San Francisco's Anchor Brewing Update
San Francisco's Anchor Brewing Update
Anchor Brewing employees' efforts continue
In Case You Don’t Remember: San Francisco’s Anchor Brewing announced its closure on July 12, which I wrote about last month. Here is an update! Former employees hoped to shift to a co-op model that would allow employees to make decisions regarding the brewery and would also allow them to have access to benefits such as profit sharing.
The Update: Former employees of the Anchor Brewing have now formed a cooperative and launched a GoFundMe campaign in hopes of buying the brewery. The Anchor Union published their fundraising campaign on Monday, September 4th with a goal of $50,000 and as of 2 pm the next day, they had raised $25,000. The GoFundMe made half of its goal in just two days and has now greatly surpassed its initial goal by almost twice the set amount.
Where will all those funds go? According to the GoFundMe, they will pay the bills for the organizations and legal team who have been helping Anchor SF cooperative since July. The funds will also start “Phase 2” of their attempt to buy the brewery back. This would include speaking with investors and telling the brewery story, as well as employee plans on how they could successfully bring it back. Once this is complete, SF Cooperative will be able to place a bid to buy Anchor back.
Although Anchor Union announced on Twitter that there was still no movement from Sapporo to share the financial statements they have asked for, they claimed they are working on a five-year business plan with Project Equity and TuttleLawGroup. Although some worry that a $50,000 goal is insufficient, given that the brewery and property alone are worth much more, the GoFundMe is only part of the proceeds. San Jose’s Fox Tale Fermentation Project released a Solidarity Ale whose proceeds will also support the bid process. Other brewpubs may later join the efforts as well.