Community space. Lots of craft breweries have this – a space where members of the local community can come together for the purposes of hosting or attending some kind of event. At my own local craft brewery, The Black Cloister, this space comprises a room. It is called the Wittenberg Room. You see, the CEO and Founder of The Black Cloister Brewing Company, Tom Schaeffer, is a Lutheran pastor. The brewery takes its name from The Black Cloister monastery in Wittenberg, Germany where Luther and his wife Katherine van Bora lived and raised a family. The Wittenberg Room is a smallish space that is dominated by a huge community table. A family of twelve could comfortably have their Thanksgiving dinner around this table.

The Wittenberg Room is a true community room. In its nine months of existence it has served a multitude of purposes. I have utilized it many times myself. Just last weekend a group of us gathered there to celebrate the recent engagement of my youngest daughter Fiona to her fiancé Marrek. Eighteen of us celebrated with pizza, cake, and beer. Back in October the Wittenberg Room functioned as a university classroom when I shared my knowledge of the American craft beer industry with a group of graduate students from Bowling Green State University who were taking a course on Local Economic Development. I had been invited to talk to the class about the economic development opportunities associated with the craft beer industry – what better place to give such a talk than a local brewery. In July I celebrated my birthday there with a small gathering of family and friends. In April the room was packed with about fifty friends and family of Mike Moore. Mike was my friend and doctoral advisee who has passed away suddenly at the all too young age of 34. We gathered in the Wittenberg room to remember Mike and to celebrate his life. The room is often in use when I go to the Black Cloister – groups of people meeting about one thing or another or celebrating this or that milestone. One time I was sitting at the bar and I looked up to see the room was filled with Lutheran pastors. I have no idea what they were meeting about but I figured that it was somewhat important as I spied one of the Assistants to the Bishop in attendance.

Of course the Black Cloister is not unique among breweries that have some type of community space. Examples abound from across the nation. The appropriately named Community Beer Company, a brewery in Dallas, TX, have a local artists support program through which space is provided to local artists to display and sell their artwork. The artists are not charged a fee for use of the space nor does the brewery take a cut of the artists’ sales. Local charities also get free use of the space to promote their particular good cause. In Portland, OR Hopworks Urban Brewery host a Tot Tuesday at their Powell Boulevard brewpub on the second Tuesday of every month. Parents can bring their young children for story time, a craft activity, and a healthy snack. Among the parents bringing their children to the brewpub is Portland’s City Dads Group. City Dads Group is a national organization with chapters in over a dozen cities across the country. Each group is made up of fathers who have taken a conscious decision to play a more active role in the lives of their children. Tot Tuesday is a community program that seems to be appreciated by parents.

Yoga classes taught inside craft breweries seem to be an increasingly popular phenomenon, even leading one writer to ask “are breweries the new yoga studios“? For example Port City Brewing Company in Alexandra, VA offer yoga classes every Tuesday. For $15 you get a yoga class and a post-yoga pint. Companies that specialize in offering yoga inside breweries even have names such as Bendy Brewski Yoga and Balance & Brews that reflect their specialization. Founded by Beth Cosi in 2011 Bendy Brewski Yoga offers classes at craft breweries in Charleston, SC and Memphis, TN. One of the goals of Bendy Brewski Yoga is “encouraging goodwill in communities and spreading happiness through yoga and craft beer”. Yoga and craft beer seem to be a nice fit. Both are increasing in popularity. According to data provided by Statista the number of people doing yoga in the United States increased from 17.7 million in 2006 to 24.3 million in 2013. One of the attraction of offering yoga inside a brewery appears to be that such classes tend to attract people who might otherwise be hesitant to attend a yoga class – the attraction of a post-yoga pint seems to have its own unique pull.

Commercial craft brewers are very cognizant that they are part of the fabric of the community in which they produce and sell their beer. Indeed they often go out of their way to be meaningful and vibrant contributors to the life of the community within which they are embedded. Having a community space is one way in which they can do this. The Black Cloister, the Community Beer Company, and Hopworks  Urban Brewery all emphasize the importance of community in the goals that they have for their respective businesses. The Black Cloister notes its “desire to build community in Toledo” while the Community Beer Company states one of its goals is” giving back to it [the community] through charitable activities and by supporting local artists”. Hopworks Urban Brewery state that “our pubs are urban HUBs for our neighbors and community”. Of course the breweries benefit from these activities taking place within their walls – they sell beer more beer and it often exposes the brewery to individuals who might not otherwise go there. Last weekend, for example, I would estimate that about two-thirds of those who attended my daughter’s engagement celebration at The Black Cloister had not been there before. In providing these spaces the breweries are providing both a resource for and a connection with the community that enhances the fabric of the towns and cities within which they are located.