1988 Was the Most Important Year for Craft Beer

Thirty years ago, Gary Fish walked into a bank looking for a loan. He told the banker about his plans to build a restaurant with a brewery in Bend, Oregon. The banker, confused by the very concept, shut Fish down, saying, “We don’t loan to restaurants.” Fish tried to explain the brewery aspect, but was met with “We don’t know beer.” “We went back and forth a while,” Fish said. “Eventually, it was, ‘All right, thanks for your time.’ Banks didn’t want to talk to us. At that time, there wasn’t a marketplace, no industry, no one knew how to make beer.” Looking back from the present era where San Diego's Ballast Point sold to Constellation Brand for $1 billion and craft beer is omnipresent, the bank sounds crazy. But 30 years back, few people knew anything outside the macro lagers. Fewer still would lend money to upstarts seeking to make their own weird beers. Fish eventually did secure enough for his little brewery. He opened Deschutes Brewery in 1988. The brewery has grown into one of the largest and most influential breweries in the US on the strength of well-respected flagships like Black Butte Porter and Mirror Pond Pale Ale, an experimental barrel-aging program, and newer additions like Fresh Squeezed IPA. 

Deschutes made its debut in a small and stagnant beer world. Yes, there was craft beer out there: Appliance heir Fritz Maytag had purchased San Francisco’s Anchor Brewing in 1965, which is widely seen as the starting point for the modern era of craft brewing. But not many people followed suit: fewer than 90 breweries opened their doors between 1965 and 1987. The breweries that did make waves -- like Bell’s Brewery in Michigan, Sierra Nevada in California, Boston Beer Co. -- certainly helped pique interest and started the heavy lifting of making people rethink beer, but they were bright sparks on wet tinder. 

In 1988, that tinder exploded. 

Fish, way out in Bend, had no idea he was part of a burgeoning revolution, nor did the nearly 60 other independent breweries that would open during the course of that year, many of which helped shape the industry into the powerful force it is today. 

The list of so-called Class of ’88 breweries includes plenty of familiar names. In Cleveland, Great Lakes Brewing was restoring the brewing history of the Rust Belt town, while in New York Brooklyn Brewery started distributing a caramel-colored lager. In Oregon, several Nike executives branched out to brew up quirky beers at Rogue Ales & Spirits, while in Chicago, Goose Island Beer Co. started its Windy City legacy. In northern California, North Coast Brewing gained a foothold, and in Denver,Wynkoop Brewing helped lay the foundation for an all-out craft takeover a mile above sea level.