Arts
On July 28, Jon Zerivitz, Adam Benesch, and Kevin Blodger, will celebrate six years of Union Craft Brewing in their new Union Collective Space on 41st Street in the Hampden neighborhood of Baltimore. While it’s exciting to see this well-deserved expansion come to life for Union Craft Brewing, this next chapter for them is about so much more than just the brewery itself. “When we initially realized that we were at capacity and needed to expand, we were just thinking about expansion,” fellow co-founder and director of marketing Jon Zerivitz reflected. “How do we solve this problem for Union? And when we went out into the city to look for a location, we still just couldn’t find anything that was gonna work for us.” So, Zerivitz, along with Blodger and Adam Benesch, the third Union co-founder and director of operations, went back to the drawing board with their search their homebase neighborhood Hampden in Baltimore. It was then they looked at a previously-dismissed, massive warehouse space located at 1700 W. 41st St. — once home to Sears — with fresh eyes. A new vision of Union’s future and the community’s started to take shape between them. They wondered what if, instead of simply expanding for themselves, they invited other local makers and manufacturers to share this space with them, to create a community hub? “The first reaction (in the community) was, ‘Whoa, this is a big step! How are we going to do this?’ ” Benesch said. “But then, I think once people understood what we really were trying to do here — and what it could all mean for all of us together — it clicked with a lot of people and realized what the potential could be.” Thus, the Union Collective, “a new home for Baltimore’s growing independent businesses,” was born. In addition to the Union Craft Brewing taproom, Earth Treks, a regional climbing and fitness gym, has also opened their doors. In future, other local businesses, such as Vent Coffee, The Creamery, Well Crafted Pizza and others, will call the Union Collective their home. There will be a larger grand opening to celebrate the full Union Collective later this year. At a time when the definition of success is completely different for craft brewers than it was even only five years ago, the story of the Union Collective presents a unique growth story for others to look to. It adds more dimension to the already proven narrative of how craft breweries revitalize towns and make a point to give back to their own communities. It also shows the potential of what could be.