WILMINGTON — Mad Mole Brewing, opening soon on Oleander Drive, is only the latest addition to Wilmington’s bustling craft beer scene. But the owners aren’t worried about competition. In fact, they’ve embraced their fellow brewers – and the feeling has been mutual.
New kids on the block
Owners and brewers Martin de Jongh and Ole Pederson hope that Mad Mole, located across the road from Wrightsville Beach Brewery and not far from Waterman’s Brewing, will be a part of a brewery community.
“The other brewers have been so welcoming to us, we’ve had a chance to compare notes, and learn from them,” de Jongh said. “You know, the hope is that there’s now even more of a reason to come down this way. You can have a few drinks here, have a few drinks over there.”
Peterson De Jongh and Pederson have been home-brewing together for eight years, back before Wilmington Homebrew opened and aspiring brewers had to use mail-order grains and hops. The two watched as Wilmington’s craft beer scene exploded, and when a chance to open a brewery presented itself – in a building right by their day jobs as programmers – they decided it was time.
Thus Mad Mole brewery was born; the name, which people ask about frequently, comes from a mash-up of “Martin” and “Ole.”
“We had a lot of names, over the years, of course, but we had to rule anything out that was already a brewery or a beer,” Pederson said. “And so Mole, from our names, and we added ‘Mad,’ because you can’t just have a little mole…if you’ve seen our logo, he’s a little mad scientist mole.”
De Jongh and Pederson hope to join the route of the Port City Brew Bus, Jeremy Tomlinson’s brewery tour – and, of course, there’s Lyft and Uber.
Related story: Check out our in-depth look at the past, present, and future of Wilmington’s craft brewing scene
A neighborhood brewery
For those less interested in a pub crawl, and more interested in an after-work drink or a place to meet up, de Jongh and Pederson hope Mad Mole will become a neighborhood bar. The finished brewery will hold a little more than 60 people, with room outside for a beer garden.
De Jongh and Pederson said they hope their tasting room will be a convivial, intimate space.
“We’re not going to do TVS – when you have TVs, you just see people’s eyes go up to the screens,” de Jongh said.
Pederson added, “We just want people talking, drinking good beer.”
Just the right size, just enough beer
Mad Mole Brewing doesn’t have the two-story sprawl of Front St. Brewery, or the expansive canning and kegging capacity of Wilmington Brewing Company. The brewery’s seven-barrel system is a big jump up from the half-barrel system that de Jongh and Pederson used for home brewing, but it’s still one of the city’s more modestly sized setups.
“We’re one of the smaller breweries. We wanted a very open brewery, we wanted people to be able to feel like they’re in a brewery, to see everything that’s going on. But we’ve only got so much room, so it’s kind of an intimate experience,” de Jongh said. “We want to be a neighborhood place, we’re just worried for now about the tasting room, and we might do a little kegging.”
Pederson laughed, and added, “It’s not that we don’t want to do canning and distribution, but we want to get this right first.”
De Jongh and Pederson plan to brew what they like, including the near-ubiquitous IPA and the harder-to-find Belgian-style beers, as well as stouts and saisons.
“We can’t possibly brew enough beer for the craft beer drinkers in this town,” de Jongh said.
Hoping for a sunny day in March
Mad Mole will be equipped with solar panels to help power the brewery, following in the steps of brewers like Mother Earth, Sierra Nevada and Highlands. The brewery is already wired, and the roof-mounts are just waiting for panels to be installed.
De Jongh and Pederson are hoping to open on a sunny day in March, although they’ve already been cleared to start brewing.
Mad Mole Brewing is located at 6309 Boathouse Road, behind the Boathouse Restaurant on Oleander Drive. For more information, you can follow de Jongh and Peterson’s progress at Mad Mole Brewing’s Facebook page.
On the map: Mad Mole Brewing, tucked away off Oleander Drive
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Send comments and tips to Benjamin Schachtman at ben@localvoicemedia.com, @pcdben on Twitter, and (910) 538-2001.
