Ale Industries in Oakland celebrated 15 years of brewing at the beginning of the year. Now, besides the rising cost of rent and everything else, owner cites the continual increase in crime in its decision to close by the end of November: https://www.facebook.com/aleindustriesbeer/
Too bad we can't talk politics here anymore...Hmm, if we could I'd say, "that's a bummer, but not surprising, seems to be a business trend in the Bay Area these days"
Oakland has a thriving and growing brewery scene. SARA and Cellarmaker are two very well known area breweries that recently moved into the area. I have never heard of Ale Industries and questions about spots to visit in the area over in the pacific forum often elicite a dozen suggestions without any mention of them. I'd guess, based on all that, that "the continual increase in crime" is more of a cop out from a brewer who couldn't compete in a mature beer market than an actual cause of their business struggles.
Yup, smells like bullshit to me. It’s not like said increase in criminal activity (if there even is an increase) wouldn’t impact other breweries in the area.
Well, read the Facebook post, maybe they're lying. But there is a lot of news about crime impacting business in the Bay area, e.g.: https://abc7news.com/oakland-business-strike-businesses-close-tuesday-crime-robberies/13830589/ I think discussion of crime and other urban problems affecting the brewing industry we all love is a legitimate topic.
Yeah I just looked at them on a map and noted that within 5 miles you have (in oakland) the new outpost for Sante Adairius opened in the last two years, the new outpost for Cellarmaker opened this year, and the original location for Ghost Town who opened a second taproom in a more east Oakland neighborhood a couple years ago. So it doesn't seem like the neighborhood is a turn off to other, successful breweries. I think it's totally reasonable to discuss it. But "discuss" has to go beyond "just take the word of a failing business owner offering excuses for closing". It's really hard to face the failure of a business you start, and it's easiest to find outside forces to blame. And there's value in identifying forces out of your control that played a role as part of the post mortem. But a single brewery who is pretty unknown to the local beer geekery closing in a neighborhood where other breweries are actively opening/expanding doesn't seem like good evidence of a community wide problem like "increasing crime". Same with blaming "rising costs", do these other brewers have access to magical inflation resistant inputs? Seems more likely that the brewery wasn't very good and failed once I was surrounded by much better options.
People have spent a lot of time on the forums discussing why brewpubs or breweries have closed. And more this past year as various challenges have caught up with the "Irrational exuberance" of the industry. Somebody could write a book about Modern Times. It will be interesting to see how things shake out in the Bay Area. I think of all the changes-- remember Beer Revolution? And the Trappist? But on the positive side I see there is even a Jack London Square Brewing district !?!
Not every neighborhood in Oakland is the same from a crime perspective. I have absolutely no problem believing that crime was a factor in Ale Industries closure. 5 break-ins in a year doesn’t smack of bullshit to me. I sure wouldn’t want to deal with that if running a business. Note that they didn’t blame it all on crime and cited other factors (e.g., rent and other cost increases) as well.
Sure, but again these other factors also affect the other breweries that aren't closing. Why would we look at a situation where 1 brewery closes and multiple others open and go, "yeah it totally must be community wide/ industry wide factors, couldn't be those guys just not being competitive anymore"? Citing crime in the bay area is popular these days, but either cvs or Walgreens got caught on their earnings call admitting that it wasn't actually a big impact on their bottom line it was just better optics for them as an excuse for closing underperforming stores. I'm not denying that there are macro trends that are making life harder for small businesses (I've actually been scrambling for the last month to see about finding some kind of credit to keep my own struggling small business), but these are challenges faced by all of these guys' competitors. Was this business just especially targeted by local criminals? Why?
The short answer is that it’s a rougher area (in my view). Sure, Sara, Cellarmaker and Ghost Town are A-list breweries, and I would agree that Ale Industries isn’t at the same level (loads of other factors come into play, too, including revenue from retail/packaged beer v. taproom revenues, multiple locations v single location, etc.). Would AI survive and thrive in a lower crime environment? Unfortunately, we’ll never know. Just isn’t at all hard for me to believe it’s a factor.
There has been "a lot of news about crime" for the past 30 years despite crime continuously decreasing over that time. I'm not saying there isn't an uptick in crime right now or that there aren't real concerns around criminal activity in the Bay Area. I'm just saying that the news has a three decade history (if not more) of not accurately capturing the state of criminal activity and I would caution folks from coming to conclusions based on what they see on said news. This is especially important now, when criminal activity has been politicized and is often exaggerated in an effort to gain political support.
Personally, I find people commenting on politics with no ties to the area they're commenting about disingenuous. Do you not realize a lot of what you believe is tied to whatever narrative your source wants to portray? (This is on all sides) That being said, as someone who has been to Ale Industries - once - I did not find a single one of their beers compelling. It's not like their beers were awful, but even their best beer (East Bay IPA?) is bested by big micro you find in grocery stores - the Sierra Nevadas, Lagunitas, etc - much less competitive with the really good craft you can find in Oakland.
The owner of AI lives in Vallejo. That's an awful commute. Maybe he's planning on reopening somewhere closer to home.
I remembered drinking their beers in 22 oz bombers bought from Ledgers Liquor in Berkeley back in the day. Couldn’t recall if at one point they distributed to SoCal.
Yes, can't imagine why Todd and Co. wouldn't want having someone from *checks notes* South Dakota to comment on the beer scene for the Bay Area for "politics" (In fact, this seems to be your first post in Pacific, so make of that what you will). I'm sure they're preventing a nuanced take that's thoughtful of the various economic and social policies within the region, and not some reactionary take that is meant to act as a "gotcha" against Democrats?
I think two things can be true: Objectively, Ale Industries was in the worst location for any Oakland-based brewery, it's not even up for debate. It was in a darkly lit industrial warehouse right between Fruitvale BART and International Blvd, two areas that I would not recommend visiting at night. The rest of the breweries (SARA, Humble Sea, Ghost Town) are in much denser and less sketch areas. However, Ale Industries' beer was also always on the mediocre side. For a while, they had the benefit of being one of the few local Oakland-based breweries so it was easy finding their stuff in a local TJs or Safeway, but then newer breweries came in that were much better (Ghost Town, Original Pattern, Temescal) or existing breweries opened up Oakland/Alameda spots (Almanac, Humble Sea, SARA, Cellarmaker); and their distribution became much more limited. Couple that with their sketchy location and the cards were definitely stacked against them.
@unlikelyspiderperson FWIW Cellarmaker and the others are in a really "uppity" area. One would have no problem walking around. Having been on foot in most of oakland, shit takes wild turns regarding "hood" feels at the turn of a corner. Cellarmaker and SARA are based in an "ARTS DISTRICT " AKA heavily gentrified industrial feeling area .Ghost Town is up in the Laurel and while the little corner its tucked away in feels ok just walk up 16th down the street and see what happens Edit : Also add Original Pattern Just my 2 cents
Yeah yeah I know Oakland is spotty and I haven't been down since any of the new places opened so I'll take your word for it that they're in a swanky part of town. But the original ghost town opened in west Oakland when that was a real sketchy neighborhood. I don't know if it's gotten better over the last 5 years, but they've obviously done well. My main point was that these breweries close and point to all these outside forces as the reason, and they're always some mediocre ass brewery. Just once I'd love to hear a closing announcement that said something like; Ya know, a little honesty and self awareness. Instead it's always some shit that makes it sound like hardly anyone could survive in this kind of climate. Meanwhile the number of operating breweries keeps going up....
