Licensing

Trying to ascertain the licensing requirements for a brewery in New Hampshire from what in on the state website is a bit challenging. So I sent off an email and got a response that was unexpected. The respondent advised that I need my federal (TTB) license before I can apply for the state license. The unexpected part was the statement "..if they (TTB)will license your production facility almost certainly we will." In the past, other brewers had told me that the state side of the equation was the difficult part. Maybe times are changing?

Another interesting statement was that a brewery cannot be in a private residence. I have been to a few brewpubs where it seemed that the owners lived upstairs. Maybe a brewpub is different or I was mistaken.

The toughest part is that the physical requirements for a brewery are not too well defined. However, one cannot apply for a license until all construction is completed and they are within 60 days of starting production. This raises the question: What do you do if you have put all this money into a facility and your license application is denied? Hopefully that is a rare occurrence.