Breweries Opening/Closing in Minnesota 2018

Had the Wee Heavy tonight& it was 6.7%. Also tried the blood orange & thought it was very good - better than expected for a newly opened tap room. However, the pricing on beers needs to come down a bit. $7-$8 a pint is too high to stay relevant after the newness wears off.

 

Good to know on the IPA..I agree...if it was packed with flavor and had the feel of a regular IPA that is outstanding then....

Wee Heavy should be much higher ABV...

 

6.7% ?? Maybe a website error then with the lower number?

7-8$ a pint? Welcome to Woodbury. I won't even stop there at those prices even though I have family on the east end of the cities.

 

I tried all the 3rd Act beers last night and agree they were all clean. The Tommygun was a little grassy and bland, but that’s a lot better than most new breweries. They have much more ambitious beers coming out soon, so I’ll have to revisit. The stout was supposed to come out last week, but they said it won’t be ready until next week. The taproom was stupidly busy again. The food looked pretty good, but it was an hour wait. The beer was definitely overpriced for what it was, but they can get away with it in Woodbury. They haven’t really attempted to push their taproom to the beer community, but the residents of Woodbury got one whiff of a place that wasn’t a chain to drink at and they are showing up in hordes.

 

Did you ever get back to tick the sixth?

 

Went to 3rd Act last night. Unless the TV menu is incorrect, the Wee Heavy is in fact 4.5%...it's the Stout that is 6.7% (and even though it says released 11/20...I was told it's not ready yet....so update your menu FFS).

I tried the West Coast IPA...which was really a Red IPA if you ask me, and the Blood Orange IPA. Neither were bad, but neither were memorable. Can't really complain for a brand new place, it could be much much worse. I am interested to see what they have in the future.

For the folks complaining about pricing...what did you expect? Welcome to Woodbury. They could sell this beer at $10 a pint and still have the taproom full right now. I expect many a Woodbury soccer mom and dad will be dropping their kids off at Bielenberg and heading across the street for a pint or two.

 

$7-8 a pint at 3rd Act? That's going to be a hard pass for me. If I need to get out somewhere close, I'll just keep going over to Junction 70.

 

I almost exclusively purchase small pours, so I didn't even notice the pint pricing at 3rd Act. 5 oz. pours are $3 a piece or $11 for a flight of 4, approximately standard prices these days. 3rd Act chose to build its brewery from the ground up, so it's probably looking to offset its large fixed costs. For a very different reason -- the $15 minimum wage coming to Minneapolis and St. Paul -- I expect that level of pint pricing (or higher) soon to be the norm in the area, at least in those two cities. There's no such thing as a free liquid lunch.

 

Anyone looking to add an official opening date to their trackers for Half Pint Brewing down Waseca way can erase the 11/30 opening reported earlier and write in 11/22/2018 (Thanksgiving) in permanent marker, according to their latest Facebook post. I’ve already updated my Google Sheet

So if you’re looking to escape family tonight, you could drive south and check them out.

 

I agree. This fleecing of beer people to pay your debts is getting a little out of hand.

 

Don't most breweries have some debt to pay off? Maybe they should all just charge $10 a pint so we can help them do it faster.

 

At that rate, make it $15 a pint and lump the tip in. The added benefit is that the new pricing structure would price some of us curmudgeonly old fools out while providing the younger crowd with their kids and their dogs and their bicycles the sort of environment they desire in today’s modern taproom. Wink, wink.

 

It sounds like 3rd Act needs to pour its beer into 10 oz. tulip glasses, for which $7 already seems to be the standard price around town. Call it "Phyletic Size Decrease in Craft Beers."

 

Buried in this article (linked) is a mention that the new Vine Park Brewery owners (who produce 651 Tyga Bite beer) are seeking a larger venue that would have a taproom and kitchen.

 

Dont humor them.

 

More info on the planned South St Paul brewery...

https://www.twincities.com/2018/11/23/craft-brewery-planned-for-south-st-pauls-concord-area/

"Big Heist Beer Co. is a startup business owned by Erik Pedersen, a financial advisor, and Eric Gerold, co-founder of the wrestling app MatBoss. Being businessmen and not brewers, Gerold said, means they’re relying on a team of people from the local brewing industry to develop beers.

“We see this more as a business opportunity than necessarily a brewery opportunity,” Gerold said. “Erik and I didn’t get together and say, ‘We want to start a brewery.’ We feel the Twin Cities’ market is not quite saturated yet, but it’s getting close.”

 

Yoergs Brewery is really hoping to be pouring lagers next Saturday. ( Believe this when i see it) Per Tom today.

 

I don't think the Twin Cities market is getting close to saturated, as long as prospective brewery owners are able to eschew their fantasies of opening in burgeoning, hip, urban neighborhoods. Bloomington* alone, for instance, easily could support several breweries, I strongly suspect. It currently has zero, with zero in planning of which I know. Around half of the breweries, and well over half of the best ones, in the Twin Cities MSA are in Minneapolis or St. Paul proper, whereas less than 20% of the population lives in one of those two cities. That's a suboptimal ratio as the craft beer industry migrates increasingly hyperlocal. Sales of craft beer on the whole seem to be plateauing, but there's still a ton of room for taproom-oriented tiny breweries to siphon off sales from large national, regional, and local craft breweries. A dozen small breweries could survive on collectively 10% of Summit's or Surly's local market share alone.

* Bloomington is the fourth-largest city in the state, behind Minneapolis, St. Paul, and Rochester and just ahead of Duluth.

Also, buried in the Big Heist article: "... the owners of Lakeville Brewing Co. said this month they have bought the former Ruby Tuesday building in Inver Grove Heights with the intent of opening a brewpub."

 

They are also looking to have their flagship brand co-packaged in cans - this tidbit is based upon word of mouth, but from a very credible source. For what it’s worth I’ve tried the Tyga Bite and enjoyed it for what it was (sessionable brown ale, low bitterness) and think they’ve got a good thing going so far.

 

These two potentially close to each other would make a nice niche.