E-Malt.com News article: USA, WI: Vintage Brewing Co. finalizing plans to begin construction of new brewpub in Sauk City

Vintage Brewing Co. is finalizing plans to begin construction this summer on a massive brewpub and banquet facility along the Wisconsin River in Sauk City, Madison.com reported.

No sale has been finalized, but village officials have tentatively agreed to sell the Madison company a vacant piece of land at the corner of Water and Polk streets, where plans call for a combined 27,000 square feet of brewing, restaurant and rooftop space across three levels.

Trent Kraemer, who owns Vintage along with his wife, Brittany, cousins Scott and Bryan Manning, uncle Mark Kraemer, and family friend Mike Bridges, said the expansive facility will dramatically increase the company’s brewing capacity and will allow it to host weddings and other banquet-type events.

“It’s a pretty large undertaking for us,” Kraemer said. “We’re really going to try to make it into a regional destination with the architecture and the scope of what we can do. It’s got beautiful views.”

The land that will be used for the project was purchased by the village years ago to hold for future development.

In the interim, village officials had moved a pair of historic buildings onto the property, but village president James Anderson said those buildings were recently moved to make way for Vintage Brewing.

“We have not only been excited, we’ve been very supportive because in town here, we’ve not had a space for weddings or reunions. So, this will bring some of that business back into the village,” Anderson said.

Vintage, which operates a Downtown Madison bar and a West Side brewpub, opened a “satellite pub” called the Woodshed Ale House in Sauk City in 2013.

Kraemer said village officials approached the company about expanding in Sauk City, but family ties to the area solidified the decision.

Plans for the new location will include about 10,000 square feet of restaurant, bar and banquet space and 7,000 square feet for rooftop and outdoor mezzanine space overlooking the Wisconsin River.

The 10,000-square-foot brewery in the facility’s lower level will produce between 8,000 and 9,000 barrels of beer per year — about five times the capacity of the company’s current flagship brewpub at 674 S. Whitney Way.

Vintage routinely keeps a dozen of its beers on tap at its Downtown Madison location at 529 University Ave., more than 20 on tap at its Whitney Way brewpub, and 15 on tap at Woodshed Ale House, 101 Jackson St., Sauk City.

Kraemer said he’s most interested in using the new facility to produce new beers.

“Our philosophy has always been variety. We’re not planning on buying two giant tanks and just filling them with our two best selling beers,” he said.

Anderson expects a land sale development agreement to be in place within the next six to eight weeks and construction to begin later this summer.

Vintage’s goal is to open the new Sauk City location by next summer. No decision has been made about Woodshed Ale House’s future after Vintage opens, Kraemer said.


17 May, 2016