Deschutes Brewery beers to hit Michigan

Deschutes Brewery announced that its craft beers will be available in Michigan beginning Oct. 6. The Oregon-based brewery will partner with West Side Beer Distributing for distribution of its beers in the Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo and Lansing areas.

Deschutes launched in Ohio, Kentucky, central and western Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin earlier this year (or, as we call it, the Deschutes Eastern Takeover). The western portion of Michigan rounds out the brewery’s geographic expansion for the year.

“We’ve seen a great amount of excitement leading up to our Michigan launch, our last major expansion for the 2014 year,” said Stacy Denbow, expansion manager for Deschutes. “Our fans in Michigan are passionate about their craft beer and we’re looking forward to them being able to get Deschutes in their home state.”

Initially, Deschutes Brewery will offer Mirror Pond Pale Ale, Black Butte Porter, the nation’s number one selling craft porter, Inversion IPA and, its winter seasonal, Jubelale. The beers will be available in six-packs (12-ounce bottles) and draft.

“We’ve been preparing for expanding our distribution area over the past few years, but we always want to make sure we can provide adequate supply to our entire footprint,” Denbow continued. “We are keeping a close eye on capacity, and that’s why we are focusing only on the western portion of Michigan at this point.”

West Side Beer Distributing distributes a portfolio of great domestic, imported and craft beer across 14 different counties to over 4,000 retailers in Michigan. The family-owned company started in the Metro Detroit area in 1965 and now has 400 team members working out of locations in Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing and Romulus.