Drifter Brewing Company is a Soup-a-hero: Brewing Hope While Filling Bellies

CAPE TOWN (WESTERN CAPE), SOUTH AFRICA — Three weeks after deciding to convert its beer tanks into giant soup-making tanks, Drifter Brewing Company has fed more than 75,000 people across ten different communities in Cape Town. Operation Soup-A-Heroes is addressing the hunger crisis exacerbated by the COVID-19 lockdown, especially for those who live hand to mouth. To keep this project going, individual donations can be contributed through Quicket .

“Food security has always been an issue in our country and with the rate of unemployment on the rise, the need for meals will only continue to grow,” says Nick Bush, Director and Co-Founder of Drifter. “Our beer business is taking a hard knock right now, but the silver lining is using our space to make huge quantities of food. Our brewing system is a 1000L tank, so a single batch of the soup can feed at least 2500 people. And we’re cooking multiple batches in a day, which means we can feed up to 10,000 people come dinner time.”

Since the alcohol ban went into effect in South Africa on March 27, local breweries and restaurants have found creative ways to try and stay afloat. At the very least, they’ve made use of their equipment for other purposes. Craft breweries typically use the equivalent of giant kettles to make beer. Across the country, this equipment is being repurposed as giant cooking pots to make mass quantities of nutritional soup. It’s then delivered to NGOs for distribution among the communities.

Woodstock Brewery initiated the soup production effort for the industry, setting up a ‘blueprint’ for other breweries like Drifter to follow. Now Drifter has taken the helm, working in collaboration with the other breweries, NGOs and volunteers to produce and distribute soup daily. Soup-A-Heroes relies on donations from the public to continue feeding these Cape Town communities, which include Hanover Park, Heideveld, Retreat, Tafelsig, Lavender Hill, Bunoon, Kraaifontein, Langa, Khayelitsha and Gugulethu.

Here’s the link to donate. Be sure to follow along our social media (@drifterbrewing) as we continue our efforts.

— The Drifter Brewing Co. Crew

Follow Along Drifter Brewing Company's Captain’s Log During Their Strict 21 Day Lockdown

Our Co-Founder and Captain, Nick, video chatting with Operations Director, Carl.

While the United States is under a nation-wide shelter-in-place order, South Africa is now officially a week into a lockdown. Unlike other parts of the world, their lockdown is extremely strict. Strict may even be putting it lightly.

Residents can’t leave their houses for walks, even to walk dogs, and no alcohol is allowed to be sold anywhere, which includes supermarkets, liquor stores, and more. This also means that restaurants and cafes are completely closed, with no delivery options. The only time residents are able to leave their residence is to buy essentials, such as groceries and medicines. The country even set up police roadblocks and military patrols in neighborhoods to ensure compliancy, as people are getting fined or arrested if they aren’t out to do essential shopping. Recently, two surfers in Jeffrey’s Bay tried to go out for a paddle and were arrested.

While this does cause difficulties for Drifter Brewing Company and other breweries and small businesses in South Africa, we feel that this decision is smart and will help flatten the curve a lot quicker than what we’re seeing in other parts of the world where lockdowns aren’t as stringent.

A large consideration into enforcing the strict lockdown is how many people are already immune-compromised with TB and HIV, and how many millions are living in close proximity to one another in townships (slums) with zero running water. Coronavirus would be a massacre in these areas, which is why governments across the continent are cracking down hard.

So what have we been able to do at Drifter?

As soon as the case numbers started coming in, we realized that we would be heading down the same path as many countries already have. Because of that, we quickly adjusted from looking at less distribution to bottle shops and restaurants and more towards at-home deliveries. In light of that, we set up a Shopify site and encouraged folks to buy directly from us.

Then, we were thrown for another loop. Last Monday evening, March 23rd, we received the news that the entire nation would be going into a strict lockdown from Thursday, March 26th, at 11:59 pm that would last for 21 days. When the knowledge of no alcohol being sold was announced, we knew we had to hustle in the window of time remaining. Needless to say, that week was absolutely hectic.

“I wanted our staff to stay healthy and safe,” shares Anna Anderson, one of Drifter’s Co-Founders, “I did a majority of the deliveries myself while most of our team worked remotely besides the brew crew.”

Drifter’s next challenge was what to do about the brewery with none of us being able to go in physically as this isn’t classified as essential work and we’re not allowed to leave our houses unless we’re deemed in one those industries. We need someone there to check tanks, top-up electricity (which is on a pay as you go system here in South Africa), and generally make sure things are okay at our location for the three weeks of lockdown.

While we were scrambling after hearing the news of the 21 day lockdown, Nick, our co-founder and captain of the Drifter ship, was overseas for business. He flew back to South Africa on that Thursday, just a mere six hours before the borders were completely closed. He’s now self-quarantines at Drifter, which solves our problem of finding someone to check on everything.

But does that mean he’ll spend the 21 days alone in the brewery? That’s to be determined. In light of this, we’ve started a YouTube series about his adventures of his daily activities — including building a swing from the eye beam — and documenting it all in his Captain’s Log.

“In terms of looking ahead, the only thing we can control right now is social media,” says Anna, “So we're trying our best to keep the brand and spirit alive while we take the daily and weekly knock of no sales.”

— The Drifter Brewing Company crew