CBF Archives

In Business First's weekly review of the top business news, we discuss the latest updates on the Crew's new Arena District stadium – and what the city is or isn't spending to support it, plus the closing of the historic downtown YMCA, a housing moratorium in one Central Ohio suburb, and how Graeter's averted a crisis shortage of its most popular flavor.

With fall weather now here, the News & Brews team finally cracked open some pumpkin beer. The divisive style peaked a few years ago and while it isn’t as prevalent as it once was (or as its coffee equivalent is), there are still a few to be had around town. We kicked it with Sideswipe Brewing’s Squashing Pumpkins, an ale that uses both squash and pumpkins in its recipe in addition to the tradi...

This week in our podcast The Wrap, we discuss a new hotel/Airbnb concept destined for the Short North, what the flying public thinks of John Glenn Columbus International Airport, a bunch of golf course news and how you can help choose the name of a new Blue Jackets/BrewDog beer. Check back weekly for our regular review of the week's top stories.

This week’s News & Brews got a taste of an old beer recipe from the area’s newest brewery. Gemut Biergarten opened late summer, serving up German- and European-inspired beers. We grabbed a crowler of its new Golem Czech-style pilsner, an easy drinking classic good in a cold mug under a hot sun or tapping toes to oom-pah music in the confines of a beer hall. Lord of the Rings, D&D, Jewish m...

This week on The Wrap we discuss Urban Meyer getting into the restaurant business, Polaris getting into the Food Hall movement, and Bold Penguin getting a whole lot of VC money.

After a run of autumnal seasonals, News & Brews tackled a different fall flavor this week — cider. With apple picking time upon us and stores stocked with cider (alcoholic and otherwise), we opened a four-pack of Columbus-based Mad Moon’s Eat a Peach. Dry, sweet, fruited or flavored, we talk personal preferences, interesting impressions and why craft cider is in comparatively short supply vers...

Business First’s weekly recap of business headlines is back. But now, The Wrap is available in easy-to-listen-to podcast form. This week, Editor Doug Buchanan, Assistant Managing Editor Eleanor Kennedy, reporter Dan Eaton and I discuss everything from a new apartment complex project in Clintonville and the Crew Stadium to Columbus Brewing Co.’s new taproom and a butcher shop’s promise of “meat for...

This week’s News & Brews sets up a seasonal face-off. The team samples a pair of local-made Oktoberfests — Norden Hoch from North High Brewing and Festbier by Columbus Brewing — and compares and contrasts the malty lagers. Which Columbus creation prevailed? Beyond the beer, we hoist some metaphorical steins to news from Columbus Brewing, which expects to open its taproom Sept. 18. In more tapr...

Central Ohio is home to more than 50 breweries, the vast majority of which opened in the last six years. But there are a few that have been in the business for decades — Columbus Brewing, Barley’s Brewing and Smokehouse Brewing, which is only a few years old under that brand, but once was part of Barley’s. Elevator Brewing Co. is part of that class as well, marking 20 years of business in 2019. Fo...

Forbidden Root won’t open at Easton Town Center for a few more months, but its beer already is here. For this week’s News & Brews, we cracked open a fresh four-pack of the Chicago brewery’s flagship beer, its Strawberry Basil Hefeweizen. That is one of four Forbidden Root beers that are now being sold around Central Ohio in cans. The brand is opening its second-ever brewpub as part of Easton’s...

Columbus Business First recently invited five leaders implementing the Rise Together plan to discuss the initiative to address poverty in Franklin County: Joy Bivens, director of Franklin County Department of Job and Family Services; Lisa Courtice, CEO of United Way of Central Ohio; Kenny McDonald, president and CEO of Columbus 2020; Bo Chilton, CEO of Impact Community Action; and Trudy Bartley, a...

Ich bin ein Homesteader. This week’s News & Brews ventures to the wilds of Licking County for the seasonal Oktoberfest coming from Heath’s Homestead Beer Co. The traditional German brew naturally inspires discussion of Oktoberfest (the event, both here and abroad) and Oktoberfests/Marzens (the beer). Can a malty beer hang in these days when so much of the market is focused on hops? Our panel w...

This week’s News & Brews embraces this steamy summer with a refreshing beer meant for whiling the days away. The appropriately named Leisurely raspberry saison from Columbus’ Wolf’s Ridge Brewing Co. was cracked open for the podcast for fans and skeptics alike. The brewery has built a reputation for its big barreled stouts and is gaining acclaim for its work with sours as well. So how does it...

News & Brews ventured out of state again this week, which is fitting since the biggest beer news of late involves an out-of-state brewery, namely the biggest out-of-state brewery in all the land. Anheuser-Busch InBev last week acquired Cleveland’s Platform Beer Co. for an undisclosed sum. We discuss why the beer giants would be interested in the Ohio brand — which includes taprooms in Clevelan...

Cows, donkeys, pigs, horses — it’s a veritable farm on this week’s News & Brews podcast. Though one might think the occasion for such discussion would be the Ohio State Fair underway now and that would have been a good hook for a discussion. Alas, that was not the hook for the discussion. Summer travels have taken the News & Brews team many places in recent months — Russia, France, Chicago...

You want fries with that? While it’s a common refrain at your local drive-through, it isn’t often necessarily associated with beer. And by associated, I don’t mean accompanying, I mean in the beer, like in the recipe for the beer. That brings us to this week’s docket for News & Brews where we cracked open a few cold cans of Drop the Fries, yet another quirky creation from the hooligans at Hoof...

Hot days and high temps demand a light, refreshing beer. Pouring this week at the News & Brews bar is Bubbles — a Rosé wine inspired cider/beer thingamajig from Cincinnati’s Rhinegeist Brewery. This intriguing creation is a big seller for Rhinegeist, accounting for an estimated 20 percent of sales, or about 12,000 barrels a year, which alone is larger than most craft breweries. It’s not only a...

The News & Brews podcast is back and our discussion this week centers around Special Hoperations, a collaboration IPA between Akron's Fat Head's Brewery and Barley Brown’s Beer of Baker City, Oregon.

After a post-Columbus Craft Beer Week/Memorial Day hiatus, the News & Brews podcast is back this week with something not from Columbus, but certainly memorable. With the summer coming soon (did spring ever really arrive?), I ventured out to secure a light and refreshing brew that could slake the people’s thirst on those hot days of yard work or backyard recreation. I failed. Miserably. My eyes...

This week’s News & Brews raises a glass to Columbus Craft Beer Week. The annual event kicks off Friday and runs through May 25 offering a wide array of beer dinners, tap takeovers and other happenings to sate the local beer imbibing public. It felt appropriate then to split a sixer of the this year’s collaboration beer, Six One Pour. The Central Ohio contingent of the Ohio Craft Brewers Associ...

Columbus Business First dipped into its archive for this 2018 interview with Adam Benner, co-owner of Land-Grant Brewing. Benner talks about Land-Grant's origins — did you know its original name and where it initially was going to open? What inspired its owners? Land-Grant has been a bit of a "good luck charm" for local sports teams, but how did it get into the area stadiums? Benner also opens up...

News & Brews is never afraid to tackle the major issues, such as what the heck is on the can of Catawba Island’s Hot Blonde? Dead fish? Steak? Mango? Tulip glass? Something else? The Lake Erie brewery’s habanero blonde is this week’s beer, prompting not just inaccurate interpretations of can art but also talk of Ohio geography — where exactly is the brewery? — and spelling. Which Business Firs...

Seventh Son Brewing took a lager and hopped it up. Float is a modern twist on an old classic and it got a short-handed News & Brews squad all hopped up on a variety of beer topics including the business case for ales versus lagers, why brewers choose cans over bottles, what defines a craft brewer and how the proliferation of new beer is hurting some in the beer industry. Which team members con...

A treat (at least for some of us) this week as News & Brews took on the Dark Lord. This opulent creation from 3 Floyd’s Brewing Co. draws fans from around the U.S. to its Munster, Indiana brewery every May for Dark Lord day, a $180 a ticket annual festival of big beer and heavy metal music. Managing Editor Mark Somerson generously shared a bomber of the 2018 Dark Lord with the team. Who among...

Pulp or no pulp is a question for orange juice, not beer. Or is it? Urban Artifact’s Gaslight was on the table for this week’s News & Brews podcast and proved to be one of the more divisive selections to date as the hazy sour IPA might have been a bit too heavy on the haze for some of the team. Columbus Business First’s latest News & Brews happy hour — a sell out event at Seventh Son Brewing Co. l...