Craft Brewers Alliance? Gulp!

Aw geez. Another noble Seattle name goes into the toilet. Redhook Brewery, the brand launched by Paul Shipman and Gordon Bowker more than 25 years ago, will become part of a corporate entity called Craft Brewers Alliance after it takes over Portland-based Widmer Brothers for a reported $50 million.

Names are terribly important, as Bowker would tell you himself, were not the most modest of men. It was Bowker, a Ballard native, who co-founded and named Starbucks. It was Bowker, the journalist for the original Seattle Magazine, who helped David Brewster launch Seattle Weekly. And it was Bowker, along with Chateau Ste. Michelle marketing manager Paul Shipman, who co-founded and named Redhook.

(Remember that old Rainier Beer commercial, with the motorcycle shifting? Raaay-Neeeeeer-Beeer. It's on YouTube, if you haven't seen it. That was Bowker, too.)

Oh, sure, there was some grumbling when Anheuser-Busch bought a one-third interest in the company some years back, but that was done to get into Budweiser's national distribution system. And they'll keep the brand names like Redhook ESB and Widmer Hefeweizen that the founders worked so hard to establish, along with the stock-exchange symbol HOOK. For now. But a quarter-century after that first, banana-flavored "Belgian" brew flowed from the tap in a converted machine shop on Leary Way, it seems that yet another northwest icon has been lured down the slippery slope of commercial success. More power to them all, big payday, bravo, I guess.

News happens to coincide with latest results from competitor Pyramid, taking a big hit from legal settlements but staging SnowCap Ale anniversary party this weekend. And downtown Seattle's Pike Brewery, owned by Shipman's former Ste. Michelle colleague Charles Finkel and his wife, Roseanne, is going gangbusters. Cheers to you, Finkels, for having the energy to reclaim the company you founded, and keeping your commitment to genuine craft beer.

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