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Michigan finalist named in Rural Entrepreneur Challenge

A love for farming and craft beer has led to a new business opportunity for a Mid-Michigan couple who are now finalists in a national competition.

Closely following the expansion of Michigan’s craft beer industry, John Enderle, who farms just north of Lansing, and his partner Julie Baker, a small business planner, decided to put their dreams of opening a malt house in action after results from a recent Michigan State University feasibility study confirmed its viability.

Baker tells Brownfield shortly after submitting the beginning paper work this June, she entered their business, Fedora Malthouse, into the American Farm Bureau Federation’s Rural Entrepreneur Challenge.  “He’s a Farm Bureau member and I read an article in Farm Bureau about the Entrepreneurial Challenge, and I thought to myself, ‘Well we can do that!’” She says, “So I went ahead and submitted an application for it and it was odd because only about two weeks prior that he had filed his DBA for his business.”

She says since then it’s been a whirlwind of activity to get the business off the ground.  “John actually does all the farming and he is developing equipment for the malt house.” Baker says, “My role actually is going to be in managing the business, doing the marketing and promotion of it.”

Baker tells Brownfield since she currently works for Central Michigan University, she’s also going to take the fermentation science course to have a better handle on what brewers are looking for and what the malt house needs to do from the supply side.

She says Michigan has almost 200 craft breweries, but only one commercial malt house.  “People are growing barley all the time, but nobody’s available to malt it.”

Baker says they have the ability to grow and source barley from local farmers for the malt house, but finding equipment is a challenge.  “We’re actually working with a company in my hometown over in Mt. Pleasant that we’ve approached to help us make some equipment and possibly sell it to other people that are in need of it now.”

As one of the four finalists of the Challenge, Fedora Malthouse has been awarded $15,000 which Baker says she’s grateful for, “There so much a need within agriculture to have people helping to start small businesses or new businesses within the industry, it’s difficult to do.”  They’ll compete in January with four other finalists for the national title and more award money.

Baker says this weekend they’ll plant their first malting barley and they hope to work with at least three to five local breweries in their first year.

AUDIO: Interview with Julie Baker (15:02 mp3):