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I think most people will look at brewing as a method of making cheap beer first and foremost.(I've been canvassing guys in work to attend and all they want is fast /cheap booze) The taste improvements can come later. the majority of people will be looking for the fastest easiest way to make somthing drinkable.especially if they do somthing in the budget to increase prices in offies..so by then should we showcase a kit..a fermenter.a spoon....a tube ..a capper and some bottles. That should come well under $50....and not knock kit brewing or under sell it...

We are preaching to the masses not to the converted. If someone does a kit and it turns out crappy they will join the forum to get help then they are converted ....

I think what I'm getting at here is, what is the cheapest possible starting kit that could be put together to allow people to make and bottle their beer. This would encourage more people to start. Could people even use old soft drinks bottles which would remove the need for a capper and caps?

cheapest way would be a brewferm kit ,a plastic fermenter, the cheapest capper and caps. and as far as cheap kits go brewferm seem to be some of the best

As long as you don't over sugar a two litre plastic bottle you can get away with bottling in it . Did have one explode once , but the brother was getting a little happy with the sugar at the time . we had at the time a 40 pint barrel ( too big really), a 20 pint barrel about 20 pint bottles ( free from Beamish and Crawford , we just asked at the gate and they gave I'll miss that brewery ) ,
The crown capper was driving us mad on one batch and we just got sick of it and put about 8 litres into plastic cider bottles ( one of those burst , but in fairness we lost a good 4 bottles as well to hammer damage and bursting caps .)

Yeah i gotta say that when thinking about it maybe a kit demo is the best way to go, using a kit some DME and a standard kettle to boil the water might show people just how easy it is to make their first beer. even doing an extract demo might seem a little complicated to someone arriving in the middle of it. i no longer do kit beers (could someone else do this, i only made 2 kit beers and both were pretty awful, my fault not the kit's) but i would be still quite willing to bring some equipment for show and tell. boilers etc as i mentioned previously, also my mash tun and bench capper should be arriving shortly so i could bring them too. we can put them in the upgrades section.

Maybe "An idiots guide - part deux" is in order? It would be good to have someone who hasn't tried it before to give the demo, to show how easy it is. Could also video it and stick it on the website.