...

Brothers Beer Back In Business

Brothers Beer are back in business and aim to pay off all their creditors by the end of 2024 says new general manager Frans Bos. They’ve had a management restructure, just hired Dylan Adams as head brewer after he lost his job when Deep Creek went into liquidation...

Police Defend Dunedin Festival

Police are happy with behaviour at the Dunedin Craft Beer & Food Festival earlier this month despite the event generating international headlines after two assaults — one inside the venue, one outside. Festival director Jason Schroeder felt the bad publicity...

Free Glass Flagon Scheme Launches Nationwide

Dozens of high-profile breweries around the country, including Garage Project, Parrotdog and Emerson's, are today launching a scheme that provides customers with free, returnable, 1-litre glass flagons for takeaway beer purchased at taprooms and filleries. Backed by...

Hop Federation Hold The Line NZIPA

It was already shaping up to be a pretty good year for New Zealand IPAs — and Hop Federation have nudged it a little closer to a great one with this new limited release, Hold The Line.  Powered by Southern Cross, Taiheke and Nectaron, all of which should be found...

UPDATED: Deep Creek Owes More Than $4m

Deep Creek Brewing went into liquidation last week owing more than $4 million. The first report from liquidator Rodgers Reidy noted that Deep Creek Brewing Operations Ltd owed unsecured creditors around $3.5 million. They also owed ASB $603,845. Money owed to secured...

Wanaka Beer Fest Puts the Focus on Local

The Wanaka Beer Fest, set for the first weekend in December, is a real showcase for local beer and bites. The beer fest is always a great day out – organisers James Julian and James Hay do a great job at providing a fun and relaxed atmosphere with great entertainment...

Panhead Supercharger X Double APA

Creating a great new beer is a fraught and illusive enterprise, requiring inspiration, experimentation and restraint in equal measure.  But what if there was another way?  What if one could simply take an already colossally popular release and just… make it more? In...

Fears Over Health Warnings On Beer

The Australian federal government has taken the first, small, step towards putting cigarette-like health warnings on alcohol. The Australian federal government is seeking advice on options to raise public awareness about alcohol harm after doctors’ groups launched a...

Paddy Gower-Inspired IPA Concentrate

Wellington-based craft soda maker Six Barrel Soda has entered the realm of non-alcoholic ‘beer’ with the creation of ZERO’LEARY — a non-alcoholic IPA-inspired concentrate. Made in collaboration with ThreeNow’s Paddy Gower Has Issues, this unique hoppy beverage is...

What Tuatara’s new skin says about the beer game

Tuatara’s move to cans for all their packaged beer, along with a rationalisation of their core six-pack offering, is a good indicator of where the craft beer market is headed. Tuatara dabbled in cans last year but finally took the full aluminum plunge in August — and...

Froth Tech Brewing Up Something Wild

The “taste of New Zealand” is about to turn up in a beer, thanks to the amazing work of the team at Froth Tech who’ve isolated a wild brewing yeast from Aotearoa’s wilderness. The yeast strain, named Wilding, will be used in a beer of the same name brewed by Emerson’s...

Blokequet — A Beer For Mental Wellbeing

­­Once upon a sunny Thursday afternoon in Morningside, a group of people gathered at Yeastie Boys' new spiritual home, Side Hustle, for a beer launch unlike any other. The air was filled with excitement and the delightful sound of beer cans being cracked open as...

Oat Cream Dream Team: Hazzy Hunter X Black Sands

It was an unassuming Saturday afternoon in Auckland, I was enjoying a few cold beverages down at the Urbanaut taproom in Kingsland whilst in the thick of a friend’s bachelor party and just before I went in for my second Toasted Marshmallow Hazy IPA, I saw two tall...

Brew Moon Hophead IPA XL

Brew Moon Hophead IPA is a beer with a very long history, one I myself found myself documenting last year on the brewery’s 20th anniversary.  But, as change comes to all things, so it does to one of New Zealand's most historic IPAs in the form of this ‘XL’ version. ...

Raw Beer Revolution

There’s a raw ale resurgence happening in beer right now, and visitors to the Funk On The Water festival in Wellington on Sunday, October, 22, can taste two unique examples — both featuring the input of Jamie McQuillan of Cell Division. McQuillan has his own...

Brothers Beer Avoids Liquidation But Venues Closed

Brothers Beer will avoid liquidation after shareholders agreed to inject more than $1 million into the business to keep it afloat and some creditors agreed to wear losses. The pub and restaurant side has been reduced from seven venues to just two in order to keep the...

Parrotdog Cold IPA

As the new Cold IPA style has continued to evolve, my taste for these deliciously bright and crispy beers has developed in kind.  As I’ve tasted my way through this year’s multitude of examples, the idea of what makes a "good" Cold IPA has suitably resolved in my mind...

New Zealand’s VIP IPAs

With the near-demise of Epic there was a risk that one of New Zealand's greatest IPAs — Armageddon — could have been lost forever. Tim Newman and Michael Donaldson reflect on the most important IPAs in New Zealand history. TIM IPA changed everything.   It...