You’ve been hearing about these guys for a long time, haven’t you? The plans first hit the wide public back in 2017 which means that this city has had more than enough time to built a little bit of hype, and a lot of curiousity, as well. The Grand Opening is sceduled, and we’ll get to that – but I feel the need to give you a little birds eye view of what they’re all about, first.

The Funding Phase

Something that we don’t often talk about here when a brewery is in planning is how you get from that idea to a working brewery. The process certainly isn’t easy and It’s most definitely not cheap. The fundraising phase is a real hurdle for a lot of folks, and it’s not as easy to get the money together as it might have been 5 years ago. A project that’s looking to come together today has to separate themselves in a very different way than they might have needed to before.

Esoteric used a really unique method to raise a large chunk of their funding, turning to a crowdfunding platform called Wunderfund that enables supporters to not only help bring a project to life but to actually get themselves a piece of ownership in the process. It was a brand new idea when they kicked it into gear, and has ended up creating a space that people can be proud of, and feel that they helped create – because they did.

What To Expect

The name Esoteric might seem a little far fetched when you first hear it. How do you create a brewery that is different than what everyone expects when you have been to so many of them? I mean, here in Cincinnati we’ve got plenty of breweries (here’s the full list of how many we have) and the variety of different taproom experiences are at an all-time high. Esoteric spent a lot of time trying to take the things they liked, and remove the things they didn’t from each one of those experiences and to build it into something that you’ve never had before.

The taproom is around 6,000 square feet and feels like a space that has been here forever. They’re calling it an Art Deco Speakeasy vibe – but whatever you label it as, it’s very “Cincinnati”, and fits into the beautiful building perfectly. The focus of the experience is about the beer, and about the people you are with. You won’t find tvs here, instead forcing you to lean into conversation and each other.

You’ll start to get a better picture of who they are as they continue to grow, but the most important part of what this is all about comes down to one thing – social change. The brewery doesn’t just want to drop themselves into a community, they want to use their influence to change the fabric of that community and make it better along the journey.

The Grand Opening

Here’s the most important part. They’re opening! The official date is September 4th, which is this weekend. 1 pm on Friday they open their doors to show off what they’ve created. They’re rolling through some special soft openings during the week before that hits, so you’ll likely see plenty of them on your social media account.