Canadian Breweries History: Heritage Brewing
For those looking to make the trip along the new UNESCO-designated Rideau Canal from Ottawa to Kingston, just follow the beer.
Ottawa's tiny Heritage Brewery was selected to produce special Rideau 175 lagers for the event, and the specially labelled beer is available only along the route, despite clamouring from other LCBO stores who have asked to carry the beer as well.
"They have been selling out, which is great for us. You never know how these things are going to turn out when you agree to do them," explained Heritage Brewery president Ron Moir, who runs the brewery with his wife, Donna Warner. "We have been getting calls from other LCBOs asking if we can ship it to them." The $2 individual bottles come in two different varieties: Heritage's premium lager and traditional dark.
Christina Tessier, director of the Bytown Museum, worked with Mr. Moir and Ms. Warner on a special Colonel By beer for an event to commemorate the 90th anniversary of the museum. The beer was named after Lt.-Col. John By who supervised the construction of the Ottawa Canal in the early 1800s.
Heritage Brewing sells about 1,000 hectolitres a year, and is available in several bars
and LCBOs throughout eastern Ontario. Besides the lager and dark, Heritage has a cask-conditioned Sgt. Major and Sessions Ale and a seasonal Maple Bush Lager, which uses Lanark maple sap instead of water in the brewing process.
With its brew site in Carleton Place and its head office in Ottawa ("The paperwork gets soggy if we leave it at the brewery," explained Mr. Moir), Heritage is the brainchild of three friends with very different business backgrounds: Mr. Moir; Chris Graham, who remains a director at Canada Post; and Frank Farrell, who runs a systems consultancy, Guideline Info Tech.
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