08/31/2022
Hello all,
After weeks of soul searching, a plethora of emotions, and many sleepless nights, I have decided to take Beer Tours USA and Craft Beer Directory offline at the end of today.
The world has changed. The market has changed. My life has changed. My passion, my priorities, my time, and my commitments have changed.
These projects started off with the sale of Anheuser-Busch to a foreign-owned entity in 2008. My desire was patriotic… with wanting to help keep America’s beer dollars in America, by helping American entrepreneurs, their families, and American-owned independent craft breweries and brewpubs gain a foothold in the market against the “Big 3” (BUD, Miller, Coors, which were all foreign-owned).
Hours of research, visiting craft microbreweries all over the country, interviewing owners, brewers, and patrons, resulted in the formation of Beer Tours USA (2010) and Craft Beer Directory (2011).
When I started this mission and finally launched the Websites, there were approximately 1,400 breweries in operation in the United States. Today we have nearly 10,000 in operation. Over the years, I now have 20,000+ breweries in my database including “Breweries in Planning”. Many never opened. Some opened shortly then closed. Some had a nice multi-year run, then sold or closed. Some expanded, opened multiple locations, closed some locations, their business model was ever-changing. Each individual brewery had their own story as to their success or demise.
I feel like I personally know most of the breweries in the database (many I did visit personally). Watching each one for years, in their planning, permitting, building, buildout, brewing, and finally releasing their product to the public (on that day, I made the brewery visible to the public on the Craft Beer Directory Website and App).
Each brewery in the database, I verified the address, type of brewery (micro - brewpub) by licensing, found the primary door used by the public to enter/exit the establishment, and geo-located that door for the turn-by-turn directions to the brewery. I did this individually for every brewery in the database.
Most of this has been a one-man show (I contracted the coding of the Websites and the App). I’ve done this for 12+ years now. Long days, seven days a week, to try to keep everything accurate in the database for the Website and hundreds of thousands of loyal App users. Conservative estimates by family and friends that have watched me do this, put this at 50,000+ hours. So, I have not made this decision lightly.
I’ve met many new people, made many new friends over the years, had wonderful experiences, and tasted phenomenal beers. I’ve gotten thousands of emails, messages, and phone calls over the years, from craft beer drinkers, App users, and business owners, thanking me for what Beer Tours USA and Craft Beer Directory has done for the American craft beer industry. For these, I am forever grateful. We did this together… emails and messages letting me know if I missed a Grand Opening, if a brewery closed, if I missed a new location opening or a brewery has moved to a new location, etc. My loyal Website and App users kept me honest!
So, this is an emotional farewell… Hopefully not forever, only until we meet again. Thank you to all, for the years of inspiration, love, words of encouragement, and most of all, support. Without you, I could not have done this. We’ve had a good run. I’ve had fun and enjoyed doing it. But now I’m looking forward to the next chapter in my life.
May America grow stronger. May we all come together and live as one. May God bless you all.
Cheers!
Sincerely,
Robin
