Anyone want to buy Redhook Brewery’s brewhouse? It’s the ‘highest quality large format brewery offered in recent history’

Redhook Brewery. Classic craft beer pioneer from Seattle. Famous for brands like ESB, Long Hammer IPA and Cooper Hook. Today Redhook Brewery is owned by the Craft Brew Alliance — a beer and cider rollup which also owns brands like Kona Brewing Co., Widmer Brothers Brewing and Square Mile Cider Co. Of note: Anheuser-Busch owns 31.5 percent of Craft Brew Alliance, and the two work together extensively. Redhook’s role in this portfolio of brands has diminished somewhat of late. CBA’s darling brand is Kona — it even has a “Kona Plus” strategy — and while Kona’s-faux Hawaii brands have taken off over the last few years, Redhook sales have been shrinking. According to this Seattle Times article:

By the end of 2016, domestic shipments of Redhook had fallen 37 percent over two years.

BUT … looking optimistically forward into 2018, CBA announced its low-key plans for Redhook: “…ongoing stabilization of our pioneering legacy craft brands Widmer Brothers and Redhook in the Pacific Northwest. We look forward to leveraging our streamlined brewing footprint, improved cost structure, and expanded brewing agreements with AB to drive further value for our business and shareholders.”

Streamlining! As things go in business with larger companies, efficiencies get prioritized. For instance: Last year, Craft Brew Alliance sold Redhook Brewery’s 22-year-old Woodinville, Wash., brewing facility and tourist attraction to Sound Commercial Investment Holdings for $24.5 million. Apparently, the brewery was only running at 30 percent capacity, and it was doing contract brewing for Pabst. Redhook’s products are brewed in Oregon today. In 2016, Redhook foreshadowed the inevitable when it laid off half of its Woodinville brewery production staff. Just the casualties of big business.

Some other casualties included the actual brewing and packaging systems, and hey, those are actually up for sale. There’s an auction with the catchy title — the “Complete Brewery Formerly of Redhook (a Craft Brew Alliance Brand) — Major Upgrades Performed in 2016, 2014 & 2011 — Highest Quality Large Format Brewery Offered in Recent History!” — being orchestrated by Loeb Winternitz Industrial Auctioneers (it’s on loebequipment.com right now, and lots begin closing Wed., March 14, at 7 a.m. PST). The brewing setup includes: more than 800,000 gallons of fermentation and brite tank capacity; a Huppman 100-barrel five-tank brewhouse; a Krones 450-bpm bottling line; KHS automatic 30-barrel-an-hour keg line; and a whole lot more.

Dig this photo collage.

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