Lizard Tail Brewing is officially no more, having shut down all of their locations this past weekend, and now confirmed by owner/brewer Dan Berry.

We have mentioned in the past how hard it can be to find out the reasons why a brewery has closed, but Berry was gracious enough to sit down and chat Thursday morning while he was cleaning out the original Lizard Tail location at Eubank and Montgomery.

He apologized to longtime Lizard Tail patrons for how abruptly it all ended, with no time for a farewell party or anything like that. Berry simply said they had no choice after his attempts to find a buyer had come up empty.

“I know there were some people interested in buying, but that fell through,” he said. “Then we had some people interested in partnering, which I wasn’t sure I wanted to do that anyway. Unfortunately, I’m just kind of done with it. I enjoy brewing, the people and everything, but I’m ready to do something else. Go back to school or something.”

Lizard Tail came into existence back in August 2014, taking over the small space in a shopping center near the Dirty Bourbon and Pelican’s, one that was previously occupied by Bad Ass Brewing. It continued along in that small space, brewing in the back, serving in the front, for several years.

Then, in the midst of the pandemic, Lizard Tail surprised everyone when Berry took over the space previously occupied by Cantero Brewing (and Firkin Brewhouse before that). The location that became known as Lizard Tail Industrial had a full-size brewery, something Berry said back then he really wanted. In addition to that space, the brewery added a third location in Nob Hill, and even talked about more taprooms beyond that.

Unfortunately, it was too big of a bite for Lizard Tail.

“Industrial was kind of hit and miss,” Berry said. “Nob Hill and Heights always did well. That one spot (Industrial), we took on the equipment lease, and a lot of the COVID loans always hung over our heads. We never got out from under that. Over the course of a couple years that took its toll. We were never able to put money back into it. We were just limping along, I guess. We were, what would you call it, undercapitalized.”

While Berry said he was grateful for having done it, ultimately it became too much for him.

“I love making the beer, but the long hours, everything since COVID has been a struggle,” he said. “I’m worn the fuck out. I’ve been trying to do everything. Since we lost our brewer, John (Ruyak), a year-and-a-half ago, I had to pick that up. That’s a good 50 to 60 hours a week on top of managing things, doing the licensing. I’ve been feeling burned out. (But) I still love the business.”

The sudden end, which was first announced by the host of the Nob Hill open mic nights on Facebook, broke loose on social media over the past weekend. Lizard Tail confirmed it was over Saturday, shutting down at the end of business.

“There was a lot of disappointment,” Berry said of the reaction from the brewery’s regular customers. “They’re sad that we have to shut down. They were hoping we would work out a deal to keep it open. So that was mostly the positive (response). There was some negative stuff, but I want to let that go. There’s a lot of negative going around.”

Now it is just a matter of emptying out the spaces so that in the future, they can be utilized as something else. Perhaps another brewery will take a taproom, or maybe even the Industrial location will be under a fourth different banner.

“I’m just basically cleaning all the places, letting the landlords know we’re out, giving the keys back,” Berry said. “Financially, I’m not in a position to pay out the leases or anything like that. We’re leaving the landlords hanging. At Industrial, all that equipment, we haven’t paid off the equipment, so we still owe some money on that. They’ll get a good deal. That all goes back to (the landlord) as per the purchasing agreement. We basically just gave them a couple hundred thousand dollars, so they’ll get all the equipment back, plus what we put in. A couple of new 10-barrel fermenters, a new 10-barrel brite tank.”

In many of our past interviews, Berry had been quite honest about the difficulties of running a brewery with multiple taprooms. There had been some hope from our last Look Back/Look Ahead Series interview, but he said shortly thereafter, that optimism was crushed by reality.

“I know at the beginning of the year we did an interview and I was positive about things, but then right away it started going south,” Berry said. “It was the same old shit. I’ve been trying to get rid of it since about February, putting the feelers out, seeing if someone could take over. Or, partner and learn the ropes and then I could (eventually) walk away, go back to school, get another job.”

Berry came into brewing from the engineering world, but he said he has no plans to go back to that. Instead, he might aim for a new degree and a new career path going forward, though there could be a slight influence lingering from his brewing days.

“I’m looking at going and getting my PhD in ecology,” he said. “I’ve had some crazy ideas with yeast over the years.”

In the end, Berry did not have a particular moment that stood out to him as the best in Lizard Tail’s decade-long run, but that ultimately he will take the good mixed in with the tougher lessons learned in that span.

“Definitely the people, the people in brewing” was the best part, he said. “I met a lot of really good people, made some really good friends, learned a lot. I didn’t know anything about owning a business. I don’t know if I really wanted to. Trying to juggle that is a brutal thing.”

A big, big thanks to Dan for being willing to sit down and talk to us. It always pays to have a little more insight into the end of breweries, not just the beginning. We can only wish him, and all of his employees, the best of luck in the future. To all the Lizard Tail regulars, we hope you find new homes-away-from-home at one of the many other breweries in town.

For the rest of us, all we can do is to keep supporting our favorite places and helping them through these tough economic times. So, as always …

Keep supporting local!

— Stoutmeister