A Chicago brewery has landed a $3.7 million grant from the city, taking a big step closer to its vision of opening a facility near the United Center arena.
Funkytown Brewery recently was awarded the funds as part of the city planning department’s Community Development Grant program, according to the Black-owned brewery and an announcement by Mayor Brandon Johnson.
The grant will cover about half the cost of a long-planned project to buy a vacant building at 1931 W. Lake St. and convert it to the company’s first standalone brewing, distribution and retail facility.
New funding comes just over a year after CoStar News first reported Funkytown’s plans to spin out of the Pilot Project incubator in the Logan Square neighborhood.
At the time, CEO and co-founder Richard Bloomfield said Funkytown was under contract to buy the two-story building near the home arena of the NBA’s Chicago Bulls and NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks.
But the brewery never completed the Near West Side purchase as efforts to line up investors for the expansion were slow to materialize after worries about tariffs and the broader economy weighed on fundraising efforts, Bloomfield said.
There also are challenges in the craft brewing industry. For the first time since 2005, the number of craft breweries in the United States that closed outpaced brewery openings, according to the Boulder, Colorado-based Brewers Association. There were 9,796 craft breweries nationally at the end of 2024.
Changes in Chicago have included the multi-brewery District Brew Yards seeking to sell its properties in Chicago and suburban Wheeling and wind down the business, and Chicago pioneer Revolution Brewing shutting down its original spot in Logan Square to consolidate operations in a production facility and taproom in Avondale.
Backed by the grant, Funkytown is now moving toward putting the two-story building back under contract while renewing efforts with investors, Bloomfield said.
“As first-time entrepreneurs doing our first capital raise, it has taken longer than we expected,” Bloomfield said. “We knew that this grant would de-risk the investment significantly and help us bring in new investors. We also realized our network wasn’t large enough.”
In a revised fundraising strategy, Funkytown is now focused on bringing in real estate investors for the building who would get a return on their investment through rent from the brewery and an eventual refinancing of the property, Bloomfield said.
Despite broader challenges in the brewing industry, Funkytown believes its niche — a rare Black-owned brewery with a focus on reaching new beer consumers with approachable beers — will continue to be a key differentiator.
Founders Zack Day, Greg Williams and Bloomfield are longtime friends to went to went to college together at Gramling State University in Louisiana.
They chose the Lake Street location because of its proximity to a new Chicago Transit Authority train station and the United Center.
The professional sports teams that own the arena are planning a massive development around the venue that will bring as many as 9,463 residential units and 1,309 hotel rooms along with new retail, entertainment and other attractions to the area west of the Loop business district.
Bloomfield said the Lake Street facility along elevated train tracks could open by this winter or spring 2027, depending on the pace of fundraising.
“I’m more hopeful now that we’ve got this grant for a significant part of the capital stack,” Bloomfield said. “After going through the last year, I try not to get too high or too low. With that said, I’m extremely excited and hopeful about the grant that the city has provided.”