Ale Asylum’s flagship Hopalicious pale ale is back from the dead, eight months after the Wisconsin brewery closed its doors, thanks to another Madison brewery.
Karben4 Brewing co-owners and brothers Ryan and Zak Koga have acquired the IP of Ale Asylum’s beers and recipes and will be putting fan favorites back on the shelf this month, beginning with Hopalicious (5.7% ABV).
Ale Asylum permanently closed in July 2022 after a sale of the brewery fell through. The 16-year-old brewery – the 12th largest brewery in Wisconsin, according to production estimates from the Brewers Association (BA) – had announced a planned acquisition by a group of buyers in October 2021. But after “months of diligence,” the “acquiring party was simply unable to attain the financing necessary” to complete the sale, co-founder and VP Otto Dilba told Brewbound in July.
The Koga brothers now wholly own the rights to the Ale Asylum brand and will keep it alive through some of its iconic beers, which will be brewed at Karben4’s Madison facility – the same facility where Ale Asylum first brewed when the company was founded in 2006. Some of Ale Asylum’s former staff members also work at Karben4, including one of the original brewers of Hopalicious, returning the flagship to familiar hands.
Financial details of the acquisition were not shared. Ale Asylum’s brewery was not acquired and will not reopen.
“Ryan and I are just really sincere people and are going to do our real honest best to honor these brands and the recipes and get it back in front of our community here,” Zak Koga told Brewbound. “The brewery started here and grew, and we’re bringing it back home. We’re really trying to be good stewards of the brand.”
Hopalicious is the first of what will become a “greatest hits album” of Ale Asylum beers returning to shelves, Koga said. While Karben4 is still narrowing down what beers will come out next, Koga said Oktillion, the brand’s 6% ABV Oktoberfest offering, is at the top of the list. Hopalicious will make its way throughout Wisconsin throughout March. The “ultimate goal” is to have all of Karben4’s Ale Asylum offerings distributed “everywhere Karben4 is currently sold,” according to a press release.
“We’ve set ourselves up to do it the right way, to not put a bunch of pressure on it and make sure that we’re bringing it back the right way,” Koga said. “We’re focused on the quality of the beer, getting it back in front of the customers and the fans, and then we’ll make it as much as they pull.
“We don’t want to just go stack this up all over the place, we want to make sure it’s being welcomed back into the beer fridges,” he continued.
Ale Asylum produced an estimated 22,734 barrels at its peak in 2015, according to the BA. After several years of declines, the brewery ended 2021 at 9,007 barrels, a -40% decrease versus 2020.
Karben4 produced 9,358 barrels in 2021, a -12% decrease year-over-year. The brewery recently doubled its canning line capacity and plans to double its brewhouse capacity by mid 2023, according to the release. With the expansion, Karben4 has the ability to produce about 5,000 barrels of additional beer offerings without “making some big changes,” and the plan is to have Ale Asylum brands make up “a big chunk of that,” Koga said.
“We have some other contract opportunities we brought in over the last six months, so we’ll see how it all works together,” Koga said.
Karben4 began producing other brands as a way to compact softer volume from a slowed on-premise recovery, Koga said. The brewery now makes non-alcoholic offerings, including Wisco Pop craft soda. Karben4 is also exploring adding a cannabis offering to the mix, as well as other non-alcoholic brands.
“I don’t think we set out to be brand buyers, but we also aren’t afraid of it necessarily. It’s just got to be the right opportunities.” Koga said. “I’m excited to see what we figure out over this year and next year, and how we evolve, and what that means for our brewery and our facility.
“I’m also not out there like some venture capitalist trying to gobble things up,” he continued. “We’re letting things come to us and keeping our eyes open.”
Karben4 will celebrate the return of Hopalicious with a “Hopalicious Comes Home” event at its Madison taproom on March 22. Details on the event, as well as a raffle to win “free Hopalicious for a year,” are available here.