Local entrepreneurs look to bring microbrewery to downtown Princeton

The local entrepreneurial team of Michael Grieve, Trevin Kennedy and Justin Stange met with the Princeton Planning Commission Tuesday and discussed the possibility of bringing a microbrewery to their building located at 430 S. Main St. in Princeton.

“We’ve started doing a little bit of construction, but not a whole lot,” Grieve said. “We have the plans of hopefully bringing something pretty exciting to downtown.”

The location, currently housing retail space, plans to be transformed into a microbrewery completed with a roughly 1,600 square-foot taproom for customers and nearly 500 square feet of brewing space that plans to be partitioned off but visible to customers.

The group’s brewing setup plans to be made of three 120-gallon tanks that will brew in nine-hour cycles. The location hopes to offer a variety of 12 beers at a time.

No food currently plans to be offered at the location, however the group indicated to the commission that they will explore the possibility of working with nearby restaurants, like Oriental Gardens and Downtown Pub & Grill, to offer customers a way of also grabbing a bite to eat.

Current plans for the location estimate to employ somewhere between 5 and 10 employees and be open six days a week from noon to 8 p.m. on weekdays and open until midnight on weekends.

The group added that they plan to have a variety of seating options from bar to table seating and stated the building’s layout will be similar to that of Spoons Restaurant and Bar.

Barring any setbacks, the group would like to open for business beginning in June, around the same time as Princeton’s Summer Concert Series.

No official decision on the microbrewery has been made at this time as more research is currently needed by city officials.

After hearing the group’s plans, Princeton’s Planning Commission will explore the city’s zoning in the area, determine if any changes will need to be made and add the topic to the commission’s next agenda.

The next regularly scheduled commission meeting will take place at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 14 and City Hall, 2 S. Main St.