With third location, expanded capacity, Trophy Brewing is booming

Trophy Brewing is booming.

The Raleigh brewery is adding two big fermenters to help bump its production up about 1,000 barrels per year. With that, co-owner Chris Powers said they'll be canning their beers more often, including some of the brews made in their small-batch system.

They also opened a third location earlier this year. Trophy Tap and Table took over the old Busy Bee location on South Wilmington Street where they tap their beers and serve rotisserie chicken.

The newest location adds square footage, but it also adds another flavor to the Trophy family.

Trophy Pizza, on Morgan Street, is where the pilot batches will show up. Brewer Les Stewart said that's where you'll find the gose with strawberry and lime, or a small-batch beers brewed with Brettanomyces.

Trophy's Maywood location will sell the brewery's core brews and have new releases. Powers said you can get a taste of the new beers before they drop.

"If we're doing a can release on a weekend at Maywood, look for the little preview kegs to pop up over at (Tap and Table on) Wilmington Street," Powers told the 919 Beer Podcast.

"We'll tap (the kegs) on a Thursday (and) you'll get an idea what you're in store for when you go to pick up the cans on Sundays," Powers said.

Now, the only problem is choosing which Trophy location to go to. But Stewart said that's been accounted for, too.

"I know it can be confusing sometimes, you know, that many Trophys show up when you put Trophy in Google. I dig that," Stewart said. "But I think the idea is to build it in a way that if you blindly pick one of them you're still going to be happy."