We operate in a pretty resource intensive industry – big electricity demands, lots of water, truckloads of malted grain coming up the highway, hops from around the world, and of course lots and lots of aluminium!

Over the years we’ve been taking steps to make our operations more sustainable. We’ve had solar panels on the roof since 2020, harnessing the power of the sun from March to October (depending on when the snow melts and falls).  That precious grain that gets trucked up the highway doesn't go to waste after it is used, like every brewery that spent grain goes to local farmers to feed their livestock.  We of course compost and recycle as much as possible, buy sustainable cleaning products, and support local where we can.

Most recently, we invested in a carbon dioxide reclamation system with help from the Economic Development Fund, which helps us capture the CO2 produced during the brewing process and reclaim it to be able to use in other parts of the brewing and packaging spaces.  This will save us a lot on trucking up CO2 tanks to the Yukon and allow us make our beer quality even better!

Here are some other shoutouts to some of our suppliers and local partners who help us do our part to tread a little lighter on Planet Earth. Cheers to the following:

• Big Bear Liquor Store - For saving our cardboard flats so we can pick them up and reuse them!
• Red Shed Malting - For providing a means for us to send our plastic grain bags back for proper recycling outside of the Yukon.
• Pride Bites For offering Eco-friendly (rPET) fabric and stuffing (made of recycled plastic bottles) for our Winterlong Dog Toys.
• Yukon Refillery – For stocking bulk environmentally-friendly soaps that we can refill for our bathrooms.
• Blue Bins Recycling - For handling all our compost and recycling over these past years.
• The Farm Gate - For collecting our spent grain and feeding it to their livestock. Which in turn gets used in things like our Scotch Eggs from Landed Bakehouse!
• Sockrates - For offering an organic cotton option for our everyday Winterlong socks!

EARTH DAY FUNDRAISER

This year for Earth Day, we're going global and shining a light on the fantastic work of the GivePower Foundation. This organization sets up solar-powered solutions in developing regions that need it most – think desalination solar water systems and power for critical infrastructure like schools, hospitals, and food production facilities.  To date they've improved the lives of over 2.5 million people across 32 countries, and they are doing it in a sustainable way.

We'll be donating $1 from every pint to GivePower on this Earth Day, April 22nd.  Come by and have a pint for a good cause.  Check out Give Power if you'd like to make your own donation and read up on some of their projects!  

Back in March we released our 7th annual Pink Boots Collaboration Brew, joining hundreds of other breweries around the world in celebrating women and non-binary folks in the brewing industry.  

The witches of Winterlong gathered for another fun-filled day brewing some Witch Craft IPA. Yes, there was beer tasting, yes, a forklift may have got a little stuck in the snow, yes, some oracle cards were read, and yes, we wore some new bling (witch hat beaded earrings crafted by the wonderful Nicole!)  We also wrote some words of encouragement on the fermenter for the beer to be it's very best!

This year’s batch of Witch Craft features a special hop blend by Yakima Chief Hops including Ekuanot®, Centennial, HBC 638, and Mosaic® hops.  Pink Boots Society members select the hop blend each year, and Yakima Chief Hops donates $1 per pound of blend sold back to the Pink Boots Society.  We also used a new yeast strain for the first time, Escarpment Laboratories Pink Boots Yeast Blend, with benefits from those sales going to the Pink Boots Society.

With every year’s release, we do some of our own fundraising:

* $1 from every pint sold on International Women's Day March 8th, went to the Pink Boots Society Canada https://www.pinkbootscanada.com/

* $3 from every 4-pack will go to local Yukon Women's Organizations: Victoria Faulkner Women's Centre, Dawson Women's Shelter, and Yukon Status of Women's Council

The batch has since sold out at the brewery, with some remaining at Yukon Liquor Stores and Big Bear Liquor.  Be sure to get some before it's gone and toast to the amazing women from Winterlong!  Thanks to Joelle, Bhreagh, Ali, Nicole, Rachel, Shanta, Amanda, Jess, Molly, Melissa, Lisa and Tor for lending a helping hand to our fearless leader Meghan on the brew day!

What is Tripel Day?

March 3rd, Tripel Day, is a celebration of the Belgian style Tripel!  We are one of 33 different brewers across seven countries and four continents participating in 2026.  We will be offering tasters of our two Tripels from 4-7 pm Tuesday, and both are available in cans for 10% off to go!  Check out the Craft Beer Days page on Tripel and see what other breweries are particpating.

Tripels are beautiful golden coloured beers, read more below!

What is a Tripel?

Tripels are a classic Belgium beer, known for their strong, complex flavours and high alcohol content.  They are the perfect marriage of spicy and fruity flavours supported by a soft, grainy sweet malt impression. Hailing from Belgium (the first Tripel was brewed by Westmalle in the 1930s), the style has spread to other monasteries and craft breweries around the world.  A typical Tripel ranges in alcohol from 7.5% to 9.5% ABV.  For their high alcohol content and strong flavours they are a best enjoyed as 'sipping' beers.

Like with most Belgian beers, the Belgian yeast is the forerunner, bringing out those characteristic spicy and fruity notes.

Winterlong's Tripels

Before we opened Winterlong, we had dabbled in a few Belgian-style beer recipes as homebrewers, from Saison to Strong Golden Ale, to Tripel.  When we started Winterlong, it was just a matter of time before a Tripel made its way into bottles and cans. 

Rewind back to 2016, when our brewer at the time, Matt Waugh, helped craft what is now Divine Intervention, our barrel-aged Tripel. Matt took inspiration from the famous Allagash Brewing, who make a delicious partially barrel-aged Tripel called Curieux. If you're ever in Maine make sure to visit their amazing brewery.  

We took the inspiration and ran with it, brewing our own Belgian-style Tripel and then ageing it in bourbon barrels for 9 to 12 months. Our first batch was aged in barrels from Port Chilkoot Distillery from Haines, Alaska.  That first batch came out March 9, 2017, just a few days after International Tripel Day!  Since then we've aged the beer in Basil Hayden, Woodford Reserve, and now Heaven Hill bourbon barrels.

Divine Intervention is our strongest beer, coming in at 11.5% ABV!  It's definitely a sipping beer!  We have been brewing this beer once a year ever since and it holds a special place in many of our customers and staffs hearts. 

Our first batch of Divine Intervention.   If you still have this bottle, you've got the original! Youc an tell by the hatched line marks.

A few years back, we brewed another Tripel beer, a bit of an experimental one, called Divine Caffeination.  Here we took our empty barrels that previously held Divine Intervention and aged some raw coffee beans in them for 1-3 months.  We rolled the barrel every so often so that the beans would soak in any whiskey and barrel-aged beer flavours. Then we got Firebean Coffee Roasters to roast the beans so that we could then add them to another batch of base Tripel. So Divine Caffeination was born!  A tripel with barrel-aged coffee.

March 3rd is a great day to come out and try a Tripel at the brewery.  Between 4-7 pm we'll be offereing free tasters.

Divine Caffeination - from Beer to Barrel - Barrel ot Bean - Bean to Beer!

It's that time of year again, for our annual release of Available Light IPA, our collaboration with the Available Light Film Festival!

We've been sponsoring the festival for 8 years now!  From 2019, when we still had the bomber bottles, through the evolutions of the can labels each year that match the festival branding.

The beer has stayed true to its juicy roots from the beginning!  Hopped with Cashmere and Krush hops it features bold tropical and herbal fruit notes with a smooth and juicy body.  

This year the festival runs from February 6-15, 2026, with over 100+ films, ALFF LIVE, media art, and ALFF Industry panels and presentations.  It's been a blast every year brewing this beer for the Yukon Film Society and enjoying it along with the amazing films they bring up every year.

The line up this year looks amazing.  Check out the program to make your 'must-see list'!

This year we're sponsoring two films:

Winterlong Beer will be availble at this Friday Night screening!

AND….

No beer service for this screening (sadly).

We'll see you at the cinema!

Looks like we all survived the December deep freeze, and can finally step outside without our warmest jackets, toques and mitts… though there’s still the problem of where to move all the snow? 

We hope 2025 was a great year for you all.  It sure was a year to remember for Winterlong! Check out some highlights below:

• We celebrated our 10th Anniversary!  It was our biggest party ever, with over 500 people attending throughout the day.  We hosted 4 bands, 3 food trucks and released 3 anniversary beers.  Does everyone remember that amazing tequila barrel-aged sour? Thank you for all the support we’ve received over the last decade!  Check out the blog post about turning 10 years old!

• Our brewers were busy, brewing 142 beers —> over 260,400 L of beer!    Our tasting room staff poured over 27,500 pints and filled the beer fridge with over 33,000 4-packs.

• Weekend Warrior IPA took over as our top seller in can sales and in pints!  Don’t worry Pingo you’re still a favourite to many.

• We brewed our first Light Lagers – Skeeter Lager and Big Bear Lager (brewed exclusively for Big Bear Liquor Store and Eatery).  Who knew we’d get sick of IPAs once in a while and crave something the complete opposite! 

• We participated in a trans-Canada beer collaboration and brewed Glorious & Free IPA!  The goal was to brew the IPA with 100% Canadian-grown ingredients and to ensure some of the sales go to a good cause that helps protect the social fabric of Canada.  Read more here.  Sales from the beer helped us raise over $1,100 for EGALE Canada a non-profit that works to improve the lives of 2SLGBTQI individuals and makes our world a more equitable and accepting place.  

• The women of Winterlong participated in our 6th annual Pink Boots Brew Day and released the annual Witch Craft on International Women's Day.  And we raised over $2,172 for Yukon women’s organizations. 

• We hosted the 2nd annual local brewers caskival at Winterlong this spring. It was thankfully a sunny day with 6 casks to enjoy from the three local breweries. 

• We received government funding to purchase a CO2 reclamation system to help us harness the CO2 produced during the brewing process that would otherwise be lost to the atmosphere. We'll be installing it this year.

What’s in store for 2026 – well we’ll keep on keeping on, bringing your favourite brews and more to the Yukon and hopefully beyond.

Big thanks to all of you for the support and to our staff for their hard work!  It's more important than ever to support local and Canadian!