A flight of Mexican-inspired beers at Cerveceria Colorado in Denver.
Build Bridges, Not Walls.
That’s the ethos behind Cerveceria Colorado, a brewery in Denver, Colorado, that takes inspiration from the culture, heritage, and ingredients of Mexico.
“Bringing people together over beer is great, even if you have disagreeing viewpoints,” said Patrick Crawford, Co-Founder of Denver Beer Co. and Cerveceria Colorado. “Hopefully, that’s a message that people at all points on the political spectrum can appreciate.”
Since the brewery opened on Cinco de Mayo in 2017, the founders and brewers have made several trips to Mexico to make new friends, catch up with old ones, and search out new and interesting ingredients. On many Thursday nights, the brewery hosts a program called “Cerveza for a Cause,” where they donate 20% of all sales to a not-for-profit partner. During their first year, they actually donated more money to charities than they made.
Kenny Gould: Where are you from?
Patrick Crawford: I grew up in Connecticut. I went to college in Upstate New York with my business partner, Charlie Berger. Right after college graduation, I drove from New York to Colorado to spend a summer in the mountains with a college buddy. I lived in Vail and went kayaking a bunch, and ended up living up there for a year. After that, I wanted a more serious job so I got a position with Lockheed Martin.
KG: That’s quite a change. What did you do for them?
PC: Our team was the launch team on satellites. We’d shoot those into space and do the mission control room thing until the satellites were up and functioning, and then hand them over the to government to operate. It was an interesting job, but eventually I realized that corporate America wasn’t for me. I had some other skills I wanted to use, and in the meantime I fell in love with brewing beer at home. I started home brewing and found that Charlie was a professional brewer at Wynkoop Brewing Company. I called him up and said, “Remember me from Colgate? We were on the same floor my sophomore year, which was his freshman year. He invited me down to Wynkoop and I brewed a beer with him. Actually, he did everything and then made me clean up. I started talking to him about small business. The two of us hit it off, wrote a business plan, won some awards from the state, pitched it to family and friends, and got the money together. We opened August 11th, 2011.
KG: This was before the brewing craze hit Colorado.
PC: When we were planning the brewery, we were gonna be the first in Denver in years. Strange Brewing opened a year or two before us. As we were opening, there was another opening up called Renegade and we were nervous. Two new ones at the same time? But then in the next year or two, it was crazy.
KG: So this was Denver Beer Company. But you have a second project, Cerveceria Colorado, that opened more recently. How did that come about?
PC: Our head brewer, Jason Buehler, had been invited to Mexico to judge some beer competitions. He was like, “There are pretty cool ingredients down here.” We started talking and said, “Jason, do you think there are enough ingredients in Mexico to form a whole brewery around them?” The political climate was such that Mexico wasn’t getting very good press, and we decided we could do two things. We could highlight the great culture of Mexico while also opening a Mexican-inspired brewery. We’ve always been impressed by the culture and heritage and regions. There are so many fun ingredients like moles and limes and cinnamon and chiles. So really, it was the Mexican inspiration that caused us to open Cerveceria Colorado. And it has been a great two-way exchange. All the Mexican brewers want to know how to make a New England IPA. In turn, they’re saying, “Check out this wonderful ingredient I just used.” One of the brewers we’ve collaborated with sent us flowers from the coca plant — that’s different than the one that has chocolate. But the flowers have this rich, roasted flavor. That’s out of a flower! The ingredients we’ve been able to use and find have been so unique and so much fun. We’ve learned a ton from the brewers of Mexico.
KG: You’ve opened two different projects at two different times in brewing history — the first in 2011, before the third wave brewing boom, and the second in 2017. Has anything about opening the second brewery surprised you?
PC: Yes, Cerveceria Colorado was opened on Cinco De Mayo in 2017. There have been a lot of similarities but actually some stark differences around both openings. With Cerveceria Colorado, we decided that all of our messaging would be about half in Spanish and half in English. If you look at our social media, it has been in Spanglish. The turnout from the Latino community has been awesome. During Great American Beer Festival week, the next Saturday we hosted the Great Mexican Beer Festival. I had a friend tell me it was the most diverse crowd she’d ever seen at a beer event. We invited four breweries from Mexico. We had luchadores. We made the world’s largest michelada. It was a great party. It was really awesome to have the Hispanic population in Denver come to drink craft beer.
KG: What else have you noticed?
PC: When we opened in 2011, it was novel to have beers that changed with the seasons. When you came to the brewery, there was always something new and fresh on tap. The breweries that existed were pouring the same thing every time you visited. But now there’s 30 different places in Denver to grab fresh beer. So with Cerveceria Colorado, we’re switching things up. At any given time, we have 10 to 12 unique beers, which is about one or two new ones every month. Typically, 5 of those are collaborations with Mexican brewers. But at the very least, all of our beers are inspired by Mexican culture, ingredients, or heritage.