Eagle Park Brewing Will Continue Milwaukee Brewing Beers

Eagle Park Brewing & Distilling Company has acquired the Milwaukee Brewing Company brand — the final piece in the company’s sale. The Milwaukee Ale House closed earlier this month and the physical brewery was sold to Chicago-based Pilot Project Brewing last week.

Eagle Park announced Monday it purchased MKE Brewing’s intellectual property, recipes and branding and said it plans to “ensure the future of Milwaukee’s third-oldest craft brewery.”

With a slight design update, Eagle Park said it intends to continue producing MKE Brewing’s flagship beers and would develop new seasonal and year-round recipes under the Milwaukee Brewing name.

“Milwaukee Brewing was one of the first three breweries in the city that kind of paved the way for the rest of us here,” said Jake Schinker, co-owner of Eagle Park Brewing. Eagle Park opened in 2017, 20 years after MKE Brewing’s launch. “I was drinking Milwaukee Brewing Company beers before I even started home brewing.”

Though the two brands now belong to the same parent company, Eagle Park and MKE Brewing will remain largely separate. Eagle Park intends to continue to create the innovative beers and spirits that have defined the brand, while the classic MKE recipes will remain as a stand-alone brand.

‘They’ve been great in this handoff process,” Schinker said of MKE. “It’s going to be a lot of work to make sure everything goes smoothly, but they’ve been very helpful in the process.”

“The hunt is on” for a taproom and production facility within the city of Milwaukee, Schinker said, but he’s not rushing the process. Eagle Park currently has two locations, in Muskego and at 823 E. Hamilton St. on Milwaukee’s Lower East Side.

In the meantime, MKE production will temporarily relocate to Eagle Park’s Muskego facility. The Hamilton Street location will serve as a temporary taproom. Even after the company finds a new home in the city, a few taplines of MKE will likely remain at the Eagle Park locations.

Muskego would remain the main production site, according to Schinker, who added that a future Milwaukee facility would be used for limited releases and small-format brews, including the return of the Brewer’s Day Off series.

An estimated 6,500 barrels of MKE beers will be produced in 2023, bringing Eagle Park’s total annual production to more than 14,000 barrels.

“The cans will look a little different, but Milwaukee Brewing will continue to produce the quality beers that the city has come to expect over the years,” said Max Borgardt, co-founder and co-owner of Eagle Park Brewing. “At the same time, this gives the Eagle Park brand the opportunity to focus on what it is best at – making cool and innovative beers and spirits.”

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The acquisition of Milwaukee Brewing’s intellectual property marks the end of the approximately six-month process of the company’s sale. The company announced in March that it would sell the production brewery at 1128 N. 9th St. as well as the Milwaukee Ale House brewpub, 233 N. Water St., and the Milwaukee Brewing Company brand.

On Friday, Pilot Project Brewing was announced as the buyer of Milwaukee Brewing’s production brewing facility and the attached Bottle House 42 restaurant. The Milwaukee Ale House closed Sept. 11 and an auction of its contents is underway, with bidding to close Tuesday, Sept. 27 at 10:30 a.m.