Our Story

The Establishment Beginnings…

It started with a sign, or more accurately a bunch of friends. Part house, part brew lab, The Establishment was the place where we gathered, slept, brewed, grew a garden, lived the good life. At some point or another, at least six of our friends called this place home. It was Brandon who found The Establishment sign on a snowboarding road trip and propped it up in the window. Everyone agreed it suited the place and the name stuck.

The epic Calgary flood of 2013 did its worst on this Erlton home. Mike was living in the basement at the time and lost everything he owned. For days we pulled debris and mud out of that basement, but the strength of friendships and goodwill in the community brought The Establishment back to its feet. The unforeseen benefit of all this destruction was that a completely gutted basement was the perfect space to set up a new home-brew system complete with a yeast lab. The brewing and experimentation rose to new levels, and soon the medals from various home-brew comps were rolling in.

The original Establishment has long since been demolished, but its memory lives on in our taproom where friends (old and new) are always welcome and great beer is always on tap.