Jason Lacny has a passion for being creative, and that is evident in his work creating craft beer at Four Fathers Brewing. He is the owner and founder of the company, which started in his home and has now grown by leaps and bounds. Lacny is a graduate of Merrillville High School and Purdue University, and has a degree in genetic biology. Four Fathers Brewing opened their doors to the public in 2014 and continues to create quality beer for residents of the Region and beyond to enjoy.
Lacny works for Abbott Molecular Diagnostics in technical support during the day, and at night and on weekends spends his time researching recipes and ingredients for new beers. Abbott is also leading the charge in testing for COVID-19, and Lacny helps them run smoothly on the technical side.
“I usually spend a lot of time on the phone with laboratories, hospitals, and respiratory hospitals, but after my day job hours, I spend time ordering ingredients and brewing. There are a lot of times I brew from 5 p.m. to 1 or 2 a.m.,” said Lacny. “Every day is a new adventure for me, but it always seems to be action packed.”
He discovered his passion and love for beer while in college at Purdue University in West Lafayette. He and his wife, who also helped found Four Fathers, would frequently spend time at the Lafayette Brew Company.
“After she and I moved to Northwest Indiana, my wife was pregnant with our first child, so I would beg her a lot asking her about the baby and she was like ‘you need to get a hobby,’ so that’s when I dove into home-brewing,” said Lacny. “Shortly after I got my feet wet with home-brewing, I saw the opportunity to turn it into a business, and the passion and fire has always been there, and it still exists here today.”
Lacny learned a lot about brewing from shadowing other breweries, communicating with other brew-masters, lots of reading, the internet, and some close friends. Whether it is the actual beer making or the business aspect, Lacny has always seen brewing as a process.
“There was a process, we registered Four Fathers as a business in 2012 and opened our doors to the public in 2014. There was a lot of time, research, and effort that went into getting the whole thing off the ground,” said Lacny.
Lacny applies the problem-solving skills he uses with his day job to help propel his creativity in brewing.
“Brewing is the perfect blend of art and science, and for me that is where the passion lies,” said Lacny. “There is an artistic idea of what a beer can taste like and then figuring out how to execute that recipe is a really neat interplay between a creative idea and the hard science that occurs behind it,” added Lacny.
Jason and Beth Lacny plan to expand Four Fathers Brewery in the near future.
“We are looking at a lot of different opportunities right now. We both love all the business parts of Four Fathers and the customer relations we have now too,” said Lacny.
Lacny lives off a quote from Socrates that states, “I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is I know nothing.”
Lacny applies this quote to his brewing as he is always learning and striving to be a great beer maker every day.