Image: Hightower

Beer tourism is alive and well. What is beer tourism? It’s traveling, sightseeing and sampling primarily (or solely) for the purpose of trying new beers.

Naturally, included in beer tourism is the ever-popular brewery tour. Consumers and fans can actually tour the facilities and see the brewing process at close range. Tours also provide the opportunity to interact with the brewers themselves—often leading the tours.

Rahr & Sons (Fort Worth)

Unfortunately, if you want to visit a craft brewery local to the Dallas area, you will have to drive a bit. Rahr & Sons Brewery is by far the most popular brewery tour in Texas, judging by the crowds. Any given Saturday can draw between 400 and 600 people no matter the weather, and it has more of a festival atmosphere at times.

Rahr & Sons tours are every Saturday (only closed once in the five years they’ve been open) from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. The cost is $5, a portion of which goes to a local charity, and the price includes a souvenir glass and three drink tokens. Usually, a band is playing and an outside vendor is selling barbecue, and they have a gift shop on-site for tee-shirts and such.

Franconia (McKinney)

The Franconia Brewery tours are much more reserved than the crowds at Rahr & Sons, usually just a handful of people. The brewhouse facilities and equipment are newer, the unique design of the owner and brewer, Dennis Wehrmann, who often also leads the tour.

Franconia tours are every Saturday at 11 a.m., and the $5 cost also includes beer samples. Because the tour groups are much smaller, they provide a greater face-to-face interaction with the brewers for questions, demonstrations and direct conversation. Private tours can also be arranged for groups of 20 or more.

Local brewpubs

Brewpubs usually do not offer much in the way of formal tours, and even then a “tour” may consist of a single room with equipment plainly visible through glass windows. But for the curious, they can provide a closer and sometimes personal look at a commercial brewery on a very small scale.

Recommended brewpubs for sightseeing are The Covey Restaurant & Brewery (Fort Worth), Uncle Buck’s Brewery & Steakhouse (Grapevine), Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant (Plano) and Humperdink’s (Arlington, Northwest Highway). Be advised that BJ’s Restaurant & Brewery locations as well as a couple of the Humperdink’s do not brew on-site, so there may not be any brewery staff or tours available.

Of course, all brewpub tours are wholly at the discretion of the respective brewers and owners, but most are happy to accommodate the truly curious and well-behaved.

Cheers!
paul@scientist.com