The modern beer revolution has opened the door for hazy and flavor-forward IPAs to take over first place in the hearts of many, but Logan Jager has a prediction for the subsequent trend in beer drinking.
“The next revolution,” said Jager, the founder of Lafayette’s new Western Flyer Brewery, “is there will be a lot more craft lager drinkers who are going to realize they’re craft lager drinkers.”
That’s the bet Jager is making with his budding beer company, Western Flyer, which has been in the works for five years in the new complex at 3660 Mount Diablo Blvd. in Lafayette.
The finishing touches are being put on the space, which will seat about 200 people inside and outside, with two big outdoor patios that go along Mount Diablo Boulevard and curve up to Dolores Drive. They’re expecting a soft launch around Labor Day.
“What’s better than sitting on the deck under an umbrella when it’s 90 degrees than having a crisp pilsner or lager?,” said Jager. “We’ll do a lot to brew beers to help you capture that moment of having a refreshing beer on a summer day. A lot of those will end up being lagers.”
The brew tank inside Western Flyer Brewery, which plans to open in Lafayette this fall (photo courtesy of Western Flyer Brewery).
But for Jager, more important than the beer itself is the space and people you’re drinking the beer in and with.
A Bay Area local, Jager went on to study economics at Cal and enter a training program at Citi in New York, where he had a decade-long career that propelled him to a vice president position.
But he returned to the Bay Area in 2017 and caught the entrepreneurial bug. He soon learned he was more interested in the people side of things than the business side.
A home brewer, he was fascinated by the way beer could bring people together.
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“I was really interested in how to use a brewery as a vehicle for community engagement,” he said. “It’s not just another place to go. Breweries are a different type of business. People feel a sense of ownership in their local brewery. People walk around with a t-shirt and hat of their favorite brewery. That’s unique. Nobody is walking around with a t-shirt of their favorite restaurant.”
Jager enrolled in the master brewing program at U.C. Davis and graduated in 2020. He’s been all-in on creating the Western Flyer brand since then.
“We call it beer for the people,” he said. “We designed the facility around variety and experimentation. In the fermentation cellar, we probably have more tanks than a small local pub brewery. That allows us to brew more often and for a given level of freshness, we have more beers on tap.”
The goal is to create a space where people are coming two or three times a week and can try a new beer every time they show up.
They’ll also have a chance to munch on some tacos and other sharable plates designed by restaurateurs that Jager has been working with, but he’s not yet ready to announce the names behind the menu.
Western Flyer Brewery plans to open in Lafayette this fall (renderings by Erin Morris Architects).
The name “Western Flyer” was the name of a boat that author John Steinbeck chartered in 1940 to get out of town after “The Grapes of Wrath” was published.
Jager drew comparisons from Steinbeck’s desire to escape the noise to other city folks who lead fascinating lives full of travel and adventure, but eventually decide to slow things down and start a family in the suburbs.
“The common experience in Lafayette is people move here and love it, it’s safe, it’s nice, but they’re like, ‘we used to be cool! What happened to us?’” Jager said. “So we wanted to create this escapist California brand.”
With a focus on experimentation in their beer and in their community-building, Jager is hoping the folks of Lafayette can start to feel cool again.
“For so long, lagers have been uninteresting and not craft,” he said. “I think people will be surprised that what they’re enjoying is a lager.”
Details: Opening this fall at 3660 Mount Diablo Ave. in Lafayette; wfbrewing.com.
Captain Paul Tate, left, and John Gregg, Western Flyer Foundation Founder and Director, aboard the Western Flyer in Moss Landing, Calif., on Thursday, Nov. 2, 2023. The Western Flyer is famous for being the fishing boat that John Steinbeck and his biologist friend Ed Ricketts used on an ecological adventure in 1940. Now, after being restored, it will return Saturday to Monterey for the first time in 75 years to begin a new life in science education. (Doug Duran/Bay Area News Group)
