Determining SQF audit scope for a Winery and very small Brewery

Hello, I am an SQF practitioner for a winery and we are currently in the process of setting up our SQF 9.0 systems for an audit date early 2022. We have also been brewing a small amount of beer, mostly for Research and Development, for a while now (requested by the owner of the winery) with the goal to eventually sell beer to local restaurants. We have an SQF consultant that says we can get away with the "brewery" not being a part of the audit if it is just for R&D, but myself and other members of our SQF committee are questioning how the "brewery" could affect our status for SQF. Or if we include it in our certification, how difficult would that be? Any advice would be awesome. Thanks!

You can exclude processes from the scope of your SQF certification.   You should notify your certification body that you intend to exclude this prior to the audit.    Your certification would have an exclusion on it for beer brewing.   there are some drawbacks.   when I see exemptions, I wonder why they chose to exempt something,  my mind races.  lol.   Also, there are marketing drawback.   You might not be able to use the SQF symbol for marketing - you would have to clarify with certification body.   

I don't think it would be hard to do and I think  you have plenty of time.   You would have to be actively brewing during the audit time.