Bad news has come to pass as Anchor Brewing who was bought by Sapporo in 2017 will cease operations and the business will be liquidated. According to news released, Sapporo had been attempting to sell the San Francisco heritage brewery for some time now and found no bids.
A financial knight could ride in during the liquidation process and the Anchor Public Taps will remain open until the beer runs out. One of the beers on tap is the 2023 Christmas Ale which was being ramped into production. Probably the biggest whale in the beer ticking world for some time.
You can get the sad details from Dave Infante at Vinepair who should get a tip of the hat for the journalism he has done on this story. But, to me, this development seems to come at a weird time. A history of Anchor (which I reviewed on this blog) came out recently, Sapporo let Anchor buy the ingredients for Christmas Ale, Anchor came out with a new summer Mexican lager and the vitriol over the bland logo re-brand had faded. Those moves don’t signal floundering to me.
If Sapporo thought that the money would come from brewing Sapporo in San Francisco, that seems misguided since Sapporo owned Stone seems much better suited to that task.
Fingers crossed that this is not the end, end but maybe, and this might be an idea too crazy, there should be a brewery who only does beers from defunct craft breweries. A place that snaps up recipes like the steam beer and Christmas ale and Liberty Ale so that they are not completely lost.