(Saint Paul, MN) – Summit Brewing Co. will break ground on its expansion next week. Here’s more from the newsletter.

—

As promised, here is the latest update regarding our cellar expansion. We are officially breaking ground on Friday, November 9 at 5 pm. Please join us, along with St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, as we toast the next stage in Summit’s history. The ceremony will take place during our Friday Tap Room hours, 3-8 pm. The first 100 people to purchase a beer that day will receive a commemorative stein to hoist high and say cheers.

Although we have been quietly investing an annual average of $1.7 million into the brewery over the past 10 years, this is the most ambitious expansion since the building of the new brewery back in 1998. The truth of the matter is that we have hit the wall on capacity. The brewery had to cut 12 brews this year due to capacity issues, so the original expansion date of June 2013 had to be moved up to this month. The current capacity of the brewery is 120,000 barrels (bbls) a year.

The $6 million expansion will increase our production capacity to 240,000 bbls a year. The addition of 7,632 square feet of cellar space and twelve 600 bbl fermentation vessels will be completed by June 2013. We are partnering with some great Minnesota companies: DCI in St. Cloud is fabricating the tanks, our general contractor is Burnsville-based PCL Construction Services, and our engineering/architecture firm is Van Sickle, Allen & Associates out of Plymouth.

We couldn’t have done this without you. Thanks again for all the support these past 26 years!