The brewery tag line "dangerously drinkable" encapsulates what drives us. Jon's brewing philosophy is that Badlands' Beers should be "satisfying, refreshing and interesting to the bottom of the third glass".

Jon’s ‘light-bulb’ moment occurred, as is common for most important decisions in life, over a beer in around 2002. Jon had at this stage been home brewing for a number of years.  He realised two things that night that would change his life path a) he had a good palate for beer and b) he had a potentially viable business model for a microbrewery - “owner/brewer”.

At the time there were around 60 breweries in the whole of Australia, including the ‘big boys’. All these years later with over 600 breweries and seemingly at least one new one opening each week, the owner/brewer model is still a relatively rare phenomenon.  This model has a number of advantages for you, the discerning drinker:

• Beer quality is the heart, soul and main priority of everything we do
• Adventurism and our ability to push boundaries is not constrained by accountants or pencil pushers influencing company direction
• The fun, passion and desire to create that started the Badlands journey is still, and always will be, at the heart of all decision making

Here at Badlands we revel in playing an active part in the Orange community and the wider craft beer community.  Whether it is donating beer to local charitable causes such as the annual local charity balls (Ronald McDonald House and White Tie Ball) or brewing one-off batches of beer such as our “Recovery Beer” brewed with assistance from our awesome suppliers and donated to venues to raise money for Bush Fire charities in the wake of the devastating fires of 2019/20.  We love to be involved!

We also love supporting our favourite sporting clubs. Our major sponsorship of Orange Mountain Biking Club has entered its 4^th year and we are set to embark on a new relationship with Orange City Rugy Union Club as a major shirt sponsor and preferred beer supplier. We look forward to announcing more community support arrangements shortly with the opening of The Taproom. 

We always put our hand up when asked for “Karma Kegs” to support members of the brewing community that are struggling. If in need, please ask!

Our commitment to the environment, embedded in our mission statement, means we operate on a default position of minimising our impact on the earth.  We do this with programs to minimise our use of plastic; our brewery spent grain and liquid waste water is utilised by local farming families as stock feed; our water usage is approximately 40% of the average craft brewery*; our can clips are made from 100% recycled milk bottles and as much as possible these are used multiple times and recycled from our customers.  The construction of our new brewery and taproom will continue to build on our principles of treading lightly and using less for example by installing under floor heating in the bar and using low energy heat pumps to warm the water.

*water to beer ratio of around 3:1 compared to industry average of 7:1