As the craft beer industry in Colorado has matured and settled in the two years since the end of the pandemic, there has been a spate of small buyouts, closures and consolidations. For some, this has meant difficult times. For others, it has created opportunities to expand.
On Dec. 20. Prost Brewing, which was founded in Denver’s Lower Highland neighborhood in 2012, will open the doors to one of the bigger expansions in recent memory – a Munich-sized taproom and biergarten, at 351 W. 104th Ave in Northglenn, that is connected to a 60,000-square-foot production space, which soon will begin making beer on two large brewing systems.
In addition to its traditional German-style beers – such as pilsner, dunkel, marzen, Vienna lager and kolsch – Prost will offer a menu of regional specialties, like a sausage board with sauerkraut and mustard; giant pretzels served with fontina fondue; and bratwurst cooked in beer.
Inside, there is a two-story taproom totaling nearly 10,000 square feet where visitors will be able to look into the glass-enclosed brewing area. The outdoor patio (including a small four-season patio) is slightly larger and boasts a stage, firepits, community seating, and games like cornhole.
“This facility is kind of a dream come true and it will be our forever home at least for the next thirty years,” said Prost co-owner and president David Deline. “We have really fortunate to have had double-digit growth over the last several years. … Nothing is ever not nerve-racking when you are taking a risk, but I think this is a perfect time. This investment allows us to double down on who we are … and to carve ourselves out as an authority in our space.”
Prost is also getting a significant amount of help – around $3.6 million in incentives from public funding sources. That includes $1.2 million in tax credits from the Colorado Office of Economic Development; nearly $1.7 million in incentives from the City of Northglenn, $706,634 from Adams County, and $25,000 in grants from the Northglenn Urban Renewal Authority.
In return, Prost has pledged to spend $25 million on the brewery over the next decade and to be an anchor that will attract other businesses and add jobs to Northglenn. Prost itself has hired 100 workers for the facility, Deline said, doubling the number of people who work for the company.
Part of Prost’s spending includes a 50-barrel, state-of-the-art brewing system from Kaspar Schulz, a storied and high-end brewing manufacturer based in Bamberg, Germany, which is home to some of the most famed breweries and brewing traditions in Europe. The equipment will allow Prost to make beers using decoction techniques, as they do in Germany.
In addition, Prost has purchased a separate 20-barrel brewing system that it will use to make smaller batches of one-off beers, Deline said. Together, the two systems will give Prost the ability to make 60,000 barrels of beer (around 120,000 kegs) “out of the gate, and with room to grow.”
To start with, though, Deline expects Prost to produce about 15,000 to 17,000 barrels of its own beer in addition to another 20,000 to 25,000 barrels of beer for other breweries. “We intentionally designed in the ability to offer contract services to like-minded breweries” who are trying to grow but might not have the capacity to do so, he added.
In fact, that is what Prost has been doing for the past few years while waiting for the Northglenn project to be finished. The brewery has been making its beer at Avery Brewing in Boulder.
That’s also where Prost got its new head brewer, Josh Rapp, who led the brewing team at Avery and has been on staff there for 10 years. We are very excited to have him officially joining the team, Deline said. “Josh is one of many highly talented people joining the team.”
In addition to the original taproom in Denver and the new Northglen facility, Prost, which distributes its beers in six states, also has taprooms in Highlands Ranch and Fort Collins.
Deline said Prost should begin brewing on the smaller system by the end of the year and will ramp up the larger system by March or April. The company hasn’t decided yet what to do with its older brewhouse, which operated in LoHi until being removed a few years ago.
The new Northglenn location opens today and will host a grand opening on Jan. 4, 2024.
