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An icon of Milwaukee’s beer baron era has been discontinued by Pabst Brewing Co., but Wisconsin Brewing is planning one last toast to Schlitz this summer. The “beer that made Milwaukee famous” is dead. Schlitz, a brand that began in Milwaukee in 1858, has been discontinued by its corporate parent, Pabst Brewing Co. The move is part of a wave of culling of its nostalgia-driven brands. The news comes, oddly enough, from Wisconsin Brewing Co., which announced on Thursday afternoon that it would be brewing “the last Schlitz” at its brewery in Verona next weekend. Pabst confirmed the move on...

VERONA, Wis. -- It's the end of an era for one of Wisconsin's most iconic beers. Pabst Brewing Co. is no longer brewing Schlitz, the brew that played a huge role in cementing Milwaukee as America's Beer Capital. The last batch will be brewed, not by Pabst, but by Wisconsin Brewing Company in Verona. WBC Brewmaster Kirby Nelson said he'll be basing this final batch on operations logs from 1948, when Schlitz was in its prime. The beer was America's top-seller in 1950. "Since Schlitz is ‘The Beer that Made Milwaukee Famous,’ I decided to brew a beer that would...

Abe Vucekovich, the owner of the Chicago cocktail bar Friends of Friends, got a call a couple months ago. It concerned Schlitz beer. This was a matter of some import to Vucekovich, because Friends of Friends is situated in what used to be a Schlitz tied house. There is a large Schlitz globe insignia on the side of the building. Because of this, Vucekovich decided to serve Schlitz beer on tap. To advertise this fact, he bought an old neon sign from a neighboring bar called Danny’s. It says “Schlitz on Tap” in bright red neon. But the call Vucekovich...

The Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company was one America's Largest beer producer. Creaters of Schlitz Beer (the Beer that made Milwakee Famous) the brand was beloved by many until the mid 1970s when attempts to cut production cost resulted in a gradual drop in quality eventually leading to it's decline. Those intrested in the companies fall will find a summery of events from it's founding until it's eventual fall in the early 1980s. This video also delves into the Hawaiian Beer Primo that was brought by Schlitz and could have served as a warning.

A Russian beverage company said on Thursday that it was acquiring the Pabst Brewing Company, which makes the Pabst Blue Ribbon beer popular with barflies and hipsters alike and other brands like Colt 45 and Old Milwaukee. [snip] The buyer is Oasis Beverages, a Russian brewer and beverages distributor. Backing Oasis is TSG Consumer Partners, an American private equity firm focused on consumer goods, which will take a minority stake. “Pabst Blue Ribbon is the quintessential American brand – it represents individualism, egalitarianism and freedom of expression – all the things that make this country great,” Eugene Kashper, the chairman...

MILWAUKEE It's the beer that made Milwaukee famous. Now Schlitz is making the city nostalgic.That beer with the old-time mystique is back on shelves in bottles of its original formula in the city where it was first brewed more than a century and a half ago. Schlitz was the top-selling beer for much of the first half of the 20th century, but recipe changes and a series of foul-ups made the beer - in many a drinker's opinion - undrinkable, turning what was once the world's most popular brew into little more than a joke. But after decades of dormancy,...

When you're out of Schlitz, you're out of beer, according to an old ad campaign. And, as Milwaukee-area beer lovers are discovering, a lot of places are out of Schlitz, at least in the bottled form. Within days of the Schlitz 1960s formula being brought back to Milwaukee, the beer was largely sold out - snapped up by both older guys who remember the beer from back in the day, and younger drinkers curious about the fuss. A new shipment is coming to liquor stores and taverns beginning Wednesday, but it will be relatively small, said Mike Merriman, president of...

I can’t wait! This is the beer I was raised on, long before certain people at Schlitz got greedy, leading to Schlitz beer becoming known as “Schitz” beer. The downfall of Schlitz, combined with a bottler’s strike at Anheuser-Busch in 1976 allowed Old Style, a sleeper brand that had been in Chicago since the early 1900s, to take over the Chicagoland beer market. OS distributors took their battle for supremacy to neighborhood taverns, bottle by bottle and case by case until the brand dominated more than 40% of the local beer market. The problems of the Jos. Schlitz Brewing Company...

Beer historian explores what happened to famous brews like Schlitz, Rainier, Schmidt and National. Chicago, IL (PRWEB) September 8, 2006 -- Using Chicago as a backdrop, leading beer historian Bob Skilnik delves into the reasons why once favorite national and regional beer brands have faded in popularity, some banished to obscurity. BEER: A History of Brewing in Chicago ($24.95, Hardcover, 416 pages, Barricade Books, ISBN 1569803129), proves to be more than a regional history book as it also details the downfall of national breweries like Schlitz and Pabst, to once powerhouse regionals with their flagship brands such as Seattle’s Rainier,...