Santa Fe Brewing Co. gets OK for taphouse

Santa Fe Brewing Co. granted license, waiver for Galisteo Street property

City Council clears way for brewery’s entrance into downtown at property on Galisteo Street.

Fans of Happy Camper IPA are … happy campers.

Santa Fe Brewing Co. is headed downtown with plans for a taphouse on Galisteo Street not far from the state Capitol.

It would be the popular local brewer’s first foray into city limits, following taprooms established in Albuquerque and Eldorado, in addition to its brewery headquarters and tasting room off N.M. 14, just south of Santa Fe.

“I’ve been kind of looking and searching all over the past five or six years for a [downtown] place,” said Brian Lock, the brewery’s president. “I didn’t want to go into a strip mall. I wanted to go into a standalone building that had some character to it.”

City councilors on Wednesday approved an off-site small brewer license as well as a waiver needed because the brick building at 510 Galisteo St. — formerly home to a cigar shop and bar — is within the vicinity of the Santa Fe Jewish Center-Chabad. Rabbi Berel Levertov of the

center wrote to the council to say he found “no issue” with the proposal.

The property includes the 1,100-square-foot interior and a 450-square-foot outdoor patio in the rear.

Parking would be available at the nearby Capitol lot, where visitors can park for free, and Lock said he was working on obtaining more nearby spots.

The new taproom will make available to the downtown set a fleet of specialty, one-off, seasonal and experimental drafts not previously available in a frosty mug in the city, Lock said.

“That’s one of the reasons for having a place downtown,” Lock said. “For so long I’ve wanted to bring to the people that live in the neighborhood around the Plaza the ability to try beers we don’t offer in the package or at other bars and restaurants.”

Santa Fe Brewing launched in 1988 and has since grown its distribution network to eight states, its distinctively designed cans reaching as far afield as Missouri. Still, the brewer has eyes for “pretty major growth,” Lock said.

The company produced 25,000 barrels of beer at its Santa Fe County facility last year. Lock said a long-term goal of 200,000 annual barrels would be achievable with a only bit more beer-production infrastructure.

“That’s not a goal for 2018,” he said. “In this climate, with the competitive nature of the craft biz, that would be hard to achieve in the short term. But, hey, if it happened five years from now or 10 years from now … that’s what the property will support.”