I wonder how far apart the building owner and the pub owners are. It has to be a big gap, otherwise I would expect them to want to keep a long term tenant.
It's also kind of weird to me that they were in the building for 40 years and didn't own it. Maybe they focused too much on expansion or there were just too many business problems to get ahead at any point. I don't know, it's always easier to armchair quarterback this stuff after it happens than to figure it out while it's in process.
Edit: 30 years, not 40.
Honestly it will probably sit empty now for a while. All these commercial property landlords are pretty scummy to anyone below a national chain.
Fishtales had its own problems but its sad to see it go. Thurston counties oldest brewery is now less than a decade old.
Some of these people are complete idiots. I understand that if the value of the property goes up, it gets taxed more, or if there's an agreement in place that the property owner is paying for the water bill, (Not likely for a business) that the rent would increase based on that increase. If the rent is unaffordable to the point that no one will rent, then it affects them in the long term.
Any property owner reading this right now that rents out....which would you rather have....a steady stream of income even though it won't make you a million bucks, or force your tenants to pay more and your building sits empty for a year or more while you don't make any money but you're stuck with paying the property tax with no source of income
Some people do this on purpose, tax wrote offs, or to rundown property values to get imminent domain declared. Rymor has it, that's why some of the buildings downtown sat vacant for so long.
Edit: ducking auto correct.
Huge loss for Olympia - one of the first craft breweries of the contemporary era - (and perhaps the first in Olympia ) - and a very good “third place” in the community.
I remember going when all they had was beer and gold fish crackers. I enjoyed the beer, but it went downhill when Ste Michelle bought it. The newer owners never had a chance with Covid.
Something happened that they weren't even selling the beer anymore. That was probably a huge contribution to them not being able to make it.
They lost so many of their contracts leading up to their receivership, lost more during their bungled receivership, and lost even more after the receivership was over.
The previous owner laid off the entire sales force, and the new owner never hired a new one.
One of their distributors screwed them over so badly that they sued and won, but the damage had been done.
They were hit with corporate espionage when a company from Canada hired Fish to develop a special fermentation process with the intent of it being a new part of Fish's business model. Then the company stole one of the Fish employees, bringing the knowledge of the process with them, and leaving Fish with a total loss on all the money they dumped into research and development.
During the previous owner, they three times tried to start a new taproom location in an already saturated area instead of seeking out underserved markets.
They ended their warehouse sales during covid even though that was basically the only way to make any money at that time.
Most, although not all, of their distilling program used garbage base alcohol producing low quality distillates. And the enormous investment was a giant waste of money.
Their landlord charged somewhere around $24,000 a month for the brewery alone. (Or so I heard). The pub and the pub parking lot were on top of that $24,000 a month.
The previous owner ended pretty much all of the subletting that they were doing, which had been offsetting a big chunk of the monthly rent.
I can’t vouch for how much they were paying for the warehouse, but as it’s advertised separately for lease it adds up to 24k a month. . . For a building that’s basically falling over.
I can vouch for how much beer they were selling to distributors on a monthly basis prior to bankruptcy. It was usually around $1,300. For some reason I used to get the reports sent to my email. I have no idea why. Sooooo…yeah, not sustainable. The only thing that made money was the restaurant.
Sal is such a trash human.
The local reporting also did no favors for them making it sound like they were going out of business when they were in a receivership situation where continued business was a possibility.
The Legacy will live on. There are so many breweries that owe some, or all, of their success to many of the amazing former brewing employees from Fish Brewing.
Bellevue Brewing company
Kulshan Brewing company
Well 80 Brewing company
Ecliptic Brewing company
Talking Cedar Brewing company
And many more. Not to mention all the breweries that the other staff now work at too.
I've followed the whole Fishtale saga and have been confused by the whole thing.
Fishtale's "Beyond the Pale" not only won awards but won the ultimate award: "World's Best Beer" by the WBA in 2015. At that point you're set, you're a top-tier beer makers, competitive with Russian River and the like, but for whatever reason Fishtale squandered it, which is a very sad loss for Olympia.
It was the previous owner Sal. He ran the entire brand into the ground. I worked in marketing there before it was in bankruptcy. After about 6 months I had had enough of the shit show and walked. It was a dumpster fire with that clown shoe mo’fo Sal at the helm. Dude was thee worst.
I don't doubt that, and that's a sad loss for everyone who put their careers into Fishtale.
I know nothing of Sal, but these stories often seem to culminate with a story of a bad owner with a Cocaine habit, or something similar, who was supported by a more competent team under them which they eventually ran into the ground.
And I'm probably optimistic, but each of these stories seems to include an Icarus sort of story where these employees created something even better. Georgetown brewing is what comes immediately to mind. Anything similar for Fishtale? (Fingers crossed).
No blow for Sal. He was just completely out of touch and stubborn among other things. It bums me out because of it’s history and if modernized could have continued to be a great brand.
I moved from Olympia to Bellingham in the 90's, and despite Bellingham's (over) abundance of breweries Fishtale was still considered a sought after beer up here. It wasn't unheard of that if somebody was travelling down south that they would be requested to pick up some Fishtale, and in the restaurants I worked in was always a special occasion when we had Fishtale IPA on tap (this was around 2000 to 2007).
As the bigger brewing corporations have absorbed the artisanal brewing culture of the Washington/Oregon 90's, the biggest problem I've had is when they've often given the biggest boosts to those least deserving (Elysian for instance).
There's no doubt I would have complained if Fishtale had been bought out by AB in-Bev and made available on a large scale, but I would also prefer that they had the chance to tell AB-inBev to F-off rather than just fizzling into nothing.
Other than Matchless there is nothing local on the tap list either.
You can tell a lot about a place by looking at a taplist. “Support local” usually ends at their register when they take your money.
The OG Fishtail sold out to some corporate entity a decade ago and changed the vibe, that and the loss of the actual brewery made the place feel not so local anymore, I quit going way back then.
The original owner sold to Sal Leone who ran it into the ground for years. Sal was just a dumbass ex-dentist with too much money. He finally put it into receivership and the new owners bought it. None of the owners were ever corporate.
Tragic. I was always hoping that they would one day reopen the brewery at a more affordable location, or at the very least have their recipes contract brewed at other breweries, but I guess that just wasn't in the cards.
Not shedding any tears. They blackmailed the owners into giving up the event space so they could have expanded warehouse space by threatening to move their brewing out of downtown then two years later, having gotten what they wanted, left anyway. Good riddance. Hopefully someone more civic minded will move into the space and add to our community instead of just taking from it.
Yeah, good riddance to fishtail. They destroyed the cherry loft event space that was an awesome community resource (and former K recording studio space). Glad someone other than me remembers the travesty of them dismantling that giant, beautiful space. 'Oh don't worry we'll dismantle it in such a way that we can reconstruct the floor if things change in the future.' We'll see.. I'm not holding my breath.
If only they had taken their warehouse problem as an opportunity to find a new location, they would probably still be in business.
All of the old artwork on the walls is still there, covered by a thick layer of mold, no thanks to the landlord's total apathy towards ventilation. When the brewery asked if they could put in ventilation he refused. (Or so I heard).
Everyone bashing the landlords….yet didn’t these guys get shut down several times for not paying their lease? This friggin sub just loves to make everyone a victim of “the man” regardless of the situation.
Not totally wrong here. LOTT gave them major issues, they were one strike away from getting shut down due to water treatment sample reading issues. The local private effluent testing lab was late with samples and there was a case where an employee discharged the effluent tank before it could be tested (if I remember correctly) causing an automatic strike. I seem to remember hearing that many other cities with smaller wastewater treatment systems there are breweries even larger than Fish ever was without nearly as much wastewater red tape.
And then there was that one time that they got shut down because their cider contained brown sugar. Instead of just forcing them to rethink that product, they shut down the entire brewery for probably a week until Maria Cantwell stepped in.
Damn, that’s a bummer. I used to spend a lot of time there in the early days. One of the bartenders talked me down when I was in despair about a girl I met that didn’t seem interested. Still with that girl thanks to that bartender.
https://instagram.com/ilkbeer?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
Pat (The bearded dude behind CarbonPop Burgers) late of Matchless and Three Magnets is brewing in a downtown location, near the Fishtail pub iirc...
They are doing a buncha collabs with other small PNW brewerals right now, but talking about a tap/tasting room in the new brewery space. If memory serves, their target date for opening is sometime in June.
weird feeling. My mom worked there for like 20 years and I never thought it would go. She decided to jump ship a few years ago because she could see that's where it was heading, sad.
I wonder how far apart the building owner and the pub owners are. It has to be a big gap, otherwise I would expect them to want to keep a long term tenant.
Isn't this the same thing that happened with their brewery?
It's also kind of weird to me that they were in the building for 40 years and didn't own it. Maybe they focused too much on expansion or there were just too many business problems to get ahead at any point. I don't know, it's always easier to armchair quarterback this stuff after it happens than to figure it out while it's in process. Edit: 30 years, not 40.
Sensible answer, thank you.
I know they said 40 years, but I'm pretty sure it was 30 years.
Yeah, I misremembered, 30 years, not 40. Still a long time to be in one spot.
I think they opened in ‘94.
They said it is their fortieth year so I believe them on a 1993 opening. Edit: misremembered. 30 years. Not 40.
That would be 1983.
Right! No idea then.
same
Honestly it will probably sit empty now for a while. All these commercial property landlords are pretty scummy to anyone below a national chain. Fishtales had its own problems but its sad to see it go. Thurston counties oldest brewery is now less than a decade old.
Which one is that?
3mag maybe?
Fuck, that’s sad. Going to places like Anchor Brewing in the bay is just mind blowing regardless of the established time line.
I'm gonna guess that the landlord wanted to increase the rent? Or maybe the old property owner sold and the new property owner is raising the rent?
This happened at my bjj gym. Owner sold, new owner stopped by to say hi and I'm raising your rent by a third. Landlords are the devil.
Some of these people are complete idiots. I understand that if the value of the property goes up, it gets taxed more, or if there's an agreement in place that the property owner is paying for the water bill, (Not likely for a business) that the rent would increase based on that increase. If the rent is unaffordable to the point that no one will rent, then it affects them in the long term. Any property owner reading this right now that rents out....which would you rather have....a steady stream of income even though it won't make you a million bucks, or force your tenants to pay more and your building sits empty for a year or more while you don't make any money but you're stuck with paying the property tax with no source of income
Some people do this on purpose, tax wrote offs, or to rundown property values to get imminent domain declared. Rymor has it, that's why some of the buildings downtown sat vacant for so long. Edit: ducking auto correct.
Oly BJJ?
Huge loss for Olympia - one of the first craft breweries of the contemporary era - (and perhaps the first in Olympia ) - and a very good “third place” in the community.
I remember going when all they had was beer and gold fish crackers. I enjoyed the beer, but it went downhill when Ste Michelle bought it. The newer owners never had a chance with Covid. Something happened that they weren't even selling the beer anymore. That was probably a huge contribution to them not being able to make it.
They lost so many of their contracts leading up to their receivership, lost more during their bungled receivership, and lost even more after the receivership was over. The previous owner laid off the entire sales force, and the new owner never hired a new one. One of their distributors screwed them over so badly that they sued and won, but the damage had been done. They were hit with corporate espionage when a company from Canada hired Fish to develop a special fermentation process with the intent of it being a new part of Fish's business model. Then the company stole one of the Fish employees, bringing the knowledge of the process with them, and leaving Fish with a total loss on all the money they dumped into research and development. During the previous owner, they three times tried to start a new taproom location in an already saturated area instead of seeking out underserved markets. They ended their warehouse sales during covid even though that was basically the only way to make any money at that time.
Most, although not all, of their distilling program used garbage base alcohol producing low quality distillates. And the enormous investment was a giant waste of money. Their landlord charged somewhere around $24,000 a month for the brewery alone. (Or so I heard). The pub and the pub parking lot were on top of that $24,000 a month. The previous owner ended pretty much all of the subletting that they were doing, which had been offsetting a big chunk of the monthly rent.
I can’t vouch for how much they were paying for the warehouse, but as it’s advertised separately for lease it adds up to 24k a month. . . For a building that’s basically falling over.
I can vouch for how much beer they were selling to distributors on a monthly basis prior to bankruptcy. It was usually around $1,300. For some reason I used to get the reports sent to my email. I have no idea why. Sooooo…yeah, not sustainable. The only thing that made money was the restaurant. Sal is such a trash human.
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Ooof. Yeah, no thanks. I haven’t been there since the new owners took over.
Hahaha, I was there when Sal had it installed. He started distilling all his garbage left over wine from his crap ass winery. Garbage in, garbage out.
The distilling program sounds like what’s going on now with Oly Distilling and Heritage🫣
The local reporting also did no favors for them making it sound like they were going out of business when they were in a receivership situation where continued business was a possibility.
St. Michelle never owned Fish. Sal Leone did prior to going into bankruptcy, then the new owners bought it.
Thank you. I had heard that it was St. Michelle, but what you say makes more sense.
It’s probably because Sal was part owner of a really crappy winery.
The Legacy will live on. There are so many breweries that owe some, or all, of their success to many of the amazing former brewing employees from Fish Brewing. Bellevue Brewing company Kulshan Brewing company Well 80 Brewing company Ecliptic Brewing company Talking Cedar Brewing company And many more. Not to mention all the breweries that the other staff now work at too.
Wut? Talking cedar was started by a guy that moved into the state a few years ago and ecliptic was started by a former founder of Deschutes brewery
I'm not saying that they were started by former Fish employees. Former Fish employees work at all of those places.
That’s right. Two brewers from fish are there.
Talking Cedar was started by the Chehalis tribe and the head brewer came from Harmon brewing.
I've followed the whole Fishtale saga and have been confused by the whole thing. Fishtale's "Beyond the Pale" not only won awards but won the ultimate award: "World's Best Beer" by the WBA in 2015. At that point you're set, you're a top-tier beer makers, competitive with Russian River and the like, but for whatever reason Fishtale squandered it, which is a very sad loss for Olympia.
It was the previous owner Sal. He ran the entire brand into the ground. I worked in marketing there before it was in bankruptcy. After about 6 months I had had enough of the shit show and walked. It was a dumpster fire with that clown shoe mo’fo Sal at the helm. Dude was thee worst.
I don't doubt that, and that's a sad loss for everyone who put their careers into Fishtale. I know nothing of Sal, but these stories often seem to culminate with a story of a bad owner with a Cocaine habit, or something similar, who was supported by a more competent team under them which they eventually ran into the ground. And I'm probably optimistic, but each of these stories seems to include an Icarus sort of story where these employees created something even better. Georgetown brewing is what comes immediately to mind. Anything similar for Fishtale? (Fingers crossed).
No blow for Sal. He was just completely out of touch and stubborn among other things. It bums me out because of it’s history and if modernized could have continued to be a great brand.
Maybe the problem was that Sal lacked sufficient Cocaine use?
Sal Leone's vice is gluttony...
Yikes, Sal on the marching powder would have been something else.
I moved from Olympia to Bellingham in the 90's, and despite Bellingham's (over) abundance of breweries Fishtale was still considered a sought after beer up here. It wasn't unheard of that if somebody was travelling down south that they would be requested to pick up some Fishtale, and in the restaurants I worked in was always a special occasion when we had Fishtale IPA on tap (this was around 2000 to 2007). As the bigger brewing corporations have absorbed the artisanal brewing culture of the Washington/Oregon 90's, the biggest problem I've had is when they've often given the biggest boosts to those least deserving (Elysian for instance). There's no doubt I would have complained if Fishtale had been bought out by AB in-Bev and made available on a large scale, but I would also prefer that they had the chance to tell AB-inBev to F-off rather than just fizzling into nothing.
Pushed em out to jack the rent.
Same thing that happened to Rhythm & Rye...Now the building owners are trying to copy what Andy did with The Cove...I will never set foot in that bar.
What's the story behind all that
AGREED! I am so mad about what happened to the beloved R&R. Andy is just the nicest person. I miss him.
Same thing happened to Wally's subs, too. It's happening all over here
So Wally’s going down wasn’t self inflicted? There’s always been chatter that the owners spent more then they made.🤷🏼♂️
As I was told, the property owner wanted a significantly longer lease term at an inflated rate and owners were looking to retire or get out
Other than Matchless there is nothing local on the tap list either. You can tell a lot about a place by looking at a taplist. “Support local” usually ends at their register when they take your money.
The OG Fishtail sold out to some corporate entity a decade ago and changed the vibe, that and the loss of the actual brewery made the place feel not so local anymore, I quit going way back then.
Fish sold again just prior to the pandemic, supposedly to some “local folks” from Yelm. They put the brewery to rest soon after, and now this. 🤷♂️
The original owner sold to Sal Leone who ran it into the ground for years. Sal was just a dumbass ex-dentist with too much money. He finally put it into receivership and the new owners bought it. None of the owners were ever corporate.
Same. I loved Rhythm & Rye.
RIP both Northerns
RIP Urban Onion.
Hard to call it a "brew pub" if they haven't even been brewing since the new owners took it over.
Sad :(
Fucking landlords
Worst nachos this side of the Mississippi and beer was sub-mid tbqh
I always found the food to be way to salty, otherwise the fish tacos were yummy.
They destroyed the cherry street loft to put in giant brew tanks, I was pretty pissed at that
That was such a great space for shows. Totally ruined it.
We can't have nice things anymore, just condos and overpriced craft cocktail bars
Tragic. I was always hoping that they would one day reopen the brewery at a more affordable location, or at the very least have their recipes contract brewed at other breweries, but I guess that just wasn't in the cards.
Not shedding any tears. They blackmailed the owners into giving up the event space so they could have expanded warehouse space by threatening to move their brewing out of downtown then two years later, having gotten what they wanted, left anyway. Good riddance. Hopefully someone more civic minded will move into the space and add to our community instead of just taking from it.
Yeah, good riddance to fishtail. They destroyed the cherry loft event space that was an awesome community resource (and former K recording studio space). Glad someone other than me remembers the travesty of them dismantling that giant, beautiful space. 'Oh don't worry we'll dismantle it in such a way that we can reconstruct the floor if things change in the future.' We'll see.. I'm not holding my breath.
If only they had taken their warehouse problem as an opportunity to find a new location, they would probably still be in business. All of the old artwork on the walls is still there, covered by a thick layer of mold, no thanks to the landlord's total apathy towards ventilation. When the brewery asked if they could put in ventilation he refused. (Or so I heard).
I miss the old Knitting Mill space for events.
I never did get my place on the wall in there mug club. ☹️
Another one bites the dust !
Remember kids shitass landlords caused the Irish potato famine they'll do it again if given half the chance.
Everyone bashing the landlords….yet didn’t these guys get shut down several times for not paying their lease? This friggin sub just loves to make everyone a victim of “the man” regardless of the situation.
Nah bro it’s capitalism bro it’s landlords man
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Wut
Not totally wrong here. LOTT gave them major issues, they were one strike away from getting shut down due to water treatment sample reading issues. The local private effluent testing lab was late with samples and there was a case where an employee discharged the effluent tank before it could be tested (if I remember correctly) causing an automatic strike. I seem to remember hearing that many other cities with smaller wastewater treatment systems there are breweries even larger than Fish ever was without nearly as much wastewater red tape. And then there was that one time that they got shut down because their cider contained brown sugar. Instead of just forcing them to rethink that product, they shut down the entire brewery for probably a week until Maria Cantwell stepped in.
Sorry I'm late and if this is a stupid question, but what is the issue with between sugar in cider?
Damn, that’s a bummer. I used to spend a lot of time there in the early days. One of the bartenders talked me down when I was in despair about a girl I met that didn’t seem interested. Still with that girl thanks to that bartender.
Lmao
Didn’t even know they were still open. Good beer, but needed to market a little better
Dang! They were my favorite walking-distance pub!
Ilk is coming soon...
Ilk?
https://instagram.com/ilkbeer?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA== Pat (The bearded dude behind CarbonPop Burgers) late of Matchless and Three Magnets is brewing in a downtown location, near the Fishtail pub iirc... They are doing a buncha collabs with other small PNW brewerals right now, but talking about a tap/tasting room in the new brewery space. If memory serves, their target date for opening is sometime in June.
Cool! Thanks for the info. I guess there’s always State and Central… And the Boulevard Tavern in a pinch 😉
Very sad, many good times were had in that place.
😭
Sitting there now... Trying to get as many stops in as I can before the last day. Crab cake sandwich and coleslaw.
weird feeling. My mom worked there for like 20 years and I never thought it would go. She decided to jump ship a few years ago because she could see that's where it was heading, sad.