Back in 2010, if you wanted a decent beer in Brooklyn, you had to work for it. The borough wasn’t yet the craft mecca it is today—it was more like a handful of bright spots scattered across a map of dive bars and bodegas. Brooklyn Brewery and Sixpoint were the anchors, sure, but the idea of a walkable, brewery-hopping afternoon? That was a pipe dream. Now, fourteen years later, you can’t swing a growler without hitting a taproom. Some of what’s happened is genuinely exciting. Some of it makes me want to order a whiskey and call it a night. Let’s take a long, unsentimental look at what’s changed.
The Early 2010s: A Handful of Pioneers
In 2010, Brooklyn’s brewing identity was basically a two-horse town: Brooklyn Brewery and Sixpoint. Brooklyn Brewery, founded way back in ’88, was already shipping its lager and Pennant Ale nationwide, but its Williamsburg tasting room felt more like a field trip destination than a neighborhood joint. Sixpoint was the scrappy one, canning Sweet Action and Bengali Tiger out of a Red Hook warehouse that didn’t even have a public taproom for years. If you wanted something off the beaten path, you had to hunt. Maybe you’d catch a Kelso keg at a dive in Clinton Hill, or stumble into a homebrew club meetup in some Gowanus loft. The scene was tiny, a little insular, and honestly kind of snobby—but in a charming, DIY, we’re-all-in-this-together way.
The beer itself was simpler then. West Coast IPAs were king: all pine, grapefruit pith, and bracing bitterness. Sours were a rumor, hazy beers didn’t exist, and if you said “pastry stout,” people would assume you meant a Guinness float. The whole game was about clean ferments and nailing classic styles. I remember sitting in a Bushwick dive in 2011, nursing a Sixpoint Righteous Ale, thinking, “This is the peak. It doesn’t get better.” I was wrong, obviously. But I wasn’t completely right, either.
The Boom: 2014–2018
Then the floodgates opened. Between 2014 and 2018, Brooklyn’s brewery count tripled. Threes Brewing landed in Gowanus in 2014 with a big backyard, a kitchen doing fancy toast, and a community-center vibe that felt almost too nice. Other Half Brewing opened in Carroll Gardens the same year, and within months, its hazy IPAs had people lining up like it was a sneaker drop. Grimm Artisanal Ales, which had been bouncing around as nomads, finally put down roots in East Williamsburg in 2018. Interboro Spirits and Ales, Kings County Brewers Collective (KCBC), Greenpoint Beer & Ale Co.—the list grew faster than a yeast starter on a stir plate.
This was the golden age of weirdness. Other Half turned haze into a full-blown religion, dropping double dry-hopped, lactose-laden DIPAs every Saturday that people traded like baseball cards. Grimm perfected the sour IPA, a style that had no business working but somehow did. Threes brewed Vliet, a lager so crisp and mineral-driven it made me rethink every pilsner I’d ever had. The energy was electric. You could bike from Gowanus to Greenpoint on a Saturday, hit five breweries, and taste thirty beers that all tasted wildly different. It felt like a movement, not just a market.
The Haze Craze and Its Discontents
But that boom brought a narrowing. By 2019, it felt like every new brewery was chasing the same thing: the hazy, juicy, low-bitterness IPA. Tap lists turned into a wall of identical-looking beers with names like “Quantum Flux” and “Citra Dreamscape.” Look, I love a good hazy. Other Half’s All Citra Everything is a genuine masterpiece. But when every brewery is dumping oats and lactose into the mash and dry-hopping at four pounds per barrel, the style loses its spark. It becomes a monoculture, and monocultures are boring.
This shift had real casualties. Classic styles started vanishing. Try finding a well-made ESB or a true Baltic porter in Brooklyn today. You’ll have better luck spotting a peregrine falcon. Even flagship beers took hits. Sixpoint’s Sweet Action, once a beautifully balanced cream ale, got reformulated into something sweeter, thinner—a ghost of its former self. I asked a brewer about it not long ago, and he just shrugged. “Market demands,” he said. That phrase should make any beer lover’s stomach turn.
The Rise of the Taproom Experience
Another big shift: the taproom itself. In 2010, breweries were production spaces that sometimes tolerated visitors. You’d drink standing next to pallets of malt, and the bathroom was probably a Porta-Potty. Today, Brooklyn taprooms are destinations. Threes Brewing feels like a Scandinavian design studio crossed with a community center. Wild East Brewing, which opened in Gowanus in 2020, has a minimalist, almost gallery-like tasting room. Talea Beer Co., launched in 2021 as one of the city’s first women-owned breweries, leans into a bright, Instagram-friendly look with floral walls and pastel cans.
This evolution has made beer more welcoming. Families roll in with strollers. Dates happen over flights. The vibe is inclusive, not just a clubhouse for bearded dudes. That’s a real win. But the polish sometimes comes at the cost of soul. When a taproom feels like a WeWork with taps, I start missing the grime. I miss the smell of wet grain and the beep of a forklift backing up. Beer is an agricultural product, not a tech startup.
Diversity and Ownership: A Slow, Uneven Shift
Let’s talk about who’s actually making the beer. In 2010, Brooklyn brewing was overwhelmingly white and male. That’s changed, but not nearly enough. Talea is a bright spot, co-founded by LeAnn Darland and Tara Hankinson. BierWax in Prospect Heights, though not a brewery, is a vinyl-and-craft-beer haven owned by Chris Maestro, a Filipino-American who curates a tap list that regularly features underrepresented breweries. Harlem Brewing Company, while technically across the bridge, has deep Brooklyn ties and is Black-owned. Still, walk into most production breweries, and the ownership and brewing staff don’t reflect the borough’s demographics. The industry’s gatekeeping—capital requirements, distribution networks, even the language used to describe beer—remains a barrier. We’ve made progress, but calling it “good enough” would be a lie.
The Pandemic Pivot and Its Scars
COVID-19 hit Brooklyn breweries like a keg dropped from a third-floor walkup. Taprooms closed. Draft sales evaporated. Suddenly, the whole business model had to shift to cans and local delivery. Some breweries thrived—Other Half already had a solid canning line and a cult following that would order cases online. Others scrambled. Folksbier, a lovely little Carroll Gardens spot known for traditional German styles, shut down in 2021. Lineup Brewing in Sunset Park, one of the few woman- and Latina-owned breweries, closed the same year. The losses stung, not just because of the beer, but because they represented voices that were just starting to be heard.
The pandemic also accelerated a trend that was already bubbling up: the blurring of brewery and bar. With taprooms closed, many breweries started acting like bottle shops, selling other breweries’ cans alongside their own. Some even added cocktail programs. Now, post-pandemic, that hybrid model has stuck. It’s common to walk into a Brooklyn brewery and find a full bar, natural wine, and a menu of small plates that rivals a decent restaurant. It makes business sense—why not capture the customer who wants a gin and tonic?—but it dilutes the focus. When a brewery is also a bar, a restaurant, and a coffee shop, what exactly are they passionate about?
The Lager Revival: A Glimmer of Hope
Amid the haze and the hybrids, a counter-movement has been quietly building: the return of the lager. And thank the beer gods for it. Threes has always championed lagers, but now you’re seeing dedicated lager breweries emerge. Wild East focuses on mixed fermentation and lagers, brewing a Czech-style pilsner that tastes like a field of barley under a clear sky. Strong Rope Brewery, with locations in Gowanus and Red Hook, emphasizes New York State ingredients and makes a beautifully rustic helles. Even Other Half has a lager program now, though it’s often overshadowed by the IPA drops.
This lager revival feels like a return to sanity. Lagers are hard to brew—there’s nowhere to hide flaws—and they demand patience. A well-made decocted pilsner is a statement of skill, not just a hop delivery system. When I drink one, I’m reminded of what drew me to craft beer in the first place: the craft. Not the hype, not the can art, but the quiet mastery of fermentation.
The Distribution Dilemma
One of the biggest changes since 2010 is how Brooklyn beer reaches your glass. Back then, if you wanted a local beer, you went to the brewery or a handful of dedicated bars like Spuyten Duyvil or Bierkraft (RIP). Now, you can find Other Half cans in bodegas in Bed-Stuy. Grimm distributes to Whole Foods. The reach is impressive, but it’s come with a cost. Shelf space is a battlefield, and the pressure to produce constantly, to keep those cans fresh and those accounts happy, has pushed many breweries toward volume over experimentation. The result? A sea of same-y IPAs and fruited sours that are designed to move, not to challenge.
There’s also the self-distribution model, which some smaller breweries still cling to. It’s romantic—the brewer delivering kegs in a beat-up van—but it’s exhausting and limits growth. The middle ground, working with a distributor who actually cares about craft beer, is rare. Most distributors treat local brands as filler between Bud Light and Corona. The system is broken, and it’s squeezing the creativity out of Brooklyn’s smaller players.
What We’ve Lost, What We’ve Gained
So, where does that leave us? In 2024, Brooklyn’s brewing scene is bigger, more professional, and more diverse in its offerings—if you count hard seltzer and canned cocktails as offerings. It’s also more homogenized at the core. The wild, scruffy energy of 2010 has been replaced by a polished, market-driven machine. I mourn the loss of the weird one-offs, the beers that existed for a single keg at a single bar because a brewer got bored and threw brettanomyces into a stout. But I also celebrate the fact that I can walk into a brewery and see people of all backgrounds enjoying a beer, that I can drink a world-class lager without booking a flight to Bamberg.
The truth is, Brooklyn’s brewing scene hasn’t just changed—it’s matured, for better and worse. Maturity brings consistency, but it also brings caution. The next decade will tell us whether that caution was a phase or a permanent state. I’m hopeful, but I’m also watching closely. And I’m still chasing that perfect, surprising pint.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the oldest breweries still operating in Brooklyn?
Brooklyn Brewery, founded in 1988, is the granddaddy, though its production has largely moved upstate. Sixpoint, established in 2004, remains a Brooklyn-born brand with a taproom in Red Hook. Kelso of Brooklyn, started in 2006, is now brewed elsewhere but still holds a place in local history. These pioneers laid the groundwork, but the modern scene really ignited with the 2014 openings of Threes and Other Half.
Why are hazy IPAs so dominant in Brooklyn?
Hazy IPAs exploded because they’re approachable—less bitter, often fruitier, and visually striking. Other Half’s success proved the model, and consumers started equating haze with quality. Breweries followed the demand, but the style’s dominance has squeezed out variety. It’s a classic case of the market rewarding a trend until it becomes a crutch.
Are there any Brooklyn breweries focusing on traditional European styles?
Yes, though they’re fewer than I’d like. Wild East Brewing excels at Czech-style lagers and mixed-fermentation saisons. Strong Rope Brewery brews English milds, porters, and farmhouse ales with local ingredients. Threes Brewing consistently offers a clean, German-inspired lager. Seek these out if you’re tired of the haze parade.
How has the cost of Brooklyn beer changed since 2010?
In 2010, a pint of local craft beer at a bar cost around $5–$6. Today, expect to pay $8–$10, with specialty pours hitting $12 or more. Brewery taproom prices are slightly lower, but four-packs of cans often run $18–$24. Rising rents, ingredient costs, and the premiumization of craft beer have all driven prices up, making it harder for casual drinkers to explore.