Chad Kuehl has beer in his blood. He grew up in Iowa, where his grandfather, a German immigrant, owned Kuehl’s Tavern. “When I was young, my brother and I used to run around behind the bar in the tavern,” Kuehl remembers. “We were very comfortable being around crowds of people in that setting, being around beer. The whole pub, beer, tavern thing was ingrained in me from a very young age.”
Kuehl met his wife and business partner, Colleen, at the University of Iowa. Engineering and nonprofit jobs would relocate them on the West Coast where they established semi-permanent residence at their “third place” at Rogue Ale House and served Anchor Steam at their wedding.
They dreamed of making their own rendition of the California Common style when they eventually opened their own brewery, but they had to wander around the globe a bit more before that would become a reality.