Founders Statement:
HopMule came about from the collaboration between a software development company, EmergenceTek Group headquartered in Buffalo, NY, and a local craft brewery & taproom. We found an essential demand to rethink the process of the limited-edition craft beer release experience. With combined efforts using thorough R&D we bring you HopMule, the ultimate tap room experience.
EmergenceTek Group has no limits when it comes to what and how they develop. We decided to test this idea on a local brewery in Buffalo, New York, Resurgence Brewing Company. Buffalonians love their beer and the craft beer market was at a growing rate of 5% in volume in 2017 making it 23% of the $111.4 billion-dollar U.S. beer market (https://www.brewersassociation.org/statistics/national-beer-sales-production-data/). Knowing the popularity of the market and being beer lovers ourselves we knew we had something special in our hands. The US had 8,386 registered breweries in 2019: an 8.9% increase from 2018 (BA, 2020).
In the past, craft releases were painfully frustrating amongst consumers and brewers. Consumers would have to wait for the exact day the craft was released in that brewery, wait in long lines, often miss their favorite releases due to lack of awareness and communication from brewer to consumer.
Brewers would find themselves either overstaffing or understaffing for lack of knowledge of the demand, could not alert the public properly/ and or in time for the release. Now we can put that all to bed with HopMule.
HopMule provides a centralized location for brewers to presell their beer releases while also allowing a more convenient way for their valued customers to get their hands on their favorite crafts! The process was made to create efficiency and convenience for beer lovers and brewers surrounding the release day process.
The app allows anyone twenty-one and over to purchase crafts in various containers and quantities decided by that crafts brewer. Registered users are alerted by email when a brewery posts a new release as well as when that users order is ready for pickup at their crafts brewery. Breweries know how many and who is picking up on pre-order release day and in turn develop a manageable CRM (customer relationship management) database through HopMule that is efficient and effective.
We built this app because we fell in love with the idea of putting a product in the hands of consumers to make their celebrations more cheerful, less stressful and to allow all breweries large, medium, and small an equal opportunity to succeed.
ETG has been providing tech services to the community for seven years and decided it was time to deliver a product Buffalo would be proud of.
“HopMule isn’t ETG’s first product, we take pride in all we have built and are excited for everyone to enjoy it. This wouldn’t have been possible without this amazing group of individuals, our team here at ETG.” -CEO at ETG, Brian Lehman
How it works:
HopMule’s front end (customer site) is built in Ionic and the backend is built with Angular 2, .net MVC. with admin functionality.HopMule is simple for the user to use. The experience of HopMule should feel like you are visiting your favorite breweries in one single stop. Planning out releases in your favorite city, weekend trip or just near your home. From the brewers’ side – it helps you manage when your customers will hit your taproom allowing you to adjust staff levels.
The Results: Focus release in Buffalo, NY
2019, HopMule was being beta tested in Buffalo, New York with Resurgence brewery. Since the initial launch in November of 2018 we have diligently used R&D to upgrade the app to what it is today. We jumped from 165 registered users in 2019 to 2,500+ users currently. That is about 6 new users each day for a year!
We have had several unprompted posts regarding peoples experience to HopMule. The experience has earned a 4.4/5 on the app store while marked as “The secret cool shit”, “This app is perfect for any beer lover” and “Quick and easy! Order ready and delivered to car!!”.
A look into HopMule Mobile:
Today we live in a very mobile driven environment. Everywhere we go we look to add more convenience and productivity to our lives. The reason why HopMule is based off an app instead of a website is to provide our users with the most convenience possible. The HopMule app is available in the apple app store as well as the android store so it can be at users’ fingertips all the time. In a year we have made multiple enhancements like brewery favoriting and brewery sorting. We listened to our target market and we found that most people felt overwhelmed when having to keep up with multiple social media accounts and websites. This would
lead to missed beer releases and in turn that brewery would lose a sale. We found it most beneficial to have registered users get notifications straight to their phone when a brewery has posted a new beer. This would lead them to the app where they can then either purchase that beer or see what else there is to offer. This call to action not only helps users, but brewery sales as well.
