Max Arndt doesn’t just like his beer cold; he likes it in the shower, too.
“There’s apricot wheat in the kitchen,” Arndt, 24 said. “In the bathroom I have vanilla porter in the shower and IPA at the sink.”
No, Arndt’s house isn’t littered with bottles and kegs, but rather bars of soap. Beer soap, to be exact. After graduating from the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management, the 24-year-old knew a desk job wasn’t in his future.
“A lot of people I graduated with went right into the corporate world,” Arndt said. “That didn’t really hold much interest for me.”
What did catch his fancy was finding a way to support the craft beers he loved and the brewers who made them. With that, Swag Brewery was born. After a few beer-fueled brainstorming sessions with friends, Arndt decided to pour some of his favorite craft brews into the soapy shower staple.
“It’s a cool idea, but nobody has really done it in a way that we like,” Arndt said. “We’re really trying to capture the style of beer in the soap.”
That’s why when the manufacturer told them they weren’t sure if honey (for the oatmeal stout soap), or even beer for that matter could go in soap, Arndt stood his ground and asked them to try.
It worked, and now the three-person team (Arndt, Brett the web guy and Mari the designer) has “six pretty awesome little beer soaps” that mimic their namesake brews in both ingredients and aroma.
“I’ll take a beer anytime of the day, any type of beer,” Arndt said. Even in the shower.
-
- “This is a favorite style of ours,” Arndt said. “It’s one of the best beers we’ve ever had.” To add a little texture, Swag Brewery added ground walnuts to the soap. “We thought about doing apricot pits ground up, but that’s just about impossible to find. Nobody saves the pits to sell to anyone else.”
-
- “The pilsner is the gateway to the craft beer world,” said Arndt. “It’s a light, drinkable beer so we didn’t want to make it too overwhelming.” It’s a clean, simple soap with beer, honey and oats.
-
- The porter is straightforward. Dark beer meant dark soap. They added a little vanilla because, “vanilla porter is kind of cool style.”
-
- Oatmeal, honey and milk all went into this soap to bring out the chocolate and roasted coffee notes from the stout.
-
- This is one of Arndt’s favorite styles. Orange peel and coriander are used to make Belgian beer, so the team added it to the recipe for texture, and to make it “citrusy and spicy.”
