Jay Boyd stands in front of the future home of Oddstory Brewing Co. The familiar building, located in the 300 block of M.L. King Blvd., will be repurposed by late fall, according to Boyd.About Jay
Name: Jay BoydAge: 25Education: A graduate of Covenant College and who also studied at the American Brewers Guild in Salisbury, Vt.Job: Developer of OddStory Brewing Co. on M.L. King Boulevard
It didn't take long for Jay Boyd, 25, to settle on a career brewing beer after he graduated in 2013 with a business degree from Covenant College.
Just one year working at Yellowhammer Brewing, a craft brewer in Huntsville, Alabama, convinced Boyd he loved the work. Then he spent four months learning the brewing craft at the American Brewers Guild in Salisbury, Vermont.
Now, Boyd and his dad, Bryan Boyd, plan to open OddStory Brewing Co., an "indoor beer garden," in late October in a long-vacant building at 336 M.L. King Blvd. at the corner of Foster Street - adding to the commercial boom going on there near the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's campus.
The Boyds will invest $400,000 in the brewery, including installing five stainless-steel beer fermenters in a brewing area at the rear of the building to be visible to those in the taproom through glass windows.
The Boyds leased the brewery space from Chris Curtis, who owns a number of properties on the stretch of MLK, most notably the just-opened seven-story, 691-bed Douglas Heights apartments at 423 E. M.L. King Blvd., that Curtis geared toward UTC students.
In keeping with the beer garden theme, OddStory Brewing Co. will have skylights, bar seating up front near glass roll-up doors and two, 36-seat community tables. Boyd plans to bring live music and other performers to the space and sell food, including pulled pork over corn bread, meatballs, and pretzels with beer cheese, all made by downtown Chattanooga's Dish T'Pass Cooking School & Catering Co.
Another microbrewery about a block away has a more-the-merrier take on Oddstory moving in.
"We're happy to see it," says Jonathan Driggers, assistant brewer at Hutton & Smith Brewing Co., a microbrewery and tap room that opened in June 2015 at 431 E. M.L. King Blvd. "The way that we've looked like it is the more reasons someone has to come down to MLK, the more people come down here."
Oddstory plans to brew 1,200 31-gallon barrels of beer a year, Jay Boyd said - with the flagships being American pale ale, Vienna lager and a Belgian blonde made with fresh ginger.
The beers will be hop-forward, but with tropical, floral aromas and flavors - and not "super bitter," Boyd says, to appeal to local beer lovers' tastes.
TVs only will be on display in Oddstory for special events, such as the Super Bowl.
"One of the main themes of our tap room is going to be human interaction," Boyd said. "Without TVs, you're going to be forced to talk to each other."