How a Vermont Brewery Grows a Data-Driven Operation with a Lean Team

Frost Beer Works

Industry: Beverage | Location: Hinesburg, Vermont | Use Case: Operations & Inventory Management

Some businesses might appear simple and straightforward from the outside. Take beer making. Water, hops, malted grains, and yeast: how complicated could it be? Yet, if you ever get the chance to peek behind the scenes of a successful brewery (which we’ll do right now), you’ll see that when it comes to running a business, nothing is as simple as it seems. 

Garin Frost, founder of Frost Beer Works in Hinesburg, Vermont, gave us a glimpse inside his day-to-operations. He showed us that every batch of beer involves dozens of measurements: from dissolved oxygen levels, CO2 readings, air pressure, fermentation temperatures, yeast propagation data, ingredients tracking, packaging details, and more. Miss one data point, and quality can suffer.

When Garin opened his brewery in 2015, he quickly realized that creating great beer would involve capturing every detail that goes into making it. This was the only way he would be able to consistently reproduce his high quality standards. Ten years in, Garin’s five-person team produces over 7,400 barrels annually. And nearly all their data collection happens automatically through systems that feed into Knack. Leveraging AI for manufacturing has turned out to be a game changer for the beer maker.

“The main problem we were trying to solve when I landed on Knack was having a singular location to store all of our data. And something that was simple enough that if there wasn’t a home for the data, I could build the home for the data quickly.” 

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

Leveraging Knack + AI for manufacturing in a step-by-step process

When Frost opened, Garin faced the same dilemma that many growing businesses do: how to store and synthesize all the data that is fundamental to running a successful operation?

Production schedules, ingredients inventory, batch tracking, quality control readings, packaging runs, distribution orders—each piece was critical, but scattered across different systems or stuck in chaotic spreadsheets.

Rather than trying to map out a grand system upfront, Garin took a different approach. He started with one table—batches. He built a form. And he started entering data immediately. Then, as new needs emerged, he’d add another piece.

“I wanted to have a system that I could start using instantly. I would literally build a table, a form, and start using the table without the rest of the application even being built. So essentially, every day we’d just build onto what we were already using.”

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

This iterative approach solved a problem that trips up many small businesses: the gap between planning a system and actually using it. With traditional software, you design everything upfront, build it out, then hope it works. With Knack, Garin could tackle things in increments, starting with whatever was the most urgent.

Need to track CO2 deliveries? Build that functionality. Production schedule getting chaotic? Add scheduling tools. Inventory getting lost in spreadsheets? Create inventory tracking—all while keeping the existing system running.

The flexibility proved necessary as Frost grew. What started as basic batch tracking evolved into a comprehensive system that now captures data from sensors throughout the brewery—fermentation temperatures, dissolved oxygen readings from their centrifuge, even air pressure monitoring that alerts staff to compressor problems.

“You could build things really quickly. You didn’t have to be a software developer to get things done… There’s a lot of flexibility, but it’s super simple.”

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

The data most businesses don’t know they need

Breweries generate more data than most people realize, and Garin captures nearly all of Frost’s automatically. Temperature controllers send readings every hour. Lab equipment feeds results directly into the system. The packaging line reports production numbers when runs complete. Even their keg inventory updates automatically when staff scan barcodes with their phones.

When a batch tastes different, Garin can trace back through every measurement, every ingredient, every process step to find what changed. When the hot water tank temperature drops unexpectedly, the system alerts staff before it becomes a problem.

“We use Knack all day long, every day… There’s not a lot of manual data entry that goes on. It’s almost all automated.”

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

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Efficiency at scale

The results show up in daily operations. Frost’s five-person production team knows exactly what needs to be done and when, thanks to scheduling systems that break overwhelming task lists into prioritized, bite-sized chunks. Inventory tracking means no more hunting through spreadsheets to find supplier information or stock levels. Quality control data lives in one place, accessible when needed.

“Without Knack, my guys would be way less efficient, and they’d probably be way more stressed trying to figure it out.”

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

Beyond beer: lessons for any data-driven business

Frost Beer Works’ combination of efficient operations while maintaining consistently high quality thresholds is testament to making your data work for you. Whether you’re tracking customer interactions, managing inventory, scheduling services, or monitoring quality metrics, the principle remains the same: get the necessary data into a system, and then use it to achieve your goals.

“Knack is not limited to any business. You can put a Knack implementation in and you can take data from 15, 20 different data sources and give somebody a singular interface. They can then look at all the data from all these other data sources.”

— Garin Frost, Founder, Frost Beer Works

What data is your business creating right now that might be getting lost in chaos?  Knack lets you start optimizing one step at a time. Try Knack today for free with our 14-day trial.

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