2019 continues as the unfortunate year that many Florida craft breweries have announced their closure.
Pair O Dice Brewing, Clearwater’s first craft brewery posted a letter dated December 27th announcing the brewery’s closure and the reasons for it.
From Pair O Dice Brewing:
Dear Pair O’ Dice Family, Friends, and Fans,
After 6 years of business Ken and I have made the painful decision to close Pair O’ Dice Brewing. We will keep the taproom open through Sunday, December 29th and welcome you all to share one last beer with us this weekend. For our High Rollers Club members please be sure to come by to pick up your mug.
What we built nearly 7 years ago now was a dream based on the breweries we fell in love with in California. It was perfect for distribution, which was our focus, and served well as a tap room for the first few years. In 2016 all that changed. Breweries became bars and the rate of brewery openings in Tampa Bay became greater than the rate of consumer adoption of craft beer. Our location became a huge hindrance at that point and, as agile as we tried to be, that was the one thing we could not change. The construction on 118th Ave N has naturally made it worse. We have always been a bootstrapped brewery and we believed that if we were resourceful enough, efficient enough, smart enough we would overcome that. Today we must admit that we have run out of resources and it’s time to move on.
We put everything we had into this business and, while we must rebuild, we are looking forward to a less stressful life. This business has made us who we are today and we would not change that for the world. We are wiser, more resilient, and Ken and I’s relationship has never been stronger, something we are especially grateful for.
Thank you to our friends and family for believing in us as well as our amazing staff. We have one of the best teams in the industry and any brewery would be lucky to have them. We cannot recommend Kyle, Bryan, Justin, and Andy enough. Their hard work and dedication kept us going on many difficult days.
Lastly, thank you for your love and support all these years. We will miss sitting down on a Friday night and sharing a beer with so many of you. Our greatest sadness comes from knowing so many of you met, built friendships, and even got married at Pair O’ Dice Brewing. We enjoyed being a part of your lives and we hope to be able to continue that on the other side of the bar.
Here’s to 6 years of Pair O’ Dice beer.
Cheers,
Julia and Ken Rosenthal
About Pair O Dice Brewing
Pair O’ Dice Brewing was founded in 2013 as Clearwater’s first production microbrewery. In that time, husband and wife team, Ken and Julia Rosenthal, have won six Best Florida Beer Championship medals. The key to their success — outside of meticulous brewing practices — is taking advantage of Florida’s native flora. Their Lucky Lucy Strawberry Blonde, is brewed with Plant City strawberries and the Clearwater Honey Cream is brewed with Florida orange blossom honey and orange peel. Their love of hops has led them to craft several award winning IPAs as well. You’ll find a little bit of everything at Pair O’ Dice so come out and #GetAPair.