Vintage Beer Truck Is The Motor For This New Monroe Business
MONROE, CT — A new Monroe business combines beer and vintage trucks.
Picture it: People call you up, book you and your truck for special events on the weekend, you show up, dispense beer to happy multitudes, and get paid.
Really, what’s not to love?
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It sounded like a match made in hops heaven to Greg Zach and Nick Kuhn as well.
There was just one problem, as there always is.
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Both men had “zero experience” with the kind of equipment required to store beer in the back of a truck and push it through a tap on the side.
“So we learned all this stuff. And we finally found a truck that we really liked. And we jumped on it,” Zach told Patch. The result was Classic Pour, in business since the fall.
That truck was a vintage 1950 Ford F2 pickup that began its career on an apple farm in Nebraska. The pair purchased the antique in August and were able to transform it into a vintage tap truck — after first figuring out how a vintage tap truck worked — in time for the Connecticut Beer Fest exhibition in October.
Classic Pour offers standard tap fare, but will provide any brew through its business relationship with GlenRo Spirit Shoppe, the biggest liquor store in Monroe
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“If you want a certain IPA from a craft brewery, we can certainly get it,” Zach said. The same goes for premixed cocktails, wines, ciders and other beverages.
Connecticut, of course, loves its food trucks. They’re part of the culture, like snow-covered gazebos and highway toll arguments. In recent years, the trucks have found a new niche, serving up the pub food in the parking lots of brew pubs that are more brewery than pub.
But a brew truck? One not associated with any brewery? That’s new.
Zach, a Monroe resident, said he expected the licenses, insurance and other legal wranglings would be huge hurdles to a quick launch, but instead found Connecticut is “pretty business friendly.” His advice to other nervous neo-entrepreneurs thinking about finally pulling the trigger?
“Do your research. Look into the market. Pick the brain of other people that are already doing it.”
The launch may have been smoother than anticipated, but Classic Pour’s first season so far has seen some tough sledding, Zach said. Following BrewFest there was a Halloween party, and then nothing, until Kuhn, a Trumbull resident, got an idea for a brand-new yuletide tradition.
The partners tricked out the tap truck with strings of holiday lights and loudspeakers for the Christmas carols, then talked Santa into taking a few unscheduled stops in December.
The kids got to meet the Jolly Old Elf, and their parents got to quaff their thirst.
After all, why should the fire trucks have all the fun?
Classic Pour’s next gig is the 38th Annual Connecticut Wedding and Bridal Expo at the Convention Center in Hartford, where they will be exhibiting on Feb. 3.
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