Our flagons runneth over, as new microbreweries keep springing up.
If each opens as planned, Buffalo Bayou, 8th Wonder and Yard Sale Brewing companies would bring to eight the number of plants making beer within an hour’s drive of downtown Houston, up from two less than four years ago.
The newcomers hope to profit from the continued migration of U.S. beer consumers away from the established, internationally owned conglomerates MillerCoors and Anheuser-Busch InBev, which runs a large Houston operation.
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The 8th Wonder crew has signed a five-year lease on a 5,000-square-foot space on the east side of downtown, within walking distance of Toyota Center and the Dynamo soccer stadium under construction. By opening the warehouse for tours and parking food trucks across the street, it seeks to be “some sort of tailgate presence” on game days, president and co-founder Ryan Soroka said.
Soroka, 27, and brewmaster Corsi, 31, are joined in the effort by executive chef Matt Marcus, 28, and chief financial officer Alex Vassilakidis, 27. They’ve been quietly raising funds through friends and family and are in the midst of getting their state and federal alcohol licenses and local business permits.
Soroka, Marcus and Vassilakidis have known each other since childhood in Houston and are partners in the successful Eatsie Boys operation, catering to the downtown lunch crowd, farmers markets and occasional excursions outside bars. They plan to open their brewery in the first quarter of 2012 with three beers: an India pale ale, an amber ale and a blonde ale.
Buffalo Bayou is a bit farther along, with some tanks awaiting installation at a 7,800-square-foot space south of Interstate 10, near Washington Avenue. It expects to start selling its first beer, a “copper ale,” by year-end.
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Yard Sale Brewing founders Justin Engle, 28, and Steven Macalello, 27, seek an even more intimate neighborhood setting, perhaps in a renovated Heights bungalow or other architecturally interesting structure. They have chosen a smaller brewing system and want to offer daily “happy hour” tours in addition to self-distributing their beers to local bars and restaurants.
These are good days to be a beer drinker in Houston. I wish them and all their microbrewing predecessors well.
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Life is good.