Interview: Magnify Brewing

BKBeerReview set out beyond Brooklyn’s borders for our latest interview. We headed out to Fairfield, New Jersey to meet up with another Bates college alumnus. We sat down with Eric Ruta of Magnify Brewing to talk about beers, Bates, and bringing people together.

BKBR: “Tell us about what you guys are doing here.”

Eric: “Yeah! We started off brewing two to three days a week. We just finished expanding our brewhouse, so we are now going to be brewing four to five times a week. By the new year we will be cranking at 5 days a week, and 4,000 barrels of beer. We are pushing three beers every Wednesday. We were doing a can release every other Friday but the lines got so chaotic that they were wrapping around the buildings. Neighbors were complaining, so we are making our beer more available by adding the tanks and we are still selling out. We also do a fair amount of weird beers and we do all of our lagers in oak which is different from other people. There are so many breweries doing so many things that you’ve got to differentiate yourself a little bit. It's fun to think of what people aren't doing yet and go for that. Also we’re bringing so many people together here with this. We have a good local following and we make enough beer now that they can come in and get what they want. I look around and I know all the people in here who come in to have our beer and choose to drink us. It’s cool to create that community here.”

BKBR: “What was it like going from Bates to opening Magnify?”

Eric: “I got to intern at Baxter Brewing while I was in Maine. Also, you know, I was watching what the Downeast Cider guys were doing (also Bates graduates) and how successful they were becoming. Look, I was fortunate to not have a lot of risk involved with this. I mean it’s always a risk starting something but I was just out of college and living with my parents. I didn’t have kids or a mortgage or anything so I had minimal risk. For me that was helpful because I was working long hours every single day, hustling to push product out to the community and get our name around. I had to sacrifice a lot to be able to get to where we are now, but I also know that I didn’t have the risks associated with some of the other guys that start this. I got to really just dive into it headfirst. Also there wasn’t that much around here in Fairfield. The closest things were really about an hour south of here and if you’re doing a silent can release you really can’t be on your phone all the time and make it in time to get that beer. There was a clear need here in this area.”

BKBR: “Tell us about the name Magnify Brewing. What does that mean to you?”

Eric: “Magnify is meant to signify that I’m trying to bring a name to New Jersey craft brewing. Magnify New Jersey on the map of craft beer. I want to have a name that represents what I want this beer to do for the community and New Jersey. So Magnify comes from this idea of magnifying the craft beer culture throughout New Jersey. You know, we go to festivals down in Florida and in the Midwest and I want people to be talking about northern New Jersey and putting us on the map. Even when we’re doing festivals and events we still are selling 99% of our beer here in New Jersey. Getting out there and pushing our name around is important for us so that people know us. When we collaborate we prefer to do it with out of state guys so that we get our brand out there. We love the guys down the street but we get better exposure when we do it with people elsewhere. We want to make sure that we are getting northern New Jersey on the map.”

To visit Eric and the Magnify team, check out their website here: http://magnifybrewing.com

Eric and Magnify will be also among the many excellent breweries in Brooklyn at the Juicy Brews Festival. Get tickets here: https://www.tickettailor.com/checkout/view-event/id/118327/chk/28ef