We’ve all been there – your boss suggests that it would be better for office work flow if you and your coworkers spent some time getting to know each other better so that you felt more comfortable relying on one another. To you, this means a long day awkwardly interacting with coworkers, playing theater games, and falling backwards into each other’s arms. This kind of stuff was great when I had to get to know my bunkmates at sleep-away camp, but now, it just seems a little silly. The point of these exercises is to connect and have fun, but it seems to me that for the most part, they just make people feel uncomfortable.

So how can we make team building better? I’ve heard of offices going bowling, hiking, and even playing laser tag, but according to Pittsburgh Magazine’s recent Best in the Burgh 2013 edition, their pick for “Best way to make your corporate team-building day bearable” is something that requires everyone to try something new and work together towards a common goal: brewing beer at Copper Kettle Brewing Company.

Copper Kettle is a brew-on-premise shop, which means it’s a small-scale brewery where groups can make an appointment to spend about 2.5 hours brewing their own beer. I have had the fortune of working at Copper Kettle since it opened in early 2012, and teaching people how to actually make their favorite beverage is quite the job. People loosen and lighten up as they go through the process, so I am not surprised that this has caught on as a team-building activity.

Brew-on-premise shops (or U-brews) are extremely popular in Canada, mostly due to the high taxes on beer that can be avoided by brewing it yourself. Here in the US, these shops are just starting to catch on, with only about 2 dozen currently in operation. Copper Kettle offers more than 50 different recipes and 6 different 15-gallon kettles to brew in, meaning that groups could brew 1 to 6 different recipes and produce anywhere from 2 cases of beer all the way up to 30 cases of beer in one brewing session!

Corporate groups have begun to make Copper Kettle their go-to destination for team building, holiday parties, and even meetings, setting up their presentations at the bar next door! Coworkers seem at ease getting to know each other as they all learn something new and work together to create something truly awesome. The only time these newbie brewers seem more excited to be spending time with their coworkers is when they return to the brewery 2 to 3 weeks later to bottle and get the chance to sample the fruits of their labor.

So the next time you are looking for a venue to bond together with your coworkers and strengthen the work place, skip the name tags and trust falls and try something a little less… well, lame. Give the people what they want! Go brewing!