Last year, Anchor Brewing, the 127-year-old San Francisco brewery, announced it was shutting down after over a century of tumultuous business operations. The brewery had survived fires, earthquakes, the passing of owners, and the Prohibition era. The COVID-19 pandemic forced the hands of former owner Sapporo to decide to liquidate the business, which had been suffering for a long time.
In a positive turn of events this past May, the brewery received a lifeline. Hamdi Ulukaya, the billionaire founder of Chobani yogurt and La Colombe coffee, announced his intention to revive the business. He planned to keep the brewery in San Francisco and restore operations. However, there is some uncertainty from the previous employees.
Photo Courtesy Hamdi Ulukaya
Anchor’s employees are part of the Anchor SF Cooperative, a group of workers who tried to purchase the brewery from Sapporo when news of the closing was announced. They failed in this venture despite pooling money together in January. Ulukaya’s purchase has sparked hope.
Anchor employees unionized in 2019 under Sapporo’s ownership after working conditions deteriorated. Union member Patrick Costello told Eater the floor workers, not the Japanese beer giant, ran the show. The employee effort to purchase the brewery was to manage it in a collective without interference from a beverage conglomerate. Over the years, Anchor has shifted from a sole proprietorship to a group of former beverage executives, to larger alcohol producers.
Upon news of Ulukaya’s intentions, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which Anchor Union is represented by, said that 77% of employees would return to work.
A statement published on the Anchor SF Cooperative X (formerly Twitter) page said 30 out of 39 workers were interested in returning.
“No one knows better how to brew and market Anchor beer better than us,” Thomas Delany, a former employee, said in the statement.
However, as of late June, they aid the new owner hadn’t met with the union yet. They claim Ulukaya hadn’t reached out to them and wasn’t familiar with the brewery until he read an article about the initial closure last July. Ulukaya told The San Francisco Chronicle that he would hire back as many former employees as possible.
Ulukaya, who is a self-described “anti-CEO,” said in a video that Anchor is a “grand jewel” of San Francisco.
“It’s the essence of this country that we can bring it back stronger, better than ever before,” he added. As of June, Ulukaya had met with four former Anchor employees, but Costello said in Eater that the union hadn’t been contacted.
There are questions about how this new ownership will affect the production and distribution of Anchor’s Steam Beer and whether classics like its Christmas Ale will return.
The biggest question that remains is its labor. At the publishing date of this article, the official Anchor Brewing website says the brewery is closed, with no indication about when operations will resume.
Photo Courtesy Anchor Brewing
Ulukaya purchased Anchor’s facilities, recipes, and logos. He said he wants to have the brewery open by Christmas, adding speculation the famous Christmas Ale may return after it was discontinued, a move that wasn’t well received. He told The San Francisco Standard he also plans to restore the original Anchor Brewing logo after Sapporo rebranded in 2021 in an attempt to increase sales.
Anchor Brewing’s tale is unique because it was a storied producer and America’s oldest independent brewery that battled adversity over and over again. For many years It managed to stay afloat until economic conditions made the brewery unsustainable.
Changes in consumer taste also had an effect. Craft beer’s popularity is waning, beverage experts say. CNN and Eater reported that it has been declining in popularity as spirits and cheaper options appear. Anchor is also competing against national craft brands like Boston Beer Co., Brooklyn Brewery, and Sierra Nevada.
Ulukaya’s ownership will have to address the issue of distribution. Under Sapporo’s leadership, the company had reduced its sales to California to save costs, ending its national distribution.
“You can’t turn a craft brewery like Anchor corporate,” Costello said to Eater. “We could just chill and make cool beer. But for a corporation, that’s almost impossible.”
The union wants to keep making a quality product rather than follow trends and chase profit. However, Anchor is a business and may need more financial help than initially thought —
the price Ulukaya paid for the brewery was not disclosed.
It’ll be interesting to see if the union can work its issues with Ulukaya. The historic brewery is a symbol of perseverance and a pillar of the San Francisco community. Getting it up and running again will please more than a few craft beer fans.
