Pabst on the selling block
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The benefactor that owns the Pabst Brewing Company and its iconic brands has put the business up for sale, according to the New York Post.
The sale has actually been in the works for some time, beer industry insiders say. Either way, it’s fascinating stuff, because Pabst controls a stable of recognizable brands including Colt 45, Lone Star, Olympia Genuine Draft, Piels, Schaefer, Schmidt, Schlitz and Stroh’s. And of course, Pabst Blue Ribbon… the oh-so-cool PBR.
Pabst, based in suburban Chicago, has hired Bank of America Merrill Lynch to find a buyer and has just sent sales books to prospective suitors. A buyer will need to pay about $300 million, according to the Post, which points out that Pabst owns the brands but contracts out its brewing to Molson Coors, the Canadian brewer.
The PBR label has been kicking tail lately. Somehow, the low-priced beer has managed to stay cool and burnish its hipster appeal. But Pabst as a company, which has no breweries and functions basically as a marketing organization, saw a series of sales declines in recent years.
The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel weighs in about what is motivating Pabst’s owner, the Kalmanovitz Charitable Foundation of Mill Valley, California:
The sale effort is apparently the result of a deadline imposed by the Internal Revenue Service. Federal tax laws don’t allow charitable foundations to own for-profit companies.
The IRS initially gave the foundation until 2005 to sell Pabst. That deadline was extended to 2010 when a buyer couldn’t be found, according to a 2008 report by the Chicago Tribune.
We’ll keep you updated about further movement on the Pabst front.
(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
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Jeremiah McWilliams is a native Virginian who came to the Post-Dispatch in early 2007 to cover beer and other consumer products. He previously covered manufacturing for the Virginian-Pilot newspaper in Norfolk, Va. He is a graduate of Washington and Lee University. 
If only we knew some great big beer company with a reputation for raiding competitors and busting them up to drive costs out while raising prices to maximize executive bonuses. Wait…um…nevermind…
Why, duff man, who could you mean? Very funny comment, duff man.
“the oh-so-cool PBR” - Ummm….no. Drinking bad beer is never cool, no matter what any wanna-be hipster loser says.
PBR is a great beer to cook with. To drink, well that another thing all together. Now a six pack of Colt 45 and you can forget last week.
PBR is not bad beer. The people who perpetuate that nonsense have likely never had a PBR, or are confusing flavor with ‘bad’, or they are relying on information from their drunk dad who “loveshh him shom budweishhher”…. PBR, and many of the ‘cheap’ beers the company produced WERE bad beers 30 or more years ago, when quality control was very lax. Now their beers are all contract brewed by Miller. There are no quality control issues, there. PBR is every bit as good as Budweiser. Also, PBR produces Stag, which is also a good beer. If I put PBR, Stag, and Budweiser in a blind taste test, 95 out of 100 people would likely not be able to tell the difference, or at least they wouldn’t know which one to call “bad”.
PBR ME ASAP!
i love Pabst. he was a great man.
A website is up to buy Pabst Brewing Co. Go to http://www.buyabeercompany.com. Trying save Pabst!!!
Wow, Pabst owns a literal who’s who of awful domestic beers:
Schaefer Beer, Carling’s Black Label Beer, Blatz Beer, Champale Malt Beverage
Colt 45 Malt Liquor, Coqui 900 Premium Malt Lquor, Kingsbury Beer, National Bohemian Beer, Old Style Beer, Schmidt Beer, Special Export Beer, Stag Beer, Old Milwaukee Beer, Schlitz Beer, Lone Star Beer, McSorley’s Ale, Haffenreffer Private Stock Malt Liquor, Jacob’s Best Beer, Olympia Genuine, Draft Style Beer, Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, Pearl Brewing Co., Ballantine Beer
Country Club Malt Liquor, Falstaff Beer, Pearl Beer, Piels Light Beer, Primo Island Lager Beer, Rainier Beer, Southampton Ales and Lagers, Ice Man Malt Liquor St. Ides High Gravity Malt Liquor, Schlitz Malt Liquor, Silver Thunder Malt Liquor, Stroh’s Beer
Kind of strange to me that they own over 20 of my least favorite beers in the world, but also own one of the best microbreweries (Southampton), NY’s oldest and greatest drinking establishment (McSorely’s), one of my personal faves (Ballantine) and even a beer that share’s my last name (Schmidt’s)