With more than 300 friends and family in attendance, Eagle Creek Brewing Company played host to a "Friends and Family Tour Tasting" event celebrating its first round of product distribution into the market place.
      "This is so exciting and really unbelievable," said co-owner Daniel Long. "A dream just seven months ago is now a reality. And we are able to celebrate it with so many friends and our family. It is truly wonderful."
      The company began to distribute its beer into restaurants last week with a tour of seven Statesboro restaurants in which its beer is being served.
      "We have a total of 15 taps in Statesboro," he said. "We aren't bottling it, but distribute it in kegs, so we have to convince restaurants to put our beer on one of their taps. We currently have 27 taps in Savannah, and will be adding three more. Honestly, we felt that we had a very, very good product, but did not expect to be in this many places this soon."
      This week, Long and his partner Franklin Dismuke will be touring 15 different restaurants in Savannah serving their beer.
      "It really is a lot of fun," he said. "People see the passion that we have for what we are making, and we get to hear feedback about our beer. This Thursday, our Low Country Pale Ale will be featured at Tubby's Restaurant in Thunderbolt which is pretty cool."
      An even bigger deal to both is the news they recently received that the company's Low County Pale Ale will be featured this August as Beer of the Month on River Street in Savannah. With all of the attention Eagle Creek is getting, Long acknowledges that production may have to be expanded.
      "We are looking at purchasing some additional equipment which is a nice problem to have, but somewhat of a surprise quite honestly," he said. "We have had two distributors and three restaurants call us from Atlanta about carrying our product, but we just can't service that request at this point. We have to focus on Statesboro and Savannah, and build our business from there."
      Long said it really hit home for him when he went out to eat recently in Statesboro with his family.
      "I was at lunch and looked over at another table and someone was drinking one of our beers," he said. "It really just made me stop and think. That is our product, and it is finally being enjoyed by others. That is just awesome."
Initially, Eagle Creek will be producing its Low Country Pale Ale and Spot Tail Blonde Ale for distribution.