Survival Tactics: How Breweries Persevered to Open During the Pandemic | Imbibe Magazine

Photo: Matt Haas

Even in less unsettled times, opening a brewery might be a multi-year voyage across uncertain seas of permitting and construction. During the pandemic, under-construction breweries crashed into the coronavirus iceberg, forcing fast course corrections for economic survival. Breweries shredded plans and rewrote them for a revised reality, then another, as shifting state and local regulations tried balancing business with public health. Stop, start, go backward, go forward. Repeat until you’re finally serving beer. “You shake your head and go, ‘Alright, let’s figure our way around this one,’ ” says Jeff Smith, the founder of LUKI Brewery in Arvada, Colorado, which opened last summer. “There’s a group of us that get to wear the Red Badge of Courage of opening a brewery during the pandemic,” Smith says.

For Imbibe, I look at how breweries pushed forward to open breweries during these difficult days.