USA, PA: The Sly Fox Brewing Company moves to Pottstown

The Sly Fox Brewing Company has recently moved its operations to a much larger facility in the Circle of Progress in Pottstown, Pottsmerc.com reported on February, 26.

Over the past few weeks the massive tanks, bottling and canning lines needed for the brewing and packaging processes have been trucked in and hoisted into place. Some of that machinery is being moved from Sly Fox’s former production brewery location built in Royersford in 2004, but much of it is new.

By next week, according to managing partners John and Peter Giannopoulos, the state-of-the-art 50-hectoliter (47 beer barrel), highly automated brewhouse will be operational. Sly Fox’s products — including Phoenix Pale Ale, Rt. 113 IPA and Pikeland Pils — will be made in Pottstown.

“Slowly but surely, we’ve been installing our equipment,” John Giannopoulos said. “We’re hoping to be test-brewing by the end of February.”

Giannopoulos noted that test brewing, which entails heating water and sending it through the brewing process, doesn’t take long. Which means Sly Fox will be brewing for real in Pottstown by the end of this month, if all goes well. The company has already stopped brewing in Royersford. That location has been sold and is being operated as Lucky Lab Tavern by a former Sly Fox employee.

The canning line that was first installed at the Royersford location in 2006 will be sold and recycled by another brewery. “We need a bit bigger canning line here,” said Peter Giannopoulos.

Sly Fox is also going through the borough’s approval process to get an on-site tasting room open to the public — something Giannopoulos is hopeful can be accomplished in the spring.

29 February, 2012