Dipsology: Beyond the Basics - After More Than 175 Years, Schlitz Will Cease Production

This brings to an end one of the nation’s longest-running beer brands, curtailing a brewing lineage that is 177 years old. This is a company that has endured through, and occasionally benefited from, hardships, historical impacts, and corporate challenges. To see a legendary brand dissipate like the foam in a dirty beer mug feels wrong on many levels. 

It might be hard today to consider the way the brewing landscape was so different in the 1800s. It is not just due to the population size, but with thousands of breweries operating today, delivering countless styles of beer, what we need to recall is that in that era, our nation was developing its own style. A growing preference for a golden, crystalline brew served chilled was emerging, and an American spirit of revolution and desire meant that landmark processes developed to make a product available across a widespread tableau.

The use of expanding rail lines was a source for reaching larger customer bases, and refrigerated train cars were developed to ensure quality was maintained, bringing the liquid inventory to ice houses in faraway cities. With these developments, Schlitz became more than a popular brand; it was an industry driver and inspired others to follow suit and expand. This was a brewery that was vital to the growth of not just the beer-making sector but also the development of the country.

Alternate Beginnings  

The Schlitz saga kicked off in Wisconsin, with a man named August Krug opening a local brewery in 1849. The operation was successful enough in that city, but before long, Krug passed away. Joseph Schlitz had worked as a bookkeeper at the plant and moved up into management with the vacuum left by the owner’s passing. By 1858, Schlitz assumed the top management, married Krug’s widow, and in three years, he renamed the brewery after himself.

Schlitz had desires to expand beyond the local customer base and hit upon the plan to use rail cars to spread his market reach. The Great Chicago Fire became the impetus for this expansion, as that historic blaze wiped out the brewers in the city. Schlitz established storehouses in Chicago, and his infrastructure meant he could deliver his product immediately, and that ability to supply the rebuilding metropolis delivered success and led to more national expansion. 

Then in 1875, during a European trip, Schlitz was among the more than 300 victims when a ship went down off the coast of Italy. The brewery operations fell to a pair of nephews of August Krug, the Uihlien brothers, who had been employed at the brewery for years, and they continued to build up the company. In 1893, the company took on the phrase, “The Beer That Made Milwaukee Famous," and it proved to be more than an advertising boast. 

Just after the turn of the century, the brewery managed to pass Milwaukee competitor Pabst as the largest brewer, becoming the first to produce one million barrels in a year. Soon after, the company cemented its popularity by making the innovative decision to use brown glass for bottling. This was done to mitigate the damage light can deliver to a brew, and it went from being a recognized packaging feature of Schlitz to becoming an industry standard. 

The historic Brown Bottle has closed at @SchlitzPark Despite a history which dates back to1938, nostalgia simply isn't enough to keep a restaurant afloat during these tough times. https://t.co/MNIk2kQvS3 pic.twitter.com/qGoXCck3JP

— OnMilwaukee (@onmilwaukee) August 15, 2022

Then, as the company hit new highs, Prohibition hit the country. Schlitz hung on as a going concern as the Uihliens diversified into other product lines and kept the lights on due to strong real estate holdings keeping them afloat. They attempted to get into the chocolate and confectionery business with mixed results, and gambled with a branded soft drink to keep the bottling lines operating, banking on the expectation that the 18th Amendment would be overturned someday.

This proved to be a cagey gambit, as the alcohol repeal was reversed in 1933, and within a year, Schlitz was not only back to a top contender but became the largest brewer globally. It dominated the beer market for the next couple of decades, but then labor strife fell upon the town. A strike by over 7,000 unionized brewery workers affected six of the largest beer companies in Wisconsin, lasting more than two months. In that time of reduced production, it allowed the St. Louis powerhouse Anheuser-Busch to become the #1 beer producer.

This is criminal for numerous reasons:
- It is American history
- It was the foundation of Milwaukee
- It’s original malt recipe was actually quite good
- had some of the best print advertising https://t.co/BSztfQs8fj pic.twitter.com/RlcY0r8YfJ

— Brad Slager: CNN+ Lifetime Subscriber (@MartiniShark) May 15, 2026

Following a new labor deal, Schlitz created a bargain brand, Old Milwaukee, and the increased production saw it dethroning A-B once again, and over the next 20 years, the two brewers battled for suds supremacy. In this desire for a competitive edge, a third generation of Uihlien was running the company and was seeking a means to boost production while trimming costs. 

The recipe for the brew was altered, and the brewing process switched to a faster fermentation method. These changes, and other tampering effects, led to the beer losing favor with drinkers, and then, by the mid-1970s, the light beer craze was kicked off. Soon, Schlitz found itself passed by Miller Brewing and Pabst. Then things fell off the cliff.

The End of the Uihlein

1981 saw the brewery hit with another worker strike, and the inability to reach an agreement after four impactful months was essentially the end for the family involvement. The handicapping of production led to a severe loss of market share, and it meant the closure of the famed Milwaukee brewhouse and the company being put up for sale. 

Another brewhouse was sold to Anheuser-Busch, and then in 1982, Strohs, in an effort to become more of a national competitor, won a bidding war for Schlitz, becoming the #3 brewer at the time. That company had also picked up other discount beer labels such as Schaeffer and Piels, and while this led to a wider distribution chain, the company was overleveraged with the acquisitions, which did not pay off at an appreciable level. Strohs would go through a series of restructuring moves for years before succumbing to reality.

By 1999, Strohs had to sell off most of its labels, splitting between Pabst Brewing and Miller. Schlitz ownership was now back in Milwaukee under the umbrella of onetime competitor Pabst, but the label languished as an also-ran. As craft beers became the rage, stalwart brands represented the very type of beers that craft brewers and their drinkers were looking to get away from. 

For a time, Pabst saw a revival, as it was a bargain beer that was favored by broke college students needing suds to fuel beer pong competitions. The PBR label took on something of a cult status, and the company flourished, which allowed it to spend on trying to also rejuvenate the Schlitz brand. The original recipe from the 1960s was used, but the attempted rollout of the rebooted beer was met with tepid interest.

Pabst Brewing was sold just over a decade ago, and the new ownership has been focused on its flagship brand, while trimming dead weight along the way. This has meant that the historical brew that dominated this nation for decades is being cast aside, like a crushed can pitched into the recycling bin.

A Sudsy Swan Song

With the announcement of the end of Schlitz, it was, as expected, something that did not sit well with a contingent of the brewing community. At the Wisconsin Brewing Company, they elected to send off the iconic brand in a fitting style. Head Brewer Kirby Nelson had spoken with the management at Pabst, and they received permission to make a limited batch run of Schlitz and do so using the old framework on the beer.

There was not a formal recipe to base things on, but Nelson was permitted to use a series of old journals and brewing records from the company — some from as far back as 1913 — to craft the style that was brewed in the 1950s era. “They weren’t specific formulas per se, but a lot of clues where you’ve done this long enough you could figure out what they were doing,” Nelson said.

You have to appreciate they found many old brewing logs from Schlitz to concoct the brewing method from the mid 1900s. https://t.co/wyFD5yxZf9 pic.twitter.com/PXM2571qKu

— Brad Slager: CNN+ Lifetime Subscriber (@MartiniShark) May 26, 2026

The throwback Schlitz brew is currently being crafted, and it will not be available until the end of next month, when the brewery will have the beer in its taproom, and the canned version will be sold. Already, the pre-orders of the special edition 4-packs have sold out, and the demand has been such that Wisconsin Brewery is impressed enough to be contemplating a secondary offering as a result.

So maybe there is a glimmer of hope that this passion for the beer will see it reconstituted in some form again, and then Schlitz may not actually see its demise. After all, it is not just a beer that made a city famous; it made a nation thrive and made beer an industry that to this day powers our country.