Best Milwaukee brew tours/experience?

Sadly I haven't been on MKE's tour yet... Lakefront, it really depends who your tour guide is and how much they've been drinking... I've been on maybe 5 of them? The last tour I did my friend asked in the beginning "Is that guy our tour guide or just some loud/random/drunk guy?" The correct answer was "yes"

...your comment makes me want to go out of my way to tour MKE soon

 

It's worth it, and completely reminds me of Lakefront....although they had to tone it down just a bit since they first started doing tours, i.e. limits on their beers above 7% abv, time limit on how long you can stay after the tour, and they make an "appearance" of limiting how many free beers you get. Ask your tour guide nicely, he will give you more tokens for free beers!!!

 

I think it's safe to say MKE is the new Animal House tour

 

If she does the combo, tell her to start at Sprecher. We did it backwards as a large group and Sprecher was a real downer after Lakefront.

 

Another vote for the Sprecher/Lakefront combo and doing Sprecher first.

If you do sprecher, spring for the extra cost beer/cheese tasting - I did that last fall when we did tours and it was well worth it. Not only do you get tasty cheese, you get more beer samples.

 

If she has a car and doesn't mind driving slightly south of downtown, it might be worth checking out Tornado Brewing.
I haven't been there yet, so I can't speak on the actual quality of the beers, but it's got to be some of the most unique concepts I've seen at a brewery. Enchilada red ale, coffee cake ale, caramel apple ale, balsamic sour, etc etc. As long as the beer is drinkable, it would be fun just to have a flight of all the weird stuff.

As for the rest of the tours:
Lakefront: Speaks for itself. Rated the 3rd best tour in the country.
MKE: Best bang for your buck. Can be a drunkfest if you want. Beer has vastly improved over the past few years.
Sprecher: Nothing special. The soda is awesome, beer is good. My least favorite tour in the city though.
Miller: Tour is free. Cool to see a massive operation and the history.
Pabst: Very cool for the historical factor.
Brenner: Haven't been on the tour, but the beer is okay at best.

 

Just an FYI....Tornado is nothing more than a bar where he serves his beer at. Good (awesome) beer, but not recommended if seeking out the "brewery" experience.

 

Totally Lakefront Brewery!

$8 - Tour Price Includes:
- A Souvenir Pint Glass (a REAL glass)
- Four 6 oz pours of beer
http://www.lakefrontbrewery.com/tour


NOTE FROM ME: Its $8 + 1.99 online ricketing order

They also have technical tours but they are $30 and serious brewery talk. Not a regular public tour.

 

Yeah, it 100% is....went last year for my bachelor party on the tour and then stayed afterwards for their Saturday open house. The day became a big blur once people started getting in to weird dancing competitions in the middle of the brewery.

Pretty awesome time but also is it a total mess.....