As Florida Avenue Brewing opens Wesley Chapel restaurant and brewery, Brew Bus plans for its new home in Seminole Heights
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Nov 3, 2020

Florida Avenue Brewing Co. has opened its new location in Wesley Chapel — and owner Brew Bus in the planning stages of relocating its longtime brewery in Tampa's Seminole Heights.

Florida Avenue, which was acquired by Brew Bus Brewing Co. in 2015, opened the restaurant portion of its new 38,000-square-foot facility in Wesley Chapel on Oct. 5. The brewhouse portion of the building — a former athletic facility known as Sport and Field — is under construction now, CEO Anthony Derby told the Tampa Bay Business Journal. The arrival of brewing equipment, he said, was delayed by the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Sinclair Group was the general contractor on the redevelopment. Between the $3.9 million acquisition of the property, construction and equipment, Derby estimates startup costs at just over $10 million. The brewery received an economic development incentive package from Pasco County in exchange for the 46 manufacturing jobs it will create on the brewing side of the operation.

The 15,000-square-foot restaurant portion of the new brewery employs 130 people, Derby said. Those jobs come as the restaurant and hospitality sectors have been pummeled by the pandemic, forced to lay off thousands in Tampa Bay.

"Everyone we’ve been able to bring on has been top quality," he said. "We had our pick of the litter, if you will. Everyone’s been super supportive of the project from when we started training in September, and we're really fortunate people stuck with us."

The brewing capacity in Wesley Chapel will make up for what the company loses in Tampa, when Brew Bus relocates to a much smaller location in the same Seminole Heights neighborhood. Brew Bus is moving to 4315 N. Florida Ave., a 3,000-square-foot building on .66 acres at the intersection of Florida and Chelsea avenues.

An entity linked to brewery owner Joe Redner bought that property in 2018 for $695,000. It's a short walk, about two blocks from the current facility at 4101 N. Florida Ave. The current brewery is 15,000 square feet; when it's finished in 2021, most of the brewing capacity will move to Wesley Chapel, though the new Seminole Heights brewery will have a small production capacity.

Ideally, Derby said, there will be no lag time between shuttering the old facility and opening the new.

"We invested in a building we didn’t own, and we wish we owned the building," Derby said, "but it didn’t work out."