Schlafly helped draft new microbrewery laws

The path to open Schlafly Beer, St. Louis’ first modern microbrewery, was not a simple one for Tom Schlafly.

Schlafly, a Thompson Coburn lawyer, had to work within Missouri’s existing laws and in some instances help draft new ones to get his microbrewery started, he told a crowd gathered for a recent CLE called “The Schlafly Story: How Craft Beer came to Missouri.”

The talk was part of a monthly St. Louis Bar Brews CLE and Happy Hour series organized by The Bar Association of Metropolitan St. Louis. The event tries to include topics that aren’t typical at CLEs but that can be fun and educational for lawyers, said BAMSL spokeswoman Amanda Lindley.

Schlafly told the story of how his brewery came to be in the city that is home to Anheuser-Busch, and the struggles he faced along the way.

The idea started at a CLE at Oxford University, he said, where his interest in microbreweries was piqued.

He started to look into creating his own with some partners, but ran into a few obstacles with state law. For instance, his business plan involved a brewpub, and breweries at the time weren’t allowed to have a restaurant selling their beer on the premises.

A change to Missouri law in 1990 allowed brewers who produced no more than 2,500 barrels of beer per year to hold retail liquor licenses for their brewery premises.

That law change came from home brewers, Schlafly said, but his brewery was issued the first microbrewery license in Missouri. In 1991, the Schlafly Tap Room, located downtown, opened.

Schlafly soon ran into another problem, however — other restaurants and bars wanted to buy his beer, but Missouri law prevented Schlafly from selling it to them.

It was then that he helped lobby the legislature to amend the microbrewery law. He was successful and in 1993 the legislature passed a law allowing microbreweries to brew up to 10,000 barrels a year and sell beer to wholesalers.

But after Schlafly and his partners opened the Schlafly Bottleworks in Maplewood, they had demand over the 10,000 barrel limit. To solve the problem, the brewery became classified as a winery — it sells cider products which are considered wine under law — and the limits were lifted.

After his presentation, Schlafly fielded questions from the crowd, such as how many barrels of beer his brewery produces a year and how Missouri’s microbrew laws compare to those in other states.

Schlafly peaked at 60,000 barrels a year, he said, and Missouri was in the middle of the pack with microbrew laws.

“Some states didn’t permit brewpubs until later, others were more open,” he said.

Robert Harry, a Stinson Leonard Street attorney who came to the CLE because he has friends that own a microbrewery, said he found the talk informative, particularly the history.

“It was a cool perspective to see how it works and know the road map,” he said.

The next bar brew event is scheduled for Dec. 1 and will be a chance to meet new legislators who are lawyers.