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It survived the Depression, the Recession, Prohibition, pandemics and both world wars, but in the end F.H. Steinbart Co. was taken down by the world of online retail.
F.H. Steinbart Co., considered the country’s longest-running homebrew supply store, will close after more than a century in business. In a December newsletter, the company announced it would discount its inventory by 50% through December before closing its doors for good.
“It’s really been the perfect storm of challenges for small, independent homebrew shops like ours,” said James Ameeti in an interview with KGW this week. Ameeti is the founder of beer and liquor dispensing company Perfect Pour Services, which bought F.H. Steinbart. “Our main suppliers, the Amazons of our industry, now sell directly to the same customers we depend on. When the companies you buy from can undercut you online, it becomes incredibly difficult to compete.”
First opened in 1918 (the year World War I ended), F. H. Steinbart Co. opened its doors to sell homebrewing supplies and equipment for what would come to be generations of Pacific Northwest brewers. Despite opening the year that national laws prohibiting alcohol went into effect, F. H. Steinbart survived the times by selling its ingredients and equipment in separate pieces, which ostensibly could be used for soda, fruit juice and malted beverages. It also sold nonalcoholic, or “near,” beer and worked with wineries operating under religious exemptions.
When namesake Franz Steinbart died in 1934, employee Joseph DeBenedetti bought the business along with his cousin. His son John DeBenedetti took over when Joseph died in 1975. John DeBenedetti died in 2021 and his widow, Mary Kay, took over, but she sold the company to Pour Perfect in August.
Brewing beer remained heavily regulated even after Prohibition. That changed in 1978, when President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that exempted hobbyists and businesses from paying an excise tax on small quantities of beer. The craft brewing industry bubbled up soon after, with Oregon upstarts like the Widmer and McMenamin brothers turning the hobby into big business.
“Being the oldest homebrew supply store in the United States has been an honor made possible only by your loyalty, your passion for craft beverage making, and your support across generations,” reads the company newsletter announcing the closure. “We are deeply grateful to everyone who has walked through our doors, asked questions, shared a homebrew, and helped keep this historic place alive.”
