21st Amendment Brewing’s resurrection starts now.
The San Francisco craft brewery shut down last November – brewpub closed, San Leandro production facility dark, 25 years of legacy seemed gone in an instant. Now it’s back. The unlikely resurrector can be found about as far from San Fran has you can get in a fairly straight line: Evil Genius Beer Company, of Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood.
Evil Genius co-founders Luke Bowen and Trevor Hayward -Villanova business school classmates started Evil Genius in 2011. They have acquired 21st Amendment’s brand, recipes, and distribution rights in a seven-figure deal. Beer Street Journal is told the California production facility was sold separately. What Evil Genius gets is the IP, and recipes of the beers folks loved and missed.
Four flagships are returning: Hell or High Watermelon, Brew Free! or Die IPA, Brew Free! or Die Blood Orange, and Lager. Some are already back in stores.
The Sale
Bowen and Hayward were introduced to the seller through a mutual friend and it is obvious they both loved the idea of the deal.
Pennsylvania was 21st Amendment’s second-largest market, behind home state California. The two breweries already shared a Philadelphia distributor in Origlio Beverage.
This time, a little different.
As Beer Street Journal reported at the time of closure, 21st Amendment died on infrastructure. Their footprint was 29 states. Tack on freight costs, supply chain instability, and and all the usual post-pandemic market crap we all suffered through (and a nod for growing the capacity too fast) and it finally all fell apart.
Here is the new plan: production will run through a network of contract brewers on both coasts, meaning beer will flow closer to the source. Same thing Sierra Nevada, Oskar Blues, and New Belgium all of done.
It’s a leaner operation, and that’s the point. “This isn’t a big beer takeover,” Bowen said. “This is about two guys who love great beer ensuring that a brand people genuinely love stays in their fridges — and ours.”
While we still wait to see if Anchor Brewing still has a future, at least 21st Amendment has found it’s way back – to 29 states by June 2026. Summer is coming and so is Hell or High Watermelon Wheat once again.
21st Amendment beers are currently available in California, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New York, with coast-to-coast distribution targeted for June 2026.
