A Low-Alcohol Beer Maker Takes Over for South Park’s Burdick Brewery

After less than a year of operating its South Park taproom, Burdick Brewery shuttered that space in February and sold it to a new low-alcohol beer operation called Seattle-Lite Brewing Company. The replacement brewery is set to open Friday, May 4 at 3 p.m.

“A lot of things changed in life,” Burdick owner Max Leinbach told Eater. “Getting married, moving an hour out of the city — I needed a change and selling the taproom was the best personal move for me.” Burdick will instead release only specialty bottled beers, a few times a year, in select bottle shops around town. Leinbach doesn’t have details on where those beers will be available just yet; fans should keep an eye on Burdick’s Facebook page for future updates.

The new brewery, Seattle-Lite, will specialize in low-alcohol, “session” beers, as its punny name indicates. It’s owned by business partners Dan Martinez and Seiky Huerta, according to Northwest Brewing News, who are making a light lager, session IPA, and a pale ale to start. The taproom will be an all-ages space, and they hope to bring in food trucks, which was also part of the plan for Burdick.

Leinbach opened his South Park taproom last July after moving out of his original brewery-taproom combo, also in South Park. Burdick and neighboring brewery Lowercase were forced to shutter their public spaces after code inspectors determined the spaces weren’t “up to snuff and would either need to be closed or upgraded with prohibitively expensive modifications.” Both breweries opted to continue brewing on site, each moving over into a new space within the same complex they had occupied. Lowercase is still brewing in the South Park spot but is pouring its beers at a new taproom in Georgetown, at 6235 Airport Way S.

• Burdick Brewery [Facebook]
• All Coverage of Burdick Brewery [ESEA]
• Seattle-Lite Brewing Company [Facebook]