To celebrate Women’s Month, Corvallis’ own 2 Towns Ciderhouse will rerelease a limited batch of The Baddie, a hard botanical cider created by an all-women-led team.
Head cidermaker was Lucy Bauer, an alumna of Oregon State University’s fermentation science program.
The drink was created last year as a nod to women’s courage, strength and grit, according to marketing director Danelle Kronmiller.
This informed the choice of ingredients and branding, from the Pink Lady apples the cider is made from to the Rosie the Riveter-inspired artwork that beautifies the cider kegs and bottles. Hibiscus lends the drink a pinker hue than the cider would normally have, in keeping with the theme.
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A “sleepy-time tea” is how production manager Matt Dickason describes the flavor.
Last year, about 6,000 gallons of the drink were sold to distributors, selling out in two weeks, according to Kronmiller. About the same amount will be distributed this year.
Bottles waiting for cider in the assembly line at 2Towns Ciderhouse in Corvallis.
Part of the proceeds from sales of The Baddie will go toward the Pink Boots Society, a national nonprofit organization encouraging and assisting women and nonbinary individuals to enter and thrive in the fermentation industry.
“We wanted something with a national presence and a local footprint,” Kronmiller said.
Proceeds from bottle sales will go to the national body of the organization, and proceeds from sales at a series of launch events taking place locally will benefit local chapters of the organization.
“It was an opportunity to have multiple layers of effecting a cause,” Kronmiller said.
The fermentation industry is male-heavy, though less so than it was about 10 years ago.
“When we look back on 10 years, we’ve made leaps and bounds of progress, but it’s still known as a male-dominated industry,” Kronmiller said.
2Towns Ciderhouse has released its second batch of The Baddie, a cider synthesized by a team of women in celebration of Women’s Month. Danelle Kronmiller talks about the motivation behind the drink.
Dickason said over the course of his 11 years working at 2 Towns Ciderhouse and, before that, seven years in the beer industry, there has been significant growth in workforce diversity.
“After we got over that initial hump of being able to hire people, then it kind of took off in its own direction,” he said.
In his production crew of about 60, every team has a woman on it, or recently had one on it before she left the production team for other departments within the company, he said.
“As far as frequency of hires, people we interview, people (we) talk to that are within the same space in the industry, it’s gone up like three or four times what I’ve seen it in the last five, 10 years. So it’s really great to see,” Dickason said.
Some of the remaining hurdles to more gender diversity in the industry, especially in the Pacific Northwest, have much to do with perceptions of the place of women in the cidermaking industry, and less with qualification or lack of a talent pipeline.
Nevertheless, through C.I.D.E.R. (Committee on Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Representation) initiative, the company offers scholarships to underrepresented students to pursue fermentation science at Oregon State University as a way to build and employ local talent.
“That speaks to the whole idea that if we want a pool of diverse talent to hire, then we have to help to create that pool,” Kronmiller said.
The two recipients of the scholarships so far (in 2023 and 2024) have been women.
Other company support for a more diverse workforce comes by way of sponsorships to important conferences such as the SheBrew conference, now in its ninth year, which assembles and showcases the work of female professional brewers from around the Pacific Northwest.
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Kosisochukwu Ugwuede (she/her) covers the cities of Corvallis, Philomath & Millersburg. She can be reached via e-mail at Kosiso.Ugwuede@lee.net or by phone via 541-812-6091
