Local Aberdeen business expands customers’ palettes with Beer School

ABERDEEN, S.D. (Dakota News Now) - The Market on the Plaza not only sells a variety of beers, but they’re also educating customers on that variety through Beer School.

The goal of Beer School is not only to expand customers’ palettes, but also to bring in more customers during the colder months.

”This is our second year, second winter, in business. Winter is hard for businesses all over, right? So, instead of having to layoff people and cut our hours and things like that, we said let’s give people a reason to come out,” said Brodie Mueller, the co-owner of The Market on the Plaza.

Last month, The Market guided attendees through light beer, but they’re visiting the dark side Thursday night. Beer School will include four classes total.

”We’re kind of going through chunks of styles. So, we did the light side, now we’re doing dark side. We’re going to do a hops next and then, we’re going to do beers where the yeast is the showcase,” said Mueller.

The classes are completely free. They can help new beer drinkers learn the ropes, or give experienced drinkers a chance to try something new.

”The breadth of different styles and different ways of making things and different flavors, it’s so wide. To break it down and kind of give you a chance to really taste what you’re drinking and the, ‘I like this, but I don’t like this’, and ‘Here’s where you should go from there,’ is really a unique experience that we don’t normally slow down to do,” said Mueller.

Educating customers on beer can also help instill the importance of valuing locally-crafted brews.

”Craft beer is incredibly important to this part of the country, as well as to the country as a whole. We’ve lost a couple craft beer bars here in this town, especially the ones that slowed down to tell you the nuances of what you’re tasting. We want to be that place,” said Mueller.

Beer School also brings a new, fun experience to the Hub City.

”The turnout has been great. The whole goal is to provide fun experiences in the place that we live, and if you can link those fun experiences to our store, then that certainly helps,” said Mueller.

The second session of Beer School will take place at The Market on the Plaza Thursday night from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. The third class, where hoppy beers will be explored, is scheduled for March 9th. The Market will also be bringing more beer-related events to Aberdeen, such as a Schell’s Boke beer-poking event on February 9th.

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