San Antonio's Weathered Souls Brewing Co. shutting down

Weathered Souls Brewing Co., the San Antonio craft brewer known for its Black Is Beautiful social-justice campaign, is shutting down.

In a Thursday Facebook post , Weathered Souls thanked the community for its support and trumpeted achievements that supporters helped it attain during eight years in operation. The business' last day will be Sept. 22, according to the message.

The announcement comes days after another of the city's highest-profile brewers, Alamo Beer Co., put itself up for sale and said it's also looking to restructure its business. Earlier this year, San Antonio's award-winning Second Pitch Beer Co. also shut its doors, joining a list of other craft-beer producers that have tapped out due to tough operating conditions.

Weathered Souls gave no reason for the closure in the Facebook post. However, in a statement to the Express-News , they blamed "financial pressures," including higher ingredient costs and a decline in consumers' alcohol consumption.

The company also struggled in the wake of its 2022 expansion into the Charlotte, North Carolina, market, majority stakeholder Mike Holt told multiple news outlets earlier this year. At the time, Holt said he was seeking someone to buy his share in the partnership.

Weathered Souls' tasting room, located at 606 Embassy Oaks, became a destination for Alamo City craft-beer enthusiasts thanks to its creative spins on classic beer styles, especially darker ales such as porters and stouts. The venture also made inroads with area restaurants and got its products onto retail shelves.

The brewery gained an even higher profile in 2020, when co-founder Marcus Baskerville launched an in initiative called Black Is Beautiful. The program encouraged other beer producers to adapt one of the company's recipes and donate money raised from the resulting brew to fight for racial justice.

Weathered Souls launched the campaign in response to the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. More than 1,300 breweries across the globe took part, Baskerville told the Current in 2021 . At that time, the initiative had raised more than $3 million for social-justice organizations.

“The diversity, equity and inclusion movement, social-justice aspect wasn’t anything I ever expected for myself,” Baskerville told the Current at the time. “Through Black Is Beautiful, I came to the realization that helping people of color, women and minorities in the industry is my purpose. It’s why I’m here. And I need to get to back to work.”

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