Having opened in 2015, the Black Sands Brewery and restaurant at the corner of Haight and Pierce is now quietly on the market with a $550,000 price tag.

And while the asking price doesn’t include the brewpub’s building on the wiggle in the Lower Haight, which is leased through May of 2020 with a base rent of around $6,000 a month and a 5-year option to extend, it does include the full liquor license, equipment and homebrew shop on the side.

17 thoughts on “Looking to buy a Little Brewery in San Francisco?”
  1. It’s even better than your typical pub because they serve coffee and pastries in the morning. Hopefully the new owners keep up the quality of the beer and food.

  2. so much work to brew on such a small scale. not too surprised this didn’t work. small local breweries that have equipment 10 times that size struggle for profit.

    1. Yes, it is a lot of work though the gear pictured looks to be at least two barrel capacity and could be viable so long as the product is creative and in the upper tiers. You certainly couldn’t run a viable brewery with the standard 1990s era blonde, amber, stout, hefeweizen mediocre menu. There are a number of 2 barrel breweries in the Bay Area that seem to be doing well though I can’t think of any operating out of a retail area like this.

  3. They were closed for minor renovations about a month ago – I forget exactly what the sign in the window said, but I think it was about ADA compliance – in any event, clearly someone was polishing things up a bit before a sale.

  4. I know we seem to be reaching a saturation point with breweries in the Bay Area but Black Sands is a gem. Interesting beers and good food. Bummer. I hope the buyer continues the quality.

  5. Good Morning All,

    If anyone has questions regarding the sale of Black Sands please feel free to contact me. The business has been very successful and is highly profitable. Ownership is only selling because they are shifting their focus elsewhere.

    Jacob Bartholomew
    Urban Group Real Estate

    1. Thanks. I’m not in the market but you might want to list what sort of gear the buyer would acquire since a big part of what the key money pays for is the brewing equipment .

  6. Another angle could be the eventual buyer of the business selling off the 2bbl system. Depending on how the cards fall, if the price makes sense to brewery seller and buyer, the system would be a nice addition to a larger (relatively speaking) brewery looking for a pilot system or a system dedicated to a specific style like sours. Or it could be a nice upgrade to another small/smaller brewery someplace else.

    1. That opens more options for the buyer though probably not a real game changer. That stainless is expensive but it will only recover a small fraction of the key money.

    2. Unfortunatley, that would not be beneficial for anyone, not a viable angle for a sale of this kind. The type of license that this business has is contingent on brewing beer on premise. No brewing on site = No liquor license.

      1. That’s an interesting angle. While I was aware of the special licenses that allow small breweries to operate a taproom to pour their product, I didn’t realize that there was a nano-brewery enabled general liquor license.

        What is to prevent someone from using this license to brew rarely and making the bulk of the profits selling $13 artisinal cocktails? That’s a lot less work with higher profit.

        1. I’ve seen at least a few “Breweries” that only have a conical fermenter on site and no brew kettle. Not sure how that works…

          1. Some guesses:
            1) They’re brewing from extract syrup which can be boiled up in large pots on their kitchen stove (if they have a kitchen). In other words the novice homebrewer process.
            2) They have a contract to buy fully brewed wort (unfermented beer) from a real brewery. I’ve never heard of that though.

            EIther way seems like too much effort to create a mediocre product. Maybe their ‘brewing’ operation is just a ruse to get a brewery-enabled full liquor license?

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