Prost Brewing will package beer in growlers, sell to liquor stores

Mile High Wine Facebook page

Prost Brewing became one of the first -- if not the first -- Colorado brewer to package its beer in growlers for sale at local liquor stores. The German-style brewery, which won't open its own doors until later this month, packaged 48 growlers with shrink wrap and delivered them to Mile High Wine & Sprits, where they sold out in two days. "If it were me and I owned a liquor store, it would be such a smart thing to put out a growler-of-the day selection," says Prost head brewer Bill Eye, who ticked off the names of more than a dozen local breweries.

"It seems to me that if you could get just two or three of those to give you some growlers every day, it would be genius," he adds.

Breweries are only allowed to fill growlers where their beer is made, but with the proper packaging, they can sell them to liquor stores who can, in turn, sell to consumers.

One of the problems with growlers is that beer filled from a tap line at a brewery often goes flat in growlers within a few days, especially once it has been opened. Prost is getting around this by using a special machine that sanitizes and pressurizes the growlers as they are being filled from kegs rather than from tap lines.

See Also
--Five growler-free ways to get fresh Colorado craft beer to go
--Prost Brewing sets an opening date in August
--TRVE Brewing: 100 people line up to join new brewery's growler club

Prost doesn't plan to bottle or can its beers at the moment, and Eye says this is likely the only packaging the brewery will do. "Mile High was the most interested, but we have been speaking with a few liquor stores around town. We have to wait to see how the tasting room does, though, before we know how much extra beer we'll have."

Mile High, which is in Lakewood, sold all of the 64-ounce growlers of Prost's Weissbier for $12.99 (with no deposit like most breweries charge); afterward, Prost delivered a second, smaller batch of 36 growlers so the store would have some to sell this week.

Prost's beer is also on tap at a few restaurants around town; the LoHi brewery plans to open its doors and its biergarten on August 23.

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