It is almost two weeks before Turkey Day so I thought I would do a brewery count for Allegheny County and Pittsburgh. This list is gleaned from the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board data base and does not actually reflect what is happening in real life. This makes me suspect the accuracy of the LBC. But this is what they show as of November 12, 2016.
Active Breweries in Allegheny County: 31, 7 of which have 2 licenses
Active Breweries in Pittsburgh alone: 10, 3 of which have 2 licenses
Note: The brewery in Varona is a commercial drinks manufacturer.
Also as shown below, Church and Copper Kettle have expired licenses, which I thing the LCB is in error. How is this on the state-wide level?
Expired Breweries in Allegheny County: 8, which includes Church Brew Works & Copper Kettle
Expired Breweries in Pittsburgh alone: 6, which includes Church Brew Works & Copper Kettle
Pending Breweries in Allegheny County: 2
Pending Breweries in Pittsburgh alone: 0
Safekeeping Breweries in Allegheny County: 9, of which 3 have 2 licenses in safekeeping
Safekeeping Breweries in Pittsburgh alone: 3, of which 1 has 2 licenses in safekeeping
Note: Mindful has 2 in safekeeping but had one license expire so it seems as they applied for 3 in total.
Brewery Storage Areas in Allegheny County: 2, I Expired
Brewery Storage Areas in Pittsburgh alone: 1
Of the breweries noted above there are 10 brewery-pub licenses but of those Draai Laag in Millvale has 2 brewery-pub licenses and I have no idea why. Two breweries have had there brewery-pub license expire: Iron City, which tried to open a small pilot brewery at the Liberty Avenue Ober Haus, and East End, which does not need it anymore.
Three breweries have an Active Brewery Storage license: East End, Pig Hill and Auroch. Penn Brewery had one but it expired in 2012.
The state has never shown The Strip Brewery in Pittsburgh of ever having a license and even though it looked like a brewery-pub it may not have. The Church operates independently of the Lawrenceville Brewing Co. and the Foundry Ale Works operated independently from the Sweet Water Brewing Co. So, this muddles things a bit. To further muck thing up Three Mugs Brew Pub actually received a license but never opened and is no longer listed in the LCB data base. I cannot confirm is Penn Brewery ever actually have a brewery-pub license.
For a bit more on this and in further detail, see pittsburghbrewers.com, which means I now have to update my Breweries in Allegheny County page, thank you very much.
Cheers, Ed
