The women behind Winnipeg’s Good Neighbour Brewing Co. are building a brand based on community connections and responsible fun through drink.
Founders Amber Sarraillon and Morgan Wielgosz are committed to inclusivity and say that means ensuring there are options for anyone who comes through their doors. Between fruit sours, milkshake sours and cocktail-inspired beers, in addition to more traditional style kölschs and pilsners, the duo say they want people to be able to explore options while sitting in their taproom. “Beer doesn’t have to be so serious,” said Wielgosz. “Beer should be approachable. Beer should be fun. It should be a little bit more relaxed.”
Together, Sarraillon and Wielgosz have over three decades of beer experience. Sarraillon, who runs the brand and marketing side of the business, began her career working for Labatt, before moving to Red Bull and then eventually as a brand and marketing director for Amsterdam Brewing Co. in Toronto. That’s where she met Wielgosz, Good Neighbour’s brewmaster, who was working as Amsterdam Brewing Co.’s brewer.
Good Neighbour’s beginnings
In 2021, the pair endeavoured to strike out on their own. “We’re pretty lucky that we both found a passion at a young age and have been inspired to continue through the industry,” Sarraillon said. A hazy pale ale, bumbleberry milkshake sour and Czech premium pale lager are the three brews that kickstarted Good Neighbour and have remained mainstays throughout the business’s growth. Since that initial trio, Good Neighbour has brewed over 100 beers.
We love the storytelling of beer.
Amber Sarraillon, Good Neighbour Brewing Co.
Travel to countries such as Czech Republic, Germany, and Mexico, to name a few, has inspired much of the brewery’s variety. The pair say their first instinct when enjoying new and interesting flavour profiles is, “How do we get this into a beer?” “That’s where we find a lot of the passion and the creativity of it, and really wanting to find a way to share our experiences through beer for the consumers,” said Sarraillon. “We love the storytelling of beer.”
The pair’s three mainstay brews are examples of how Good Neighbour develops its products – travel, community and plain fun and exploration. The Czech lager is something Wielgosz learnt to perfect on a trade mission to the Czech Republic in 2018. She was one of 10 North American brewmasters invited to be submersed in Czech beer culture for 10 days and says the trip inspired her to have the premium pale lager be a part of their core brand.
Through connections made on that trip, Good Neighbour is able to use all Czech ingredients in its lager with the only exception being water, which itself gets manipulated so that its minerals and pH match that of the Czech Pilsen region. The Bumbleberry milkshake sour was inspired by Saraillon’s mother’s bumbleberry pie. As for the hazy pale ale, “That’s been a fun road trying to dial in and perfect that recipe,” Wielgosz said.
Portfolio pairs core beers with innovation and rotation
For some of the series in Good Neighbour’s portfolio, the beer style remains while the flavours rotate. The fruit sours, for example, change with what’s in season and what the team is excited about. “We have a huge kitchen of folks that are just super creative and bring different ideas to the table,” said Sarraillon. Some of the flavour combinations they’ve experimented with include dragon fruit and watermelon, and peach and apricot to keep consumers engaged with new varieties, and keep themselves excited as well.
The pair say they also feel inspired by the local shops and restaurants in Winnipeg. They say their neighbours have a plot of land where they grow Saskatoon berries. That was the catalyst for Good Neighbour’s annual Saskatoon milkshakes. “You’ll find inspiration everywhere if you are looking for it,” Wielgosz said. “We have those kind of core, standard, very traditional beers. And then we have a highly innovative rotational side of our portfolio as well.”
On top of that, it’s important for the pair to offer alcohol-free options, too. Enter the Good Neighbour sparkling hop water series – filtered carbonated water that’s cold steeped with hops for 24 hours and then the hop varieties are paired with fruit. They offer amarillo hops with grapefruit, azacca hops with mango and ekuanot hops with passion fruit.
“So again, we talk about inclusivity and diversity, and just welcoming folks whether they drink beer or not,” Sarraillon said. She says it also provides an alternative for gluten-free folks and for kids if they want to try it. “It’s not a non-alcoholic beer, per se, but it is a non-alcoholic option for folks to at least experience hops or the profile of hops,” said Sarraillon.
Finding their own place in the ’hood
Since their 2021 beginnings, Sarraillon and Wielgosz have been contract brewing out of Oxus Brewing, another Winnipeg brewery, brewing and packaging their beers through Oxus’ facility. Now, Good Neighbour is getting its own brewery. It’s been a year in the making, and Wielgosz and Sarraillon are opening the doors to their new space this spring. In the front, they plan to have a retail store and tasting room. Out back is what they’re calling the Good Neighbour backyard. There they’ll have games and movies for folks to enjoy with a beverage.
Beer should be approachable. Beer should be fun. It should be a little bit more relaxed.
Morgan Wielgosz, Good Neighbour Brewing Co.
“We talk about it being a community hub, that’s really something that’s important to us; to bring people down [and] provide a meeting space for folks [to] have a few beers and connect, and have a nice time,” Sarraillon said. “We’re super pumped to be a part of a neighbourhood. We have this vision of people showing up to our little retail store on their bike and filling their basket with beer, and heading out for the day and things like that.” Sarraillon says she plans to retrofit a bike to facilitate beer deliveries. “Just really embrace that local neighbourhood vibe,” she said.
In part, the pair’s effort to make inclusion a priority for Good Neighbour stems from being women in a male-dominated industry. “There’s more folks out there beyond just men and guys drinking beer,” said Saraillion. “I think a big part for us, and Good Neighbour as well, is trying to invite diversity in and welcome people who may not have had the opportunities that we have, or who have had similar challenges that we have had.” We want to try to break those barriers for folks,” she said, whether it’s people looking to work with the team or consumers.
As the first all-female and 2SLGBTQI+ owned and operated brewery in Manitoba, the pair notes that earlier in their careers, seeing women in leadership roles in the industry was rare. “The demographic of craft beer is changing in a very good way,” said Wielgosz, and the pair want Good Neighbour to reflect that in the portfolio of drinks they offer, and in providing a safe and welcoming space for all.
It’s important for Sarraillon and Wielgosz that Good Neighbour’s portfolio, space and ambiance be about more than beer. When people walk into their shop, they want guests to kick back and have a good time. “I think the only thing that we’re asking is that people just explore and have an equal amount of fun with this as we do.”
