New Belgium considers Asheville, North Carolina, for new brewery

Over the past two decades, New Belgium Brewing has helped to make Fort Collins into one of the most well-known small beer cities in America. Now New Belgium could solidify the reputation of another small beer city by creating a second brewery there. The company confirmed to the Fort Collins...

By Jonathan Shikes

September 26, 2011

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Over the past two decades, New Belgium Brewing has helped to make Fort Collins into one of the most well-known small beer cities in America. Now New Belgium could solidify the reputation of another small beer city by creating a second brewery there. The company confirmed to the Fort Collins Coloradoan over the weekend that Asheville, North Carolina, is one of four East Coast cities where it is looking to build.

New Belgium spokesman Bryan Simpson had declined to give specifics about its search as recently as Friday (to Westword) and as publicly as on Twitter, when the brewery wrote on September 7, "Rumor police! NBB is looking to build a facility somewhere on the east coast but the site has not yet been decided on. #avlbeer." The hashtag "#avlbeer" is a common one used by people tweeting about Asheville breweries.

But the Asheville City Council began talking about the issue late last week in relation to whether or not it would offer the company tax incentives to move there. "We have an opportunity with the New Belgium brewery," Davis was quoted by the Ashville Mountain Xpress as saying. "We're going to have to make a decision on that, whether to help the brewery with incentives or encourage them to be here because of the quality of life."

Simpson has said the brewery will make a decision by the end of this year.

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