By Roger Morris
Special to Delaware Business Times
A Milwaukee-based malting company has decided to take advantage of the rise of regional craft breweries paired with the agricultural capacity of Sussex County by opening a regional facility in Laurel in late January.
According to the company’s sales and marketing head, Amy Germershausen, Proximity Malt will have an annual capacity of 250,000 tons of malt and other products to service commercial brewers in Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and some of Pennsylvania when it is fully operating.
Proximity took over a site with an existing grain elevator, refurbished it and added malt houses, a laboratory and offices. Expectations are that the facility will employ 20 to 25 workers.
Laurel was chosen in part because of Delaware’s high production of winter barley, and Proximity also cited the cooperation of local officials in assisting in making the site production-ready.
“We’ve already had a lot of interest from potential clients,” Germershausen said, “and we will be working with breweries to test our products” beginning with two- and four-row barley malts. Altogether, Proximity will offer at least 20 different product lines made from grains including barley, wheat and oats.
The manager of the Proximity Laurel facility is Matt Musial, who has 20 years of brewing experience with Stroh’s, Anheuser Busch, BP Biofuels and Boston Beer.
