An established local craft brewery has gone up for sale, maybe.
Farm League Brewing and the building hosting it at 295 Ainslie St. S. in Galt are listed on Realtor.ca as for sale.
The online listings put the building at a cost of $2.75 million and the business is set at $1.68 million. The building, the former Galt Knife Factory, is on the city's heritage registry but not designated.
When reached by phone, co-owner Collin McKinnon was taken aback by the listing calling it inaccurate and claimed their main investor was looking to refinance the building and was taking a look at a real estate option “out of curiosity” because nobody had done so since it was bought back in 2021.
“My investor’s comment exactly was just I think this is an overly zealous agent who wanted to get information for him that would maybe impress the owner but didn’t get the go ahead to actually go live with the listing whatsoever,” McKinnon said.
McKinnon said they were working to have the listing taken down but both remain up as of 5 p.m. Thursday.
Shawn Quilty, the listed sales agent for the building and business, confirmed the listings as accurate in a phone interview.
He explained the main investor, who isn’t one of the operators, is looking to divest and work on something else after growing Farm League Brewing.
“When an asset like this goes on sale, it can cause disruption with the employees and it’s an emotional thing for people,” Quilty said, adding he would take it down if he was directed to by his client. “The reality is the main investor feels like it’s a good time for them to work on another project.”
He said a potential buyer would need to purchase both the business and building, roughly costing $4.3 million.
McKinnon was adamant nothing was changing with the brewery.
“We just expanded two months ago and purchased 33 per cent more equipment in the building than we had before,” he said.