Intrepid Sojourner Beer Project Has a New (and Much Less Complicated) Name

Santa Fe Drive’s Intrepid Sojourner Beer Project, a brewery that crafts its beers with an international flair, has a new name: Next Stop Brew Co.

According to co-owner Ben Gettinger, the brewery chose to rebrand itself in response to consistent feedback about the impact of what he describes as the brewery’s “sort of clunky” old name.

“We started to realize that name was getting in the way of customers evangelizing about our brand because they didn’t know how to pronounce the name or didn’t know what it meant,” Gettinger said.

With the two-year-old brewery set to begin selling its beers in cans for the first time this month, Gettinger and co-owners Andrew Moore and Nick Fredman decided now was the right time to rebrand. They chose the name Next Stop Brew Co. because it would allow the brewery to maintain its travel theme.

“We definitely like tying the beers together with a travel brand,” Gettinger said. “Travel and exploring the world is important to us and we wanted a new brand that still played on that and would allow us to use some of the same airplane and travel motifs we used with Intrepid Sojourner.”

Gettinger said the Intrepid Sojourner name was originally chosen because Moore, who also serves as Next Stop’s head brewer, began home brewing during leaves from his former job as an archaeologist working on digs in the eastern Mediterranean. He began to incorporate flavors and spices from that region, and eventually others around the world, in his brews and brought that approach to Intrepid Sojourner.

The rebrand also means new names for the brewery’s beers, which will now be named after iconic cities from around the world. For example, the Lemongrass & Ginger Kölsch will now be sold as the Bangkok, while the Chamomile Half-Wite has been renamed the Amsterdam and the Turkish Coffee Stout is now called the Istanbul. The actual beers, however, will remain the same apart from the name changes.

The new brand will then likely be followed by another even more significant change for the brewery. In August, the brewery also announced on Facebook that it is putting its brewery and tap room at 925 West Eighth Avenue up for sale in order to focus on distribution of its cans in Colorado and beyond. Once its facility is sold, the brewery will transition to brewing its beers at other breweries.

However, the Facebook post explained Next Stop will continue to operate its taproom and brewery on Santa Fe until the space is sold to a new tenant.

Next Stop is throwing a party featuring a keg tapping, merch sale and the South Side Eats food truck from 1 to 11 p.m. on Saturday to celebrate the rebrand and the release its first cans of Bangkok.

• Previous Eater coverage of Intrepid Sojourner Beer Project [EDEN]
• Next Stop Brew Co. [Official]