Southeast Georgia will get a taste of a Georgia Southern University student’s award-winning beer with the opening of Statesboro’s first local production microbrewery, Eagle Creek Brewing Company.

The company is distribution-only but will invite the public to visit educational tours and tastings events with live entertainment, Daniel Long, owner of Eagle Creek Brewing Company, said.

“We want to be what Terrapin Beer Company is to Athens and what SweetWater Brewing Company is to Atlanta,” Long said.

Eagle Creek Brewing Company is currently renovating the former French Quarter Cafe next to Sugar Magnolia Bakery and Cafe on Savannah Avenue. and will open early summer. The location is not only spacious enough for a production brewery, but its uniqueness and proximity will drive people downtown, Long said.

The head brewer is going to be Cole Brown, senior communication arts major.

The head brewer of a production brewery is in charge of recipe development, hiring assistant brewers and scheduling when the beers will be brewed, Brown said.

Brown is a member of the home brewers club, Blind Willie Brewers, and is dedicated to studying the process of brewing and will bring experience to Eagle Creek Brewing Company, Donald Armel, president of Blind Willies Brewers and professor of graphic communications management, said.

“I’ve only been brewing for two years, and I’m recognized as the youngest brewmaster in the Southeast,” Brown said.

“Cole is born to brew beer. If you don’t ask him his age, you’d think he had been doing this for ten to fifteen years,” Long said.

“When he was really getting serious he would wipe me out, buying large quantities, searching for the ‘magic’ recipe that would make his business a winner,” Armel said.

The brewing process will include a 15-barrel brew house and a 30-barrel for fermentation. In all, the company will make about 1,000 gallons of beer a day, Brown said.

Long and co-owner Franklin Dismuke decided to take the steps to open a brewing company after receiving praise from their friends on their home-brewed beer.

Long’s vision for Eagle Creek Brewing Company began in 2010 when he expressed interest in opening a beer company similar to Terrapin in Statesboro, Armel said.

Long said, “I told Cole, ‘You produce good quality beer, and we’ll make sure the world knows about it.’ Franklin and I will be the face of the company, Cole will be the quality.”