Right Bee Cider: A Cider Made With Love

By Melissa McEwen in Food on May 12, 2015 3:35PM

It seemed to come out of nowhere: A beautiful, locally-crafted cider with a thick, creamy body and mildly-sweet finish called Right Bee Cider. It's one of the most unique and interesting drinks on the market right now in Chicago. And it's brought to us by just two people: Katie Morgan and Charlie Davis.

Over pints of their cider at Kaiser Tiger, I naively asked them why they liked bees so much. "It's like 'right beside her,'" Charlie said, pointing to Katie. And then I felt a little slow, having not noticed the homophone before, but that explains a lot more about the cider than honey-making insects do.

"It was made to replicate the first cider he brewed me," Katie said. It was a cider Charlie brewed to celebrate her birthday before they even started dating. The cider turned out very well and it impressed Katie. They got married last year.

Charlie's background is in beer brewing and Katie is a full-time cardiac nurse. Originally, Right Bee was a side project for Charlie while he worked as a brewer at Vice District and bar-tended, but last year they made the plunge and turned it into a business on its own.

"The only test-marketing was my tastebuds," Katie said.

"A lot of people ask what style it is—in the beer world you take a style and replicate it, but in this case it's truly original," Charlie said.

And the original was made with plain old cider bought from the grocery store. These days they get their apples from the East Coast, one of the few local cideries not using Michigan apples, but Charlie says their supplier has been good to work with.

Besides that, it's a simple recipe, Katie said. "We don't add any additional stuff, the only thing besides apples is organic cane sugar. We take pride in using quality ingredients."

Their strategy from the start was to bootstrap themselves and grow slowly. Charlie and Katie built up the infrastructure and organized the business while planning their wedding. That approach also has allowed them to avoid the issues with overzealous expansion and investor conflict that plague many food startups.

But this has some downsides. The main one: they are keg-only for now. "Kegs allow us to package and distribute it ourselves easily—it takes five minutes to kill a keg, and then we bring it to the bar," Charlie said. "But profits aren't as good because it's like selling in bulk. We'd like to move into bottling soon."

However, you won't see a range of different ciders from them anytime soon either. For now it's just one cider.

"We want to do one thing really well. Eventually when we hit our stride we can try out something new," Charlie said.

"There is something special about the simplicity," Katie said.

And the slow growth extends to their distribution. They expand to new bars slowly, getting to know each one.

"We are so lucky that everyone is so supportive, we love visiting accounts," Katie said. "We've been lucky we have strong friendships with our accounts. Sometimes it's freezing outside and the bartender gives you a hug and encouragement—people don't know how much that means to us."

So far people love it, even people who don't normally like cider. "We wanted it to be accessible to people who think they don't like cider because it's too sweet. A lot of people tell us they aren't normally a cider fan but they really like ours," Katie said. And that makes them happy.

That factor is important to both of them because it's literally a labor of love. "We created something out of our story—our relationship and marriage," Katie said. "We're self-conscious about it, but we are thrilled when people like it."

View a list of bars that have Right Bee Cider on tap at their website.