Taproom

From hard-plumbed process piping to the draft lines in your tasting room, the more precisely you can monitor the flow of liquids, the more efficient—and profitable—your brewery can be.

Every brewery operator knows that taproom margins are the highest margins. So, how can the beer that you distribute help to bring customers to your door?

After helping to grow one of Chicago’s most iconic craft breweries, Matt Gallagher in late 2024 opened Suncatcher—a small neighborhood brewery focused on classic styles and easy drinkability.

How low can you go? Craft breweries are testing the waters with $3 lagers, customers are diving right in, and the numbers are adding up.

Much of the real work of selling beer happens at the bar—and it often starts with a question. Here’s how to ready your taproom team with the answers that satisfy customers and promote sales.

As guaranteed taproom-fillers, private events can boost your brewing business—all you need is the space, a few options for food, and fresh ideas.

People are looking hard for value right now—and even when margins are tight, strategically offering deals on beer can pay.

It takes some extra attention to pricing and inventory, but some smaller breweries are finding that mixed packs can help energize to-go sales from the taproom.

With abundant amusements and comforts at home, people are going out less—a blow to hospitality, to draft beer, and to craft. Here’s how we can lean into craft beer’s strengths, aiming to lure drinkers away from their screens and back to the social life.

People are going out less often, generally, and brewery taprooms have had to get more creative to keep those beers pouring and margins healthy. Here are specific tips on how to entice customers out and make it worth their while.

Most people who operate small breweries don’t want to go into the restaurant business—yet food is an increasingly important way to attract customers and increase beer sales. For small breweries considering what kind of food program might be the best fit, here are some lessons learned.

Chasing flavor-driven trends on retail shelves is certainly one way to pursue growth. Yet smaller breweries may find more success by recommitting to an identity grounded in intentional brewing.

If you build it, they will come... Some breweries are discovering that investing in chargers for electric vehicles can attract more customers while serving wider company goals.

Simply having great beer is no longer enough, and on-site pie is a hit any way you slice it. Using pizza as a prism, here are three operational approaches to drawing more customers with food.

Two years of pandemic have altered hospitality and the beer industry in meaningful ways. Here’s a look at how COVID has—and hasn’t—shifted taproom architecture and design.

The pandemic hit urban, taproom-focused breweries such as Chicago’s Hopewell harder than most. Despite keeping its taproom closed, Hopewell has survived and thrived by leaning into to-go beer, widening its offerings, and widening its welcome.

Thousands of small, taproom-focused breweries are keeping afloat during the pandemic by leaning into to-go sales. How can we encourage those customers to keep coming back? One small brewery in Vermont has developed tactics that are working already.

Knowing that business will slow as the weather gets frosty—especially amid fears that indoor areas are less safe—breweries are taking different tacks to keep attracting drinkers to their patios and beer gardens.

Gabe McKee, design principal at V Three Studios, explains how flexibility and reassuring design will help breweries prepare for the months to come and future events.

Brewing marches onward—but presentation sadly lags behind, failing to do the product justice. Greg Engert, beer director of the Neighborhood Restaurant Group, offers the latest tools of the trade to help bars and taprooms rise to the challenge.