As beer leaves a keg, it flows into the Jumper Box™ and travels through the coils until it reaches your faucets (“taps”)—wherever they’re mounted—where your beer is dispensed. A Jumper Box™ is the reliable middle man between your beer and beer trailer.
When you fill a Jumper Box™ with ice it surrounds the coils, which chills the beer inside of them down to a proper serving temperature so you get a cold pint, everytime.
Installing a commercial cooler or refrigeration unit inside your trailer to keep your beer cold will be insanely cost-prohibitive, cut into the valuable interior footprint of your working space, and make you so cold that you’d be better off turning it into an ice cream truck.
Do I need to keep the kegs cold? The beauty of Jumper Boxes™ is that they’re designed to allow the ice to do all the work by chilling the beer as it circulates through the coils. While prior refrigeration of your kegs before you arrive at your event or icing the kegs on-site is not necessary, it will help minimize the effects of ambient temperature inside your trailer on extremely hot days.
Rest assured, Jumper Boxes™ will chill your very first (and every subsequent) pour from a keg at room temperature (~ 70° F) down to a proper serving temperature, under 40° F.
If you’re a brewery or an established beer trailer, chances are you probably already have the shortlist of accessories needed to complement the integration of a Jumper Box™ into your mobile bar setup. Otherwise, because the layouts of beer trailers can be so diverse, you have the leeway to choose the additional equipment a la carte or as part of a packaged Shank Kit.
In either case, here’s what you’ll need to transfer beer from its keg to your Jumper Box™ and from your Jumper Box™ to your guests' glasses.
If you’re new to the game, we have additional resources to help you become experts in pouring draft beer anywhere. While you’ll find that these how-to guides and instructional videos focus on their popular predecessor, jockey boxes, the philosophies and many of the applications transfer synonymously to Jumper Boxes™.
There is an emerging culture of mobile bars and beer trailers that will be changing the landscape of hospitality at special events. Jumper Boxes™ are the secret sauce to satisfying the demands of thirsty entrepreneurs and their guests by enhancing your bar service while bringing people together in a fun, memorable way.
]]>While you can probably already see yourself slinging drinks for an energetic crowd with a picturesque landscape backdrop, there are steps you have to put into motion behind the curtain first so that when you’re ready to pull it back for the big reveal all your ducks—scratch that, your drinks—are confidently presented in a neat row.
This is a broad-strokes overview with what you should be considering, and it allows you to ramp up at your own speed.
DEFINE YOUR IDEA
So you want to start your own mobile bar company? Awesome! Now what? Think through your idea to first begin establishing your brand identity—that is, all the elements (visual, emotional, etc.) that consumers identify as associated with and unique to your company.
PROTECT YOUR IP
Your intellectual property is the most valuable asset you own. You have to protect it. Doing so is going to take some time and research, but it will pay off.
As you start throwing around names for your mobile bar business, and BEFORE YOU GET ATTACHED—cross reference every one (including alternative spellings and hashtags) with a deep-dive Google search and scrub across social media.
If there’s ANY chance of brand confusion or you infringing upon an existing entity with the same, similar, or even remotely similar name, your best play is to pass and pick another one. You do not want to invest time and money developing branding, claiming URLs and @usernames, graphic design, printed collateral, etc. only to be rocked by a cease and desist.
Also, test variations or abbreviated versions of your preferred name to ideally establish identical references to your online presence. Using lame Jane again as our example, it’s a sloppy look if this is how she promotes her brand:
Pro tip: Noting Twitter’s limit, above, you’ll achieve pro status if you can snag identical usernames across all platforms in 15 characters or less.
Oh, and before you hit “Create Profile,” did you check to make sure your website domain/URL is available? Start there, then work out toward social media in tandem. When you find the one that checks all the boxes, buy the URL and claim the social media before someone else does.
Give your name an unbiased eye to evaluate if it’s confusing to spell, challenging to pronounce, and/or is offensive or inappropriate in any way, shape, or form. Pick it apart and be critical because once you commit you have to be prepared to embody it and, if necessary, defend it.
Speaking of which, register your new business as an LLC in your home state. It’s easy to do and should cost less than $100.
Continue reading How to Start a Mobile Bar Company Right Now, Part 2...
]]>Leverage One Piece of Equipment to Bring Your Business to Life
]]>Once you’ve established the vision for your mobile bar catering service, put it to use and make some scratch.
INVEST IN A PORTABLE DRAFT STATION
Shameless plug, for good reason. Coldbreak’s in the business of manufacturing premium mobile draft equipment, and a jockey box is the first tool you want in your toolbox to pour beer anywhere. With a little bit of strategy, you can leverage it to start earning you money long before your actual mobile bar trailer is wheels down ready to roll.
While you’re sketching out the plans for your ideal mobile bar trailer buildout, you can rent out your jockey box. And you don’t even need to be there with it for it to earn a return. By now, you should be networking your way into different catering circles and event opportunities. There will inevitably be people who need a portable draft beer solution, but don’t have the means. Your jockey box is those means.
Whether it’s to lame Jane who didn’t do her homework, your neighborhood brewery in a pinch, or favorite local non-profit’s annual fundraiser, your jockey box is their missing link. You don’t have to be responsible for curating any alcohol or even serving it (but, you could add a couple line items to your invoice if you are). All you have to do is loan out your jockey box for the weekend and presto—you’re literally already in business.
The beautiful thing about building your mobile bar business on the foundation of a jockey box is that once your trailer is finished, you will most likely be asked (over and over again) to provide a secondary, satellite bar station or need to cater two events at once. Problem already solved(!) because you can parlay your preexisting jockey box for that purpose.
BUILD IT AND THEY WILL COME
Your jockey box is now on autopilot making you a little bit of money so you can focus on the business of building your mobile bar or beer trailer. While this post isn’t going to show you how to do that (stay tuned, though—that instruction is coming!), it is intended to point out one of the most critical aspects you should be planning for: draft beverages.
Your jockey box is versatile enough to do most of the heavy lifting. Because it’s portable and self-sufficient, you’d almost be wasting it if you tethered it to your mobile bar trailer exclusively. Once your trailer is operational, transition your jockey box to a secondary role for additional bar stations as needed.
Nearly identical to a jockey box, but with a simple modification designed specifically for mobile bars, spec the construction of your trailer to include a Jumper Box. It does exactly what a jockey box does—dispenses any kegged beverage anywhere. The critical difference (read: benefit) is that the faucets (i.e., its “taps”) are not attached to the cooler. This subtle mod allows for the flexibility to position the cooler (the box) out of your way inside the trailer in one place and your faucets installed anywhere else.
For example, you can add a professional draft tower to the service countertop of your trailer just like you’d see at the bar of your favorite taproom or taps to the exterior of your trailer if you’re doing high volumes of beer. Don’t worry, every component is made to be easily detached for cleaning and storage after your event.
Keep in mind, jockey boxes and Jumper Boxes are not limited to only beer. They can be used to dispense any kegged beverage. This is going to be particularly helpful when you decide to start offering cocktails on draft, flavored seltzers, cold brew coffee, or soda. Taking advantage of this equipment will set you apart from the competition by providing your guests with an experience that upholds the same integrity as any bar that’s not on wheels.
]]>KEG WHAT’S POPULAR
The best cocktails to serve on draft are those that are widely popular, ordered frequently, and not weighed down by overly thick or unusually complicated ingredients.
A short list of the best cocktails to keg include:
*Those marked “nitro” will be dispensed relatively “still” (with minimal, cascading carbonation) with N (nitrogen). The others will be carbonated with CO2 (carbon dioxide)—as will most beers you’d serve on draft.
THE KEG
Unless you’re catering an open-bar wedding during Spring Break at a no-holds-barred hotel for 1,000 amateur 21-year-olds, you’ll only need a compact, 5-gallon Cornelius keg (aka a “Corny” keg). They hold 640 ounces of liquid. Rarely to probably never will you use a commonly recognized, much larger “half-barrel” keg. It’s simply overkill. Here, less is more.
Corny kegs have two exceptionally user-friendly features:
INGREDIENTS
Whatever you add to your batched recipe inside the keg has to flow through a narrow beverage line (aka, “jumper”) and out an even narrower pathway through a faucet. Also, remember that you should be cleaning your draft lines regularly. Avoiding ingredients that slow or impede that flow or are difficult to remove through normal cleaning practices is essential.
Fruit
Fruit or fruit juice is probably the most common ingredient, aside from the spirit and water, that you’ll be adding to your batched recipes. Fruit is good, but pulp and seeds are very bad. There’s one easy fix and one easy workaround.
You can strain the pulp out of any fresh fruit or juice using a common, food-grade, squeezable strainer bag. A traditional colander or strainer will not be fine enough, so sack up.
An alternative to fresh fruit is citric acid. Dose your batched cocktail with a couple scoops of commercially available powder to mimic lemon/lime flavors. You’ll just have to experiment with the ratios that shake out best for your recipe.
Syrups
Texture matters. If your recipe calls for thick and sticky viscous syrups like honey or maple syrup, dilute them with water first before pouring them into your keg. Remember to account for the water you’re adding to your syrups when you’re portioning out the total water needed for your recipe to fill the keg.
RECIPE CONSIDERATIONS
The most important thing you have to remember when you’re batching kegged cocktails is that you’re not crafting them by hand one-by-one. You’re making (up to) 640 ounces of the same cocktail at a time!
When kegging a cocktail that’s normally stirred (e.g., a Manhattan), water effectively becomes an additional ingredient from the ice cubes melting. So, make one Manhattan with your preferred recipe, noting total volume of liquid ingredients. Then, after you’ve made your cocktail—and stirred it, allowing some of the ice to melt—strain all of the cocktail’s liquid from the ice. Lastly, factor in that additional volume of water into your bulk recipe.
Note: Sometimes some recipes, depending on the blend of ingredients, don’t translate equally in bulk. That’s okay. So, when you’re experimenting with your recipes and building them inside the keg, do as you would when cooking and build them in measured steps. Add a little at a time, then taste. Add a little, taste. And so on. Document your recipes because once you nail it, you can replicate it without thinking about it.
PRESENTATION
It’s almost therapeutic to watch a seasoned bartender spend five minutes building a complex, multi-layered cocktail with a dozen obscure ingredients. It should be if you’re paying $18. That’s part of the experience. You can retain some of the magic even with cocktails on draft.
It’s all about the presentation. Catering a wedding or festival is a different environment than only serving 10 seats in a dimly lit speakeasy. The name of the game is efficiency, but that doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice flare.
The time you’ll save from meticulously measuring and surgically mixing every ingredient into its cocktail form can be allocated to the finishing touches and the details that matter. You can still garnish your draft cocktails with attractive eye candy in gorgeous glassware. You should. And, while you’re at it, you’ll be able to build a more meaningful bond with the higher volume of guests you’ll be able to serve, which will lead to new customers, new clients, and more cash in your tip jar.
SHOUTOUT
Thanks to our friends at Eastern Kille distillery, in Grand Rapids, MI for their expert authority in helping us compile this resource. If you’re in the neighborhood, tell ‘em we sent you.
Continue reading Pro Tips for Preparing Cocktails on Draft, Part 2...
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CARB UP
Carbonation is the distinct tiny bubbles and effervescent, fizzy mouthfeel we recognize as characteristic of many popular cocktails (and beer and pop and seltzer, etc.). Adding it to our already-prepped and filled kegs is easy, but it does require a little practice and patience.
To achieve an ideal carbonation level of 10 psi when your cocktail is being dispensed at the tap, you’ll want its carbonation level inside the keg to be upwards of 50 psi before you start serving it. We do this by a shortcut known as “force-carbing”—directly infusing CO2 into whatever liquid is inside the keg.
Once you’ve injected CO2 into the cocktail that’s already been prepped and filled inside a keg, pull the release valve on your keg (once sealed) to purge the keg of any oxygen. Doing so helps to slow/prevent the oxidation of any perishable ingredients (fruit), unwanted excessive acidity, and oxygen-induced off-flavors.
It will take 48-72 hours for the carbonation inside that kegged liquid to reach ~50 psi. Your keg needs to remain refrigerated during the wait.
If you’re in a pinch, you can cheat the waiting game. Dose your keg with CO2 as you normally would, as stated above. Then, periodically throughout service, you’ll have to agitate your keg by giving it a few vigorous shakes. Note: This isn’t recommended, and will require constant attention, but it’s better than a flat Gin & Tonic.
CARBONATION CONSIDERATIONS
For reference, beer dispensed through a Jumper BoxTM is ideally ~25-30 psi and ~10-12 psi for draft beer from the source at your favorite taproom. If you’ve operated a jockey box or have any experience with on-premise draft beer, you’re used to occasionally adjusting psi, but you also know that once you’ve got it dialed in you’re golden.
The flexibility of being able to dispense draft cocktails or beer through a Jumper Box is worth the price of admission. However, because the footprint of everyone’s mobile bar trailers will be different, you may have to adjust your psi a degree or two either higher or lower to account for the length of your jumpers and the elevation of your faucets in relation to kegs. What’s important is that you start at 10 psi for draft cocktails and work out from there.
SHELF LIFE
Any kegged liquid concoction that includes perishable ingredients will need to stay refrigerated until its next use. If kept cold, kegged cocktails should easily stay stable for one week, often two. To maximize longevity (read: quality!), it’s critically important that your keg was properly cleaned and that you purged as much oxygen as possible from it after you filled and sealed it.
Consider the type/vibe of the event, the potential consumption habits of the guests, what other alcohol options will be available, and whether you will be able to repurpose any leftover kegged cocktails at your next event. Use these factors to help determine the volume and variety of cocktails you’ll prepare and offer on draft.
Note: Just because you can prepare up to five gallons of a cocktail in advance doesn’t mean you should or have to.
SHOUTOUT
Thanks to our friends at Eastern Kille distillery, in Grand Rapids, MI for their expert authority in helping us compile this resource. If you’re in the neighborhood, tell ‘em we sent you.
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Whether you decide to install a draft tower as a countertop feature inside your mobile bar or as taps on the exterior of your beer trailer, you have to account for beverage tubing and gas lines.
Just like at your favorite brewery or restaurant, beer doesn’t magically transport itself from its keg to your glass. We’re working on that tech right now with Elon, however. Anyway, your beer must travel through beverage lines (i.e.,vinyl tubing)—known as “jumpers.”
*A faucet shank is a stable unit that either gets housed inside a countertop draft tower or is the tunnel from the inside of your beer trailer to its exterior wall that allows for you to install taps to the outside of your trailer. Faucet shanks support the connection between Shank Jumper and beer faucet.
Note: Both the Keg Jumper and Shank Jumper are vinyl beverage tubing, constructed identically. Their only difference should be their diameter (explained below). We (COLDBREAK®) have taken the liberty to assign them names to distinguish their location and purpose in the setup.
Your beer trailer is going to be designed and set up differently than her mobile bar. And while we can’t predict or account for every possible scenario, there are a few things to consider when you’re building yours.
Without getting too scientific, we have to control the flow of beer via the CO2 pressure that forces it up and out of its keg with an appropriate diameter of our beverage lines. Otherwise, your beer will either dribble or blast out of your faucet. Like Goldilocks, we want to avoid both extremes, and instead need something in between and just right.
Our recommened Keg Jumpers are 5/16” ID (i.e., its internal diameter).
FYI, your beer then travels through stainless steel coils that are 5/16” OD (i.e., its external diameter). Their ID is 1/4".
When beer exits a Jumper BoxTM, it needs to transfer into a Shank Jumper that is equal to or smaller (never larger) than the coils’ internal diameter.
The Shank Jumper should be 1/4" ID (matching the coils), or 3/16” ID (one measurement smaller).
Pro tip: To help maintain the liquid’s proper serving temperature as it leaves the chilled coils and combats ambient temperature, we recommend insulating your Shank Jumper with a piece of basic pipe foam (see photo).
By default, most beverage lines come in 4’ or 6’ lengths. This gives more than enough leeway for the vast majority of mobile bar trailers to be flexible in their setup. For those who want to tidy up their tube spaghetti aesthetics, you can easily trim their length on your own at home. Reattaching the tailpieces and end clamps is self-explanatory and easy.
Regular cleaning is essential to ensure that the product being served to your guests maintains its integrity in quality, flavor, and presentation. In addition, the importance of adhering to proper sanitation standards is critical. Guests expect (and deserve!) that what they’re drinking out of your mobile bar tastes exactly the same as it should coming straight from their favorite taproom.
In all seriousness, if this is something you’re not willing to maintain, stop now—pack up shop, and go home. Yes, it’s that big of a deal.
Every Two Weeks (14 days):
For a practical tutorial, watch our how-to video, How to Clean a Jockey Box.
Both your Keg Jumpers and Shank Jumpers should be replaced every one to two years, or sooner if you experience any bacterial contamination (from not cleaning regularly) or off-flavors.
To that point, if you’re dispensing root beer, intensely-flavored beers, margaritas, wines, or cider—generally anything with aggressive sugar content, flavor, or color—you should be replacing your beverage lines after each use. So, let’s say you regularly cater weddings and you have a 4-tap Jumper BoxTM. It’s a smart play to designate each line for distinctly different beverages. For example, two lines could be beer, one for white wine or a mixed cocktail, and the last one for alcohol-free soda.
For draft beverage novices, don’t fret—after your system is properly installed and set up, and once you’ve done one cleaning cycle, proper care and maintenance will feel like second nature.
While there will probably be waaay more information than you’ll ever need, if you’d like an in-depth dissection of all things draft beer systems, reference these two trusted, downloadable publications from the Brewers Association: Draught Beer Quality for Retailers, and the technical and scientific-heavy rabbit hole, Draft Beer Quality Manual.
]]>For those who may be unfamiliar with both, jockey boxes are the beer industry’s solution to pouring taproom-quality draft beer anywhere. Historically, they’ve earned their reputation at beer festivals because they don’t require electricity.
Instead, jockey boxes are constructed from professional-grade, insulated coolers and modified with stainless steel coils internally and faucets externally. As beer flows from its keg through these coils it’s chilled by ice inside the cooler until it’s dispensed out of faucets on the front.
Fun fact: You can dispense any kegged beverage through a jockey box (or using a Jumper BoxTM!). This makes them popular for also being able to offer wine, hard seltzer, coldbrew coffee, soda, etc. on tap.
Yes—jockey boxes are a turnkey draft beverage station! So, what about Jumper BoxesTM?
The subtle, yet advantageous difference that makes a Jumper BoxTM distinct from a jockey box is that Jumper BoxesTM do not have faucets on the box itself. Trust us, there’s a method to this madness!
A jockey box is a self-contained draft beer system, portable unto itself. Wherever you can go, a jockey box (plus your kegs and a CO2 tank) can follow. And just like that, voilà—beer on tap, dispensed directly from the jockey box!
While identical in construction (remember—minus the faucets), think of a Jumper BoxTM as the essential middleman—the bridge, if you will—that allows your static mobile catering service to become its own dynamic draft beer bar on wheels. No longer are you weighed down by having to haul hundreds of bottles and cans to your next event, nor do you have to worry about installing commercial refrigeration in your beer trailer.
The elevator pitch for Jumper BoxesTM is that they allow you the flexibility to customize your catering truck or mobile bar trailer such that you can design your beer’s tap layout to fit cohesively with the limited space you have.
This luxury is dually advantageous in that you can present a guest-facing experience that feels just like being in your favorite neighborhood watering hole.
Here’s how it works...
Think first about how and from where you’d like your guests to be served. Is a bartender inside the mobile bar slinging drinks from behind the bar like they would at a restaurant? If so, you probably want to install a permanent beer tower on the bar counter or back bar—either work.
Or, if your niche is serving draft beer exclusively (i.e., no mixed drinks, coffee, etc.), perhaps you want the draft beer taps (i.e., the faucets) on the exterior of your trailer. This would allow a bartender to serve a high volume of guests quickly at ground-level from behind a banquet table (think music festival, corporate conventions, for example), or for guests in an environment where they’re able to walk up and serve themselves.
In either case, notice that the faucets—where the beer is literally being dispensed into your guest’s glass—are not directly attached to the Jumper BoxTM. As a matter of fact, the added benefit is that they actually don’t have to be close at all. They probably will, but they don’t have to be. You’ll appreciate the leniency this affords.
These reasons why Jumper BoxesTM do not have faucets attached allow you to install the faucets where they’re convenient for the way you need to operate. Then, all you have to do is let the Jumper BoxTM do what it’s meant to do—chill your beer so you can pour it from wherever you want—inside or out.
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