1634 Meadery
April 22, 2025
Who are you and what is your business?
I am Deb Clapp from the 1634 Meadery in Ipswich, MA! We are a small but dedicated team of 5 bringing you the best mead, or honeywine, around! We opened our doors in 2015 and haven’t looked back! Come and summon your inner Viking and sample some mead! We do flights and glasses, and bottle sales as well.
Please provide a brief description of your company.
We make mead, or honey wine, which is fermented honey. Mead is the oldest of all alcohol on the planet, dating back 8,000 to 10,000 years! We strive to “keep it local” by sourcing our honey and fruits from New England apiaries, farms, and orchards. We distribute our mead to over 140 liquor stores in MA and offer mead flights at our Tasting Room in Ipswich.
What inspired you to start your business, and what keeps you going?
Dan had gone on a genealogy trip with his cousins back in 2004. He brought me back a bottle of Dansk mead, which sat on the liquor shelf for a year. Once we tried it with friends at a dinner party, though, that was it! Dan was hooked. He decided to go commercial at the repeated urging of friends and neighbors, so in 2015, we opened our doors and the 1634 Meadery was established! We have hosted visitors from every state and many countries all over the world. We are happy to bring this ancient emerge back to life and share the history.
What aspect of your business are you most passionate about? (history, conversation pieces, etc.)
We love supporting local – we get our honey from Merrimack Valley and Crystal Bee apiaries, and fresh fruits from New England farms and orchards – like Russell Orchards, Marini and Nourse Farms, and even neighbors’ back yards! The other aspect is that we LOVE telling the stories of New England and Ipswich specifically. Our mead names come from history, like Devil’s Footprint, Choate Bridge Cyser, BeeWitched, LightKeeper, Hatchet Hannah – we tell the stories on the bottle’s back label.
Is there something unique about your business that you’d like to share that most people wouldn’t know about?
When we started thinking about the concept of the 1634 Meadery, there were only 40-50 meaderies across the whole country! Now there are over 500. Mead is growing in popularity. It is a fantastic alternative to beer and wine, and it is gluten-free! It is also a more sustainable drink as the ingredients are locally sourced. We will also take back clean bottles! And we compost our lees, or left over fruits, at the end of fermentation!
What sets your business apart from other similar businesses?
We keep it local. By sourcing ingredients from New England, we, in turn, support other beekeepers, farmers, and fruit growers. Local ingredients make for better mead.
Do you have a goal you want the business to achieve in the next one, 5, or 10 years?
Well, we are just (or have just) celebrated our 10th year in business! So, we’d love to continue creating unique mead varieties and introducing new folks to this historical libation.
Why do you love the Greater Cape Ann region and doing business locally?
Local folks flooded our doors when we opened back in 2015. And we still see folks retiring, bringing family members and friends, and growing our mead audience! We feel the love. Yes, we get out of town and state visitors, but it is the local folks who really keep us going, and for that we are so grateful!
As someone doing business in this area, how has or how can the Chamber help your business?
The Networking has been great – it spurs more ideas that I can tackle! Having resources for podcasts and advertising, and such helps our tiny company get the word out!
Contact Info
3 Short St, Ipswich, MA 01938
https://www.1634Meadery.com
978-325-6215
info@1634Meadery.com
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