Explorium Buys Good City In Continued Craft Beer Shakeup
Four Good City locations will be rebranded as part of Explorium's big expansion.
Good City Brewing’s downtown location before opening in 2019. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.
Company Brewing. MobCraft. Enlightened. City Lights. And now add Good City.
Closings and buyouts of craft brewers are causing a major shakeup in Milwaukee’s once-thriving industry.
The owners of The Explorium Brewpub are buying Good City Brewing and its four locations. The entire operation will be rebranded as The Explorium Hospitality Group.
“We are bringing Good City Brewing into The Explorium family,” said Joan Doble, who owns the business with her husband Mike, in a video announcing the change.
Good City, founded on the East Side in 2016, includes a Farwell Avenue location, a Deer District location across from Fiserv Forum and suburban locations at the Mequon Public Market and in Wauwatosa at the Mayfair Collection. All of the locations are leased.
“We are going to continue those four as Good City Brewing for a little bit, while we reimagine some of the spaces, rebrand and definitely you will see some changes,” said Mike.
Explorium launched in early 2017 with an unusual location, at least for the time: a brew pub within Southridge Mall. But, coupled with a well regarded operation, the Greendale location became a recipe for success. A Milwaukee location, in the Pritzlaff Building on the edge of the Historic Third Ward, was added in 2020.
The hospitality group will maintain the brewpub focus with its expansion, but will ultimately do so without the Good City recipes or brand. The Good City intellectual property will be retained by the current ownership group. Each of the Good City locations includes a full kitchen, to pair a food menu with a craft beer.
There have been hints that Good City could be in the market for change. Co-founder and CEO Dan Katt left his position in October 2023 to return to the real estate industry with the Mandel Group. In April, co-founder David Dupee took a job as the executive director of the American Sign Museum in Cincinnati. After progressively expanding its Farwell Avenue location, it announced in late 2023 that Allie Boy’s Bagelry & Luncheonette would take over the southern half of the space. An event venue above the Deer District brewery was dropped amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.
Katt confirmed the Century City 1 warehouse, acquired by an investment group affiliated with Good City in 2018, is not included in the deal. As of late 2022, the investment group was exploring the construction of a second building for additional tenants.
The Good City closure follows a series of changes in Milwaukee’s craft beer industry. City Lights Brewing Co. announced its impending closure Dec. 31. It will join Enlightened Brewing Company in closing in early January. MobCraft Beer closed at the end of November without a buyer. Company Brewing closed in May amidst a Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing. In December, two-location Gathering Place purchased a Grafton brewery. For insight on the trend, and what’s driving it, see our December coverage.
Look for more coverage on the deal, and the changing craft beer industry, in a future column.
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