Now Open: Future Magic Brewing Co Is East Brisbane's New Community-Minded 150-Seat Beer Haven

Before Rhys Pike and Sean Astill opened Future Magic Brewing Co, Manilla Street in East Brisbane was already home to a brewery thanks to the Gold Coast-born Black Hops' Brisbane taproom. For many, setting up shop opposite another beer joint might've been cause for second thoughts, but not for this duo. Valuing community — cultivating Future Magic's own via crowdfunding, and celebrating the community it has joined in its new abode — is one of their guiding principles.

"I think people want to be really proud of their suburb and their postcode," Pike tells Concrete Playground. That was something that Future Magic were eager to build upon with their 150-seater brewery — and, to do their part to make its chosen home as great as it can be.

"Our rationale was basically to say that we want to be within a certain walking distance of either train or bus or ferry, to make it easier for people to get to the venue, but still pretty central as well. And just looking at all of the data, like census data and population density, and planning ahead for things like the Olympics — which is obviously quite a long way away still, but is impending — and just walking around," Pike continues.

"Before we signed the lease, we walked around the suburb and had a look at all the businesses and chatted to locals, and we just found that everyone was so enthusiastic about the possible concept of having another brewery."

Pike and Astill did hear the obvious doubts, however. "We've had quite a few people ask us in really direct terms 'don't you think it's silly to open a brewery within 100 metres of another brewery?'," Pike says. "And our rationale is that, it's a weird concept but the rising tide will lift all ships. If there's a great brewery in an area, it will then change the way another brewery will operate, and make them make their processes better — and it means that the local offerings for beer and food and wine, and craft concepts like gin and so forth, will become better for everyone."

The pair met about seven or eight years ago, with Astill dabbling with home brewing and Pike running a craft beer blog and Instagram account, and both working for a technology business. "Sean presented me with a couple of home brew beers he had made, and I told him they were of very high quality and he should consider submitting them to some awards," Pike explains. Astill followed his advice, placed second in the state in the Queensland Amateur Brewers Association awards, and then fourth in the country. He'd next work for Ballistic Beer Co.

Bringing Future Magic to fruition sprang from there, with monthly catchups to work through the duo's plans, research into ideal locations and a 12–18-month search for the perfect property, which involved inspecting 40–50 properties. Pike and Astill went with the industrial brick Manilla Street warehouse — the home of a former packaging supplies company — for its feature wall, its capacity to host both a taproom and the brewing operations, and its room for growth.

"It's kind of cool and funny in its full-circle nature that the building has gone from a place that has housed boxes of pizza to serving boxes of pizza," Pike says. "We still get people coming in every week asking to buy pizza boxes and cake boxes."

Future Magic's pizza range is made in-house, with seven types available — plus two for kids — alongside mushroom arancini and bruschetta.

The main drawcard, of course, is the beer pumping through 12 taps. That includes its own brews, complete with a mango and passionfruit sour; a Thriller in Manilla Hazy IPA collaboration with Black Hops; two guest taps currently pouring tipples from Woolloongabba's Easy Times, which is located just blocks away the other side of the Gabba; and two ciders and a wine list from Witches Falls Winery well.

None of the above would've come to fruition without the crowdfunding campaign, which raised almost $300,000 from 230 investors up to August 2022, and helped build that sense of community. "We really wanted to put our money where our mouth was early on," Pike notes.

"A lot of breweries are around for three or four years, and then they go to market with a crowdfund. The most recent ones from the big-name breweries have raised $2–3 million in the space of 24 hours. For us, it was about getting our community involved as early and often as possible — to get everyone to be like 'our best advocate is our owners, technically, or our shareholders, who will bring their friends and family and spread our community through the process of experiencing it in person'."

Find Future Magic Brewing Co at 32 Manilla Street, East Brisbane — with opening hours varying on Wednesdays, and the brewery operating from 12–9pm Thursdays–Saturdays and 1–8pm Sundays.

Images: Rhys Pike.