Business in Bismarck is booming! So be sure to keep up with all the local action by tuning in every Tuesday during the Evening Report as Jim Christianson takes you "Inside Business".

Bismarck`s Namesake Beer | 10/23/2012

Steve Nelson and Devon Waldron aren`t afraid to get their hands dirty or their shoes wet.

"There are days you love it and days you love it a little less," Nelson said.

But this isn`t their full-time job. At least, not yet. For the past few years, Waldron has been trying to turn his dream of brewing into reality. Thanks to help from the Nelson family, Edwinton Brewing Company is finally gaining traction.

"Let me tell you, if we didn`t really want this, we wouldn`t be here, because we ran into a lot of brick walls," he said.

Now that they`ve found a workspace in Mandan, the two are brewing their new creation, called "Lou." Nelson says it`s not uncommon to spend 12-hour days in the shop carefully watching over his craft.

"If you aren`t being completely sanitary in everything you do, one little thing of bacteria in the fermenter will grow into a million and that`s all you`re going to taste in the beer and it`s not going to be very good."

It takes Edwinton about two weeks to brew one barrel of the Belgian ale. But Waldron and Nelson say if they could brew it faster, they would. So far, every drop is spoken for and Peacock Alley is the only place where you can find Edwinton Lou on tap.

"They`re in uncharted territory here. There are no other breweries in North Dakota, so they`re blazing a trail for others to follow," said Peacock Alley owner Dale Zimmerman.

Last week, in just one night, Peacock Alley poured six kegs of the Belgian IPA, exactly what the brewing partners were hoping for.

"Going out and making beer, I can`t be asking to be doing something cooler or that I`d like to be doing more, it`s so rewarding," Nelson said.

"It`s not like we`re living the dream, but we feel like it`s not just a dream anymore, if that makes sense," Waldron said.

And so long as Waldron and Nelson spend countless hours in a steamy warehouse, North Dakota beer drinkers will have something they can call their own.

Waldron says they chose the name Edwinton because it was the original name of Bismarck before it was changed in 1873. He says within a few years, as the operation grows, they hope to move across the river and start brewing in Bismarck.