BILLINGS — Wondering where to have your next drink? Two Montana natives have got you covered. They created a website that shows every brewery, distillery, winery, and cider house in the state, making sure there’s a drink in every hand.
“Shayne’s always had some great grandiose ideas. I like to think of him as the ideas guy,” said co-founder of A Drink in Every Hand, Josh Rykowski on Sunday.
Shayne Merry and Josh Rykoswki met in the Army years ago and despite living in different states now, their friendship remains stronger than ever, thanks to one of Merry’s unique ideas.
“We’d always look up to find what breweries were in the area. And I started amassing lists on the computer for towns that we went to,” said Merry, co-founder of A Drink in Every Hand.
That list turned into an Excel spreadsheet, and with the help of Rykowski, that spreadsheet became the website, A Drink in Every Hand.
“I’m a data miner, I love doing it. I love sitting down on a computer and just linking, and linking, and linking and finding it,” Merry said.
Merry compiles the lists and does the research while Rykowski maintains the website.
“Each of the different types of locations, they have different icons for them,” said Rykowski.
Clicking on any of the icons on their interactive map will give you all the information you need.
“If you click ‘get me there’, that will actually open a Google Maps with driving directions to the location,” Rykowski said.
The two are constantly updating the site, making sure it’s as accurate as possible.
“And we have things in the future that we want to try to do also. They have the passports where you get the actual stamp. We would like to do that on your phone and online,” said Merry.
Whether you’re a brewery owner or simply a customer, Merry and Rykowski want to hear from you.
“We tried to do our best to just pull off their sites and just paraphrase some things, but if they have any feedback for us too, we’d greatly appreciate that,” said Rykowski.
And they hope that their website helps in supporting local businesses across the state.
“Our thing is to just support local, support your local brewery, distilleries, go to small places and spend money,” Merry said.
You can access the website by clicking A Drink In Every Hand and you can visit their Facebook page here.
