Look ahead to 2025
So Co-Founder Paul gave a review of what happened in 2024, possibly our most crazy year since our first year, and somewhat of a rebirth for us. Lots of good things happened, and we looked back and could feel that we largely shifted in the ways that we were aiming to as a company. While the proof will be in future years, it is hard to really look back and pick much, aside from relatively small matters, that didn’t go as well as we could have hoped.
Not only do we have a great bunch of people in place, we also have more depth of knowledge than ever, and have now got all the fancy bits of equipment up and running. We broke the mould of what a KBC beer is, and collaborated with more people than ever.
Today it is the turn of me (Ben) to share my perspective, looking towards the year ahead. What I will just comment, looking ahead, is all of this last year has really been laying the groundwork for us to be able to really stretch our legs in 2025. And what better year to be in a position to really push yourself than one as significant as a 10 year anniversary?
The realization that we are coming up to 10 years is both slightly surreal – in that in some ways our launching feels like it was a lifetime ago, and in others it feels like it can’t possibly be 10 years already – and reflective. With our changes in 2024, we are still redefining our identity 10 years on, but we also now believe that this might be something that will be permanently evolutionary. Either way, one really important element will be defining who we are once again, making sure that we are all internally on the same page, and getting that message out to the world.
If we are to be honest with ourselves, however, that’s likely to really happen in the second half of 2025. If the first half of 2024 was chaotic, the first half of 2025 is likely to be insane. We are currently collaborating with a Japanese brewery once a month, and have been since James arrived, but we are also now collaborating with a second brewery per month, each one being a former KBC brewer plying their trade elsewhere, and this is going to continue until we reach our anniversary itself.
And when is this anniversary? May 10th. May 10th 2025 will be 10 years to the day from when Hajimemashite, our first ever beer, went on sale to beer bars. And how are we celebrating it? Well we don’t want to give away too much just yet (and, truth be told, there still a lot of elements being worked out!), but we are planning an event on the date of our anniversary (conveniently a Saturday!) at Ohigashisan Hiroba, the new green space in front of Higashihonganji, just north of Kyoto station. And we are hoping to be joined by a lot of our brothers in arms, in addition to those to whom we have been indebted to from the beginning. We look to sharing more on it soon, but for now pencil it in!
What will be a big shift, kicking off in stages from January, will be an update of our existing series. Some series will be retired, some will be replaced, and some will be tweaked/updated. They will all be visibly changed to reflect KBC in 2025 (KBC 2.0), and this will include our dear Core Series beers as well. We have already shared about our new Hop Idol series, that will be our new IPA experimental series, but this is just the start, and we can’t wait to share over the coming weeks (keep an eye out for upcoming blogs).
Another huge step for us will be, off the back of our creating a number of one-off Kyoto Limited releases, our Kyoto-only year-round beer. This is going to be a refermented in package product that will mature and evolve with time, but does not need to be kept refrigerated (although cellar conditions are recommended). We have tried its prototype and are excited about its release, confident that it is going to be approachable and characterful, a beer that craft beer drinkers in Kyoto can enjoy at the end of a hard day, but are also hoping that it will be a gateway beer that will introduce a whole group of unexposed people to craft beer. We always feel that Kyoto is great as a city for craft beer in terms of the number of beer bars given its population, but retailers are still behind areas like Kanto. We’d love for this beer to help contribute to Kyoto being a great beer city, as well as the wonderful food city that it is.
And how about our one-offs/mini-series, the beers we have been dubbing “KBC 2.0” until now? Well, these will continue up to our 10-year anniversary in May. And how about beyond that?
Well, we haven’t decided yet what format it will take. As Paul shared in the previous post, we learned a lot from what we made in 2024. Lots of dos, and a good number of don’ts as well, and we will be using all of this information to decide the best way forward. One thing is for sure, however, and that is that we want to continue exploring, and also having fun. We believe it to be an important part of our DNA, and the way to make us a better brewery. Yes, 2025 is going to be quite a year. Lots of new challenges still to come, lots of stepping out into the unknown, and we can’t wait to see how it all comes together! Ben