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| - I've had two experiences with Brew Mentor that were wildly different. After relocating to NE Ohio, I started looking for brewery supply stores. My girlfriend and I visited a few one weekend, including Brew Mentor. My first visit an employee named Brian who I think was part owner/manager was extremely friendly and enthusiastic and it was clear he really loved his store and brewing beer. He showed us around the shop, including a small bar and area where they brew in the back. We decided to take stock of what we had and come back next weekend to buy supplies and get brewing.
Here are some of the Pros: Pretty extensive collection of beer and wine kits, carboys, hydrometers, bottles, caps, etc. Decent selection of hops, grains, and yeast. A small station with magazines and recipes, some coffee roasting material, a beer, wine, and coffee bar.
They do sell a nice looking copper cooling coil for about $65. While its not strictly necessary to have one, they are really nice to get your wort down to pitching temp quickly. If you aren't the DIY type, theirs might be a good option. But, if you have a Lowes or Home Depot nearby, you can make one yourself for less than half that price with a bit of patience and elbow grease.
My second visit was about an hour before the store closed on a Saturday. I had a partial recipe that I wanted to use as a starting point for a brew with steeped grains, 3 1oz hop additions including some hop leaf and pellets, and light pilsen malt extract. I saw the same guy, Brian, who I had such a good experience with previously and walked up to him and said hello, mentioning that I was there last week and came back to buy ingredients to start brewing a beer for a friend's going away party.
I showed him my recipe and that was where all the trouble began. The amount of grain I wanted milled was listed in grams, the malt extract in pounds, and the hops in ounces. I figured that was pretty standard, but he started giving me an attitude about it and told me that he didn't have the time to try and help me convert units to try and have a successful brew. I told him that was fine, I could figure it out, and shook his head and said it wouldn't be worth the effort. I was shocked at how different the same guy was treating me. I asked him if he had hop leaf and his response was that 'no one brews with those because is just too inconsistent' and that I should just buy a pre-packaged brew kit. His tone was extremely rude and while I'm not anything more than a hobbyist brewer with only a dozen batches under my belt, his attitude was really unprofessional. Maybe the big industrial breweries don't use fresh hops, but I have been to plenty of microbreweries and know plenty of hobbyists that do. The vendor that Brew Mentor buys their pre-packaged hops from, Hop Union, even sells leaf hops in addition to pellets. Brian repeatedly pushed the brew kit, despite my preference for using my recipe as a starting point.
When I picked out the hops I wanted, the guy was even condescending about my choice of using cascade, citramax, and chinook. 'The flavor will be too piney,' I was told. Maybe I happen to like and want that pine resin/citrus/grapefruit hop character. While all of this was going on there was a younger employee helping another customer and he, admittedly, seemed to be pretty friendly and helpful.
We had plans with friends to brew and cookout that evening that I didn't want to bail on despite my awful experience son in the end I just bought a kit and a package of the chinook hops just to get out the door. He didn't seem particularly helpful, I wasn't sure if their policy was mill your grain yourself or not and I didn't want to leave empty handed after a 30 minute drive.
I don't know what was going on with my second visit. Maybe they had a bad day, maybe an hour was too close to closing to come in and expect fifteen minutes of customer service, or maybe I took Brian's attitude and tone for being rude and condescending when he was really trying to be helpful. My first interaction with him was great. Unfortunately after the second all I can say is that for me, I'd rather spend my money somewhere else.
I hope this was just a one-off experience because brewing is a great craft to share with friends and I'd like to see the NE Ohio home-brew community grow. Cheers.
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