I tried looking to see if there are threads about Worthy in Bend but I didn't see much. I went to Worthy on a recent trip to Bend and was very surprised a new brewery had such a massive shiny new place...it's a very fancy place. Reminded me a bit of some of the brewery chains (rock bottom/BJ's/The Ram). But their facility reminds me of Green Flash or Harpoon, they put a ton of $ into it. Usually a brand new brewery doesn't go there till they are established for a bit.
Here's a good intro article, and here's a look at the place from shortly before they opened. There's also a big collection of articles on Worthy's website. The tl;dr: The primary investor is Roger Worthington, attorney, owner of the land they built the brewery on, and co-owner of Indy Hops. Chad Kennedy, former brewmaster at Laurelwood is part owner & brewmaster, and apparently had significant input on the design and build-out of the facility. I'm not sure how much ownership percentage he has in the business, but since many articles refer to it as "Chad's new brewery" I assume he has a decent stake in the place. They brought on Chris Hodge from Columbia Distributing to act as CEO. He brings decades of knowledge from the distribution side, which will help tremendously when they start seriously packaging beer for retail. With 60,000bbls of capacity they're obviously looking at packaging the majority of their beer and expanding into other states. They went big on the sustainability angle and installed shitloads of solar panels and other "green" stuff. Chad really wanted to push the education side of things, so they've got conference rooms, a small hop yard, and greenhouses that they can use for seminars and "brew school" (whatever that entails). On a related note, cans of their Kolsch just arrived today.
The place looked impressive when I drove by. It was in the morning though, and they weren't open yet, so I didn't get a chance to stop by.
I've been following Worthy and Crux with some interest, because it seems like it may be a turning point for craft beer in retrospect (or maybe not at all). Almost every brewery that I know of prior to them had to start small and build up to their dream facilities, but these two got to start with state of the art brewhouses, packaging lines and experienced brewing staff. I don't necessarily think they were the very first to do this or that they got every single little thing they wanted, but a marked contrast from most craft breweries, plus they're both close to me. It will probably take a few years to be able to assess the differences, but I think it will be interesting to see how the businesses evolve when they didn't go through that initial "shoestring budget" phase, for better or for worse. Maybe the deep benches of both breweries means they just get to shortcut to success, but I also wouldn't be surprised if it means some unique obstacles too.
