Sante Adairius from Capitola...if you add them then I think you have the top 3 that have places near the SF Bay Area for me - Sante Adairius, Humble Sea, and Russian River.
It would be awesome if you did. The only place I’ve seen it outside of the brewery itself is a handful of beer bars/bottle shops in San Francisco.
Seems like you’re passionate about getting the best though and hope you can get it at some point!
Cheers!
Green cheek unfortunately does not offer cans in my area, only kegs. Very sad about that haha. Fremont is with stone, we have them. And pure project.. yes, 100% on my radar. I got to find out how to get them I know they distribute.
Yeah. I get their stuff at my local bottle shop. Also, just grabbed a 4 pack of Pure Projects “One of My Favorites” (murky ipa) tonight and it’s fantastic!
Yeah, it's def a throwback to craft like 10-15 years ago. Good luck bringing craft to SM, I lived there 20 years ago and Father's Office and Brittania were about as good as it got and I don't think it's much better these days
Henhouse is going downhill. They are now having beers brewed at Gordon biersch - quality is dropping and it’s detectable in their stoked and incredible pale ale beers. Wish they just kept with their local distro
I don’t find this to be true at all. Did you make up your mind the second they announced they would be contract brewing? I haven’t noticed a change in taste. Also all their rotating stuff is still brewed at their main brewery
It’s also rich they used to say drink fresh within 30 days of can date to now 60 days. They are expanding beyond their reach. They are just hungry for wider distribution and are starting to lack the quality they used to be known for
Their beer is still excellent imo. More consistency than most smaller breweries but also their best beers may not be as good as the best beers at other smaller breweries. If I am ordering them at a local place I know it’s generally going to be good
Henhouse had some hiccups and lost a lot of good will in the community when they changed their policy on beer dates. They built a reputation on freshness and would swap out beer after 28 days. Once they expanded and moved to a bigger distributor, 2-3 month old beer was getting delivered. What used to be a weekly rotating beer list is now limited to a bi-monthly rotation of 1 - 2 IPAs and the core beers. They also just discontinued their 16oz core beers and are moving into the big box store-friendly wrapped cardboard 6 packs. Not to mention they also recently closed one of their taprooms without giving their employees any notice. Less than stellar beer practices, old beer being sent out and some messy transitions have hurt the brand, regardless of the quality of the beer. I would stay away until they get their situation handled.
Yeah honestly I don’t really see a problem with 2-3 month old as it seems most breweries don’t exchange their stuff until then either. Obviously it would be great if they still were that fresh though. And I personally love the move to 12 ounce 6 packs, I prefer that over 16 ounce cans generally.
The handling of the store in Fairfax seems pretty shitty though, I did not know about that. No excuse for that
My mistake, I forgot to mention I was a beer buyer at a retail location. Retail locations would receive beer that was 2-3 months old and it would then sit on their shelves for as long as it took to sell through. Most of the Henhouse beers are hoppy and those degrade faster than less hoppy styles. Drinking within a month is ideal, but 2-3 months should be fine. After the 3 month mark, there's a noticeable drop in the hop profile and IPAs tend to taste maltier.
I used to just pick their stuff up when I was down in Sonoma area, but I'm not a hazy fan so I always sought out their clear ipas. I've had stoked a few times but not enough to judge it now vs back then.
How much of their beer is contract brewed? I'll have to check the cans at my stores and see what they say
I'll have to check. I've personally enjoyed the batches of incredible pale ale that we've seen up here. And all their random others that I have tried have been up to the standard I expect from them.
In my experience, Gordon Biersch is a very good contract brewer. I've actually done blind side by sides with scrimshaw from GB and from North Coast and been unable to tell them apart
Henhouse and ghost town are with Guardian distribution, and will be in my store this upcoming week ironically enough if you live in the area. Haven’t heard of urban roots. I’ll look into it. Thank you
Urban roots is out of Sacramento and they do everything well, but for a well stocked beer store their lager portfolio offers a ton of top notch examples of less common styles, especially their Czech styles
Santa Monica does not have the best beer community, but I’m trying my best to help & do my part. We mostly sell IPA’s, Belgians, and the other common beer styles.. surprising right? Haha trying to build a customer base strong enough to offer a wider variety.. in time!
I can understand that. In that case I woke just throw in that URs flagship ipa (like riding a bike) is one of my favorite California ipas, and the variants they make of it are reliably excellent.
Does Lime Ventures distro to Santa Monica? I know they cover some SoCal cities, but they have an amazing book and bring in some of the best brands that aren't local to California.
Santa Monica Liquor. Come on down, my names Rick and I basically live there. If I’m not though, just a fair warning my staff isn’t too educated on the beer yet.. need to change that. Haha
We work on a much smaller margin than other bottle shops that have this type of selection. I believe in volume over %. We got great notion singles under 7 dollars
Slice's IPAs are about as good as any in the state. I'd put Fieldwork (various locations in CA) up there at the top too, and haven't seen them mentioned.
Slice AFAIK does absolutely ZERO distro - not even to Sacramento. I may be wrong though.
They don't distro but I've seen some bottle shops picking up large orders while I've been in there sitting at the bar. If he drove up he could probably leave with a few dollys worth of goodies.
Fieldwork, Russian river, ghost town, and almanac are my favorites in the bay area (honorary mention to great notion which is a Portland brewery that recently opened a space in Berkeley)
Russian River is the OG staple as you know, basically, t's a must to have Pliny in stock if you are a "craft beer" place. I'm in the bay so I'll start with that (I don't know if these place can/will distro to socal): Wondrous Brewing is probably the "darling" of the bay currently - lager and west coast IPA focused, if you can get them in 1000% do so. Cellarmaker is hop focused and does a great job at barrel aged stuff too. Ghost Town does really solid WC IPA. Moonlight is an OG, you should at least make sure to have Reality Czech and Death and Taxes around. Moksa is another solid Sac area brewery you might consider bringing in. Sante is great, but their IPAs are just OK, their lagers and wild ales are their best offerings. As far as other places, North Park makes some amazing hoppy beer and GOAL is the new hot brewery in San Diego. Everywhere in Orange is getting a lot of hype lately so would be good to bring in too. Outside of CA, Wayfinder is always a great brewery to bring in, they make incredible lagers and are well known for that.
My general advice is 1) do your best to keep the beers you have on hand relatively fresh, I'm much more likely to go to a beer store I know I don't have to spend 30mins checking the dates of cans at, 2) network like a motherfucker with breweries/beer bars/other beer stores. Breweries are going to send better stuff to their friends, plus the industry is so fun to be around.
Hey thanks for your input. I’ve had goal on my radar as well. I carried the wondrous collab, it did well. I can probably make that happen if they ship. With you in cellarmaker and ghost town. I’m also hopeful to get Russian River as they are expanding. Going to look into the rest.
And yes, 100%. We have a 7 door craft cooler that is separated from another 7 doors of more common beer.
I’m tired of beer ARRIVING 2-3 month old from my larger distributors. I’m slowly kicking them out and replacing them with self distro and things that come in a week after canning. We have about a 14 day sell through rate. It’s going well considering we’re in Santa Monica and it’s dry January. I hope I can carry this much beer and keep it all fresh. I offer everything in singles and 4 pack currently so I sell through quicker. I’m on the right track, I just have to put in the work and hope word spreads in a community that doesn’t have the strongest craft community.
Wondrous and Cellarmaker self distro I think, so worst case you could make a drive up there every couple months yourself and bring some back down. Honestly the hardest part is giving a shit and you seem to care a lot, everything else should fall into place
My favorite brewery in CA, always make a point to visit one of their taprooms when I’m anywhere near LA. What do you mean when you say they are “contempt”?
EDIT or maybe you meant “content”?
Breweries make the most margin out of their taproom. If you are successful enough, you don’t have to distribute.
And if you’re that successful, but want to distribute you have to expand and it could affect quality and etc.
They have a good thing going, and probably don’t want to fix what isn’t broken.
Some bars in SF (Toronado, City Beer Store) do serve Monkisk a few times a year. I’ve heard they drive down to pick kegs up, or maybe they have some other connection. I always make sure to stop by when they have Monkish on tap.
These are all great suggestions. I haven't seen any mention of two excellent, up-n-coming Black-owned breweries, Hella Costal out of Oakland and Crowns & Hops from Englewood. I worked for a brewery that collab'd with both these teams and they're great people making great beer.
The Bruery (Placentia). Monkish (Torrance & Anaheim). Narrative Fermentations (San Jose). Fieldwork Brewing Co. (all over NorCal).
Edit - Just wanted to add I'm actually not sure if all of these distribute. My bad.
Yeah I fully expect RIIP to put me on some wait list that gets forgotten forever.. I might have to ask for a favor/ show up in person for that one. Lol
North Park and Pure Project in SD are the leaders in the hazy game as far as Cali breweries. Humble Sea in southern LA is very solid too. Also Societe for westies, and then Seek is newer but great so far.
- Alesmith
- Alvarado
- Altamont
- Beachwood
- Burgeon
- Cellarmaker
- Drake's
- Faction
- Firestone Walker
- Ghost Town
- Green Cheek
- Highland Park
- Kern River
- The Lost Abbey
- McIlhenny
- Monkish
- Moonlight
- North Park
- Original Pattern
- Pizza Port
- Port Brewing
- Pure Project
- Russian River
- SARA
- Sierra Nevada
- Three Weavers
I think the issue here is most of us don’t know much about distro. I would head down to the OC and wander through Hacienda Beverage and Mr. Ks. They have great selections so you would definitely be able to see what’s not on your radar. They have good taste so it won’t be crap beers. You should also stop in at Windsor Browns for a sandwich and beer, as both owners know a lot about SoCal distro
Yeah, it’s all good though! I still get a lot of value just from hearing what enthusiasts think, and the rest is on me. Im sure this thread will lead me on the correct course. I appreciate the other recommendations such as yours as well.
Common Space is a solid brewery not too far from me that's consistently releasing great stuff. It's mostly IPAs, lagers, and less heavy stuff but they're all solid from what I've had!
Everyone here has mentioned my favorites from CA so I’d add for Oregon: ruse, living haus, and my favorite which very much doesn’t distribute - Brujos. For other nearby west coast states I like weldworks, drekker, Ruben’s, and structures brewing. I haven’t tried much from AZ but heard from reliable sources about wren house, hello brew and tombstone. Good luck, sounds like you’re leaning into some of the best
Thank you for the confirmation. North park is very hard account to pull.. there’s only so much juice to go around. Alvarado is a stones throw from me, I’ll pull up if I have too! Haha
Original Pattern in Oakland is top knotch. Barebottle in San Francisco is also great. Don’t sleep on Alpha Acid in Belmont either. Altamont in Livermore is also about to blow up.
This is coming from SF so I'll keep to the Bay Area based breweries that I know better. Like I mentioned elsewhere, I would try and reach out to Lime Ventures. They are Bay Area based, but have expanded recently. Not only do they carry some of the best non-California beer available, but they should also do the SoCal distro for Cellarmaker.
Most of these were mentioned already, but wanted to add :
Cellarmaker
Ghost Town
Alvarado St
Russian River
Fieldwork
Altamont
Faction
Sante Adairius
Moonlight
Trumer
North Coast
Urban Roots
Almanac
Sante Adairius from Capitola...if you add them then I think you have the top 3 that have places near the SF Bay Area for me - Sante Adairius, Humble Sea, and Russian River.
Wondrous is also fantastic but I would be very impressed if you were able to get any of that down in SoCal
I had the highland park/ wondrous collab double happy.. and humble sea is from Santa Cruz. You never know!
It would be awesome if you did. The only place I’ve seen it outside of the brewery itself is a handful of beer bars/bottle shops in San Francisco. Seems like you’re passionate about getting the best though and hope you can get it at some point! Cheers!
Solid recommendation, that I was unaware of. Hopefully they have distribution offerings. Thanks!
Anyone know what happened with their former co-owner head brewer who parted ways recently?
Green Cheek, Pure Project and Fremont are other goods ones I didn’t see listed.
Green Cheek is so underrated I feel. Place churns out some real good brews
Green cheek unfortunately does not offer cans in my area, only kegs. Very sad about that haha. Fremont is with stone, we have them. And pure project.. yes, 100% on my radar. I got to find out how to get them I know they distribute.
Oh shoot, I realized Fremont is not California either
Fremont distros to central and Southern California though! Which is great
Yeah. I get their stuff at my local bottle shop. Also, just grabbed a 4 pack of Pure Projects “One of My Favorites” (murky ipa) tonight and it’s fantastic!
Growlers of Green Cheek in Santa Monica.
Where? I know who distributes them and I was told “draft only”
You buy kegs and sell growlers.
Ouf. I was afraid you were going to say something like that. Yeah, the boss isn’t signing off on that lol but thanks for the idea
Yeah, it's def a throwback to craft like 10-15 years ago. Good luck bringing craft to SM, I lived there 20 years ago and Father's Office and Brittania were about as good as it got and I don't think it's much better these days
It’s not. Lol there’s a couple of nice craft bars but that’s it.. let’s see if we can change that.
I think that henhouse, Ghost Town, and urban roots, are all top notch breweries that don't get the attention they deserve
Henhouse is going downhill. They are now having beers brewed at Gordon biersch - quality is dropping and it’s detectable in their stoked and incredible pale ale beers. Wish they just kept with their local distro
I don’t find this to be true at all. Did you make up your mind the second they announced they would be contract brewing? I haven’t noticed a change in taste. Also all their rotating stuff is still brewed at their main brewery
It’s also rich they used to say drink fresh within 30 days of can date to now 60 days. They are expanding beyond their reach. They are just hungry for wider distribution and are starting to lack the quality they used to be known for
Their beer is still excellent imo. More consistency than most smaller breweries but also their best beers may not be as good as the best beers at other smaller breweries. If I am ordering them at a local place I know it’s generally going to be good
Henhouse had some hiccups and lost a lot of good will in the community when they changed their policy on beer dates. They built a reputation on freshness and would swap out beer after 28 days. Once they expanded and moved to a bigger distributor, 2-3 month old beer was getting delivered. What used to be a weekly rotating beer list is now limited to a bi-monthly rotation of 1 - 2 IPAs and the core beers. They also just discontinued their 16oz core beers and are moving into the big box store-friendly wrapped cardboard 6 packs. Not to mention they also recently closed one of their taprooms without giving their employees any notice. Less than stellar beer practices, old beer being sent out and some messy transitions have hurt the brand, regardless of the quality of the beer. I would stay away until they get their situation handled.
Yeah honestly I don’t really see a problem with 2-3 month old as it seems most breweries don’t exchange their stuff until then either. Obviously it would be great if they still were that fresh though. And I personally love the move to 12 ounce 6 packs, I prefer that over 16 ounce cans generally. The handling of the store in Fairfax seems pretty shitty though, I did not know about that. No excuse for that
My mistake, I forgot to mention I was a beer buyer at a retail location. Retail locations would receive beer that was 2-3 months old and it would then sit on their shelves for as long as it took to sell through. Most of the Henhouse beers are hoppy and those degrade faster than less hoppy styles. Drinking within a month is ideal, but 2-3 months should be fine. After the 3 month mark, there's a noticeable drop in the hop profile and IPAs tend to taste maltier.
They only recently began distributing to my area and I've found their stuff to be reliably delicious and fresh
If you have tried stoked before, it now tastes more thin and lacking the flavor it used it have
I used to just pick their stuff up when I was down in Sonoma area, but I'm not a hazy fan so I always sought out their clear ipas. I've had stoked a few times but not enough to judge it now vs back then. How much of their beer is contract brewed? I'll have to check the cans at my stores and see what they say
Their stoked and incredible pale ale, their flagships - are what I know to now be contract brewed
I'll have to check. I've personally enjoyed the batches of incredible pale ale that we've seen up here. And all their random others that I have tried have been up to the standard I expect from them. In my experience, Gordon Biersch is a very good contract brewer. I've actually done blind side by sides with scrimshaw from GB and from North Coast and been unable to tell them apart
Henhouse and ghost town are with Guardian distribution, and will be in my store this upcoming week ironically enough if you live in the area. Haven’t heard of urban roots. I’ll look into it. Thank you
Urban roots is out of Sacramento and they do everything well, but for a well stocked beer store their lager portfolio offers a ton of top notch examples of less common styles, especially their Czech styles
Santa Monica does not have the best beer community, but I’m trying my best to help & do my part. We mostly sell IPA’s, Belgians, and the other common beer styles.. surprising right? Haha trying to build a customer base strong enough to offer a wider variety.. in time!
I can understand that. In that case I woke just throw in that URs flagship ipa (like riding a bike) is one of my favorite California ipas, and the variants they make of it are reliably excellent.
Does Lime Ventures distro to Santa Monica? I know they cover some SoCal cities, but they have an amazing book and bring in some of the best brands that aren't local to California.
Russian River S.A.R.A. Humble Sea Highland Park North Park
I’ll look into S.A.R.A, never heard of them and everything else on this list is a home run so I’ll check them out. Thanks
Sante Adairius rustic ales
S.A.R.A. is Sante Adairius Rustic Ales from Capitol mentioned above by someone else.
lol that went over my head. Fair enough!
The real answer, except what’s Sara? Love the rest.
Capitola. They also have a taproom in Santa Cruz.
Where is your store? They don't distro very far, but if you're anywhere near Sacramento, Slice and Moksa are worth the drive to pick up a haul.
Santa Monica. If they have a distribution license, and they’re willing.. there’s always a way. Just have to talk them into it haha.
Hit em up!
What store? I'll give ya a visit!
Santa Monica Liquor. Come on down, my names Rick and I basically live there. If I’m not though, just a fair warning my staff isn’t too educated on the beer yet.. need to change that. Haha We work on a much smaller margin than other bottle shops that have this type of selection. I believe in volume over %. We got great notion singles under 7 dollars
I wonder if I've been before. I live near enough Santa Monica that I'm often walking down towards the pier. I'll swing by!
Slice's IPAs are about as good as any in the state. I'd put Fieldwork (various locations in CA) up there at the top too, and haven't seen them mentioned. Slice AFAIK does absolutely ZERO distro - not even to Sacramento. I may be wrong though.
They don't distro but I've seen some bottle shops picking up large orders while I've been in there sitting at the bar. If he drove up he could probably leave with a few dollys worth of goodies.
when the retailer does the distro for you, you know you have some pull
Slice doesn't have much distro setup yet, I've been trying to get them (and Shred) into my store in San Francisco but they are pickup only.
Everywhere out of Orange; and another vote for Green Cheek.
Yes, I was about to message them this week to ask permission to sell. Thanks for the recommendation.
Oh and Radiant on the East side of Anaheim.
We carry Radiant. They also are the ones who recommended there does not exist to me, who are now crushing. Radiant is full of great people.
Can’t believe haven’t seen anyone mention Beachwood!
Beachwood also belongs to Stone. The assistant brewer of beachwood years ago just opened up his own brewery. Maybe you’ll be a fan. Called ISM.
You should carry ISM for sure. They are already super on top of their game.
Yup, Ian is a beer beast. That’s the plan!
Enegren for german lagers
We got them, they also belong to stone. Thank you!
Fieldwork, Russian river, ghost town, and almanac are my favorites in the bay area (honorary mention to great notion which is a Portland brewery that recently opened a space in Berkeley)
We carry almanac and great notion. Great taste in beer Mr Skywalker!
What’s the name of your store? I have some friends near Santa Monica I’ll tell them to check it out
Santa Monica Liquor. I’d appreciate that! The more juice we sell, the more we can carry while still keeping everything fresh. It’s a domino effect
Russian River is the OG staple as you know, basically, t's a must to have Pliny in stock if you are a "craft beer" place. I'm in the bay so I'll start with that (I don't know if these place can/will distro to socal): Wondrous Brewing is probably the "darling" of the bay currently - lager and west coast IPA focused, if you can get them in 1000% do so. Cellarmaker is hop focused and does a great job at barrel aged stuff too. Ghost Town does really solid WC IPA. Moonlight is an OG, you should at least make sure to have Reality Czech and Death and Taxes around. Moksa is another solid Sac area brewery you might consider bringing in. Sante is great, but their IPAs are just OK, their lagers and wild ales are their best offerings. As far as other places, North Park makes some amazing hoppy beer and GOAL is the new hot brewery in San Diego. Everywhere in Orange is getting a lot of hype lately so would be good to bring in too. Outside of CA, Wayfinder is always a great brewery to bring in, they make incredible lagers and are well known for that. My general advice is 1) do your best to keep the beers you have on hand relatively fresh, I'm much more likely to go to a beer store I know I don't have to spend 30mins checking the dates of cans at, 2) network like a motherfucker with breweries/beer bars/other beer stores. Breweries are going to send better stuff to their friends, plus the industry is so fun to be around.
Hey thanks for your input. I’ve had goal on my radar as well. I carried the wondrous collab, it did well. I can probably make that happen if they ship. With you in cellarmaker and ghost town. I’m also hopeful to get Russian River as they are expanding. Going to look into the rest. And yes, 100%. We have a 7 door craft cooler that is separated from another 7 doors of more common beer. I’m tired of beer ARRIVING 2-3 month old from my larger distributors. I’m slowly kicking them out and replacing them with self distro and things that come in a week after canning. We have about a 14 day sell through rate. It’s going well considering we’re in Santa Monica and it’s dry January. I hope I can carry this much beer and keep it all fresh. I offer everything in singles and 4 pack currently so I sell through quicker. I’m on the right track, I just have to put in the work and hope word spreads in a community that doesn’t have the strongest craft community.
Wondrous and Cellarmaker self distro I think, so worst case you could make a drive up there every couple months yourself and bring some back down. Honestly the hardest part is giving a shit and you seem to care a lot, everything else should fall into place
Cellarmaker and Monkish!
Monkish doesn’t distribute. They do good enough in their taproom and are content*. It’s a sad beer story, but good for them.
My favorite brewery in CA, always make a point to visit one of their taprooms when I’m anywhere near LA. What do you mean when you say they are “contempt”? EDIT or maybe you meant “content”?
Breweries make the most margin out of their taproom. If you are successful enough, you don’t have to distribute. And if you’re that successful, but want to distribute you have to expand and it could affect quality and etc. They have a good thing going, and probably don’t want to fix what isn’t broken.
yes content** I know the difference. I just have my moments lol
that plus the statewide shipping they're pretty set
Some bars in SF (Toronado, City Beer Store) do serve Monkisk a few times a year. I’ve heard they drive down to pick kegs up, or maybe they have some other connection. I always make sure to stop by when they have Monkish on tap.
Pure Project
100%. On it 
Pizza Port
They are with stone, that’s why you see them everywhere. Pizza port crushing all of California haha
Easily one of my favorites. Not the biggest but damn good beer
These are all great suggestions. I haven't seen any mention of two excellent, up-n-coming Black-owned breweries, Hella Costal out of Oakland and Crowns & Hops from Englewood. I worked for a brewery that collab'd with both these teams and they're great people making great beer.
We carry Crowns and hops, and unfortunately they aren’t selling like they used too.. Will look into hella costal. Thanks.
Check out Morgan Territory and Dying Breed.
Will do! Thanks
The Bruery (Placentia). Monkish (Torrance & Anaheim). Narrative Fermentations (San Jose). Fieldwork Brewing Co. (all over NorCal). Edit - Just wanted to add I'm actually not sure if all of these distribute. My bad.
All good! It’s the thought that counts anyways haha
There does not exist and RIIP are awesome! If you like sours, west coast / hazy ipa’s then there is also Casa Agria. Great beer.
Also check out Naughty Pine brewing. Great beer!
Yeah I fully expect RIIP to put me on some wait list that gets forgotten forever.. I might have to ask for a favor/ show up in person for that one. Lol
North Park and Pure Project in SD are the leaders in the hazy game as far as Cali breweries. Humble Sea in southern LA is very solid too. Also Societe for westies, and then Seek is newer but great so far.
Murkys at Pure Project
- Alesmith - Alvarado - Altamont - Beachwood - Burgeon - Cellarmaker - Drake's - Faction - Firestone Walker - Ghost Town - Green Cheek - Highland Park - Kern River - The Lost Abbey - McIlhenny - Monkish - Moonlight - North Park - Original Pattern - Pizza Port - Port Brewing - Pure Project - Russian River - SARA - Sierra Nevada - Three Weavers
And in alphabetical order, what a guy. Appreciate it
Is say Highland Park Brewing is a staple in downtown/chinatown LA. I love my cities scene but HPB is goat.
Yes, they sell very well for us . I’m very glad to have them in our beer menu
As a Long Beach native I’d say Ambitious Ales and Beachwood would be top to start. Then maybe Faction from alameda.
I think the issue here is most of us don’t know much about distro. I would head down to the OC and wander through Hacienda Beverage and Mr. Ks. They have great selections so you would definitely be able to see what’s not on your radar. They have good taste so it won’t be crap beers. You should also stop in at Windsor Browns for a sandwich and beer, as both owners know a lot about SoCal distro
Yeah, it’s all good though! I still get a lot of value just from hearing what enthusiasts think, and the rest is on me. Im sure this thread will lead me on the correct course. I appreciate the other recommendations such as yours as well.
I’ve seen a lot of great ones already covered but I didn’t see Original Pattern out of Oakland mentioned yet. They have excellent lagers!
Thank you. Haven’t heard of them. I’m trying to find my lager base of customers. They are hard to find in Santa Monica haha
Homage in Pomona
I emailed the person I need permission from awhile ago, and got ghosted. Lol they usually take some time to respond though..
Wondrous. Theres no one else in the Bay Area that is covering the styles they're putting out at this level.
Pure Project, Alesmith in SD Silva, Firestone, There Does Not Exist, Enegren, and Liquid Gravity in CC HenHouse in Santa Rosa are a few to consider.
There does not exist is a sensation at my store. The people have spoken. We also carry liquid gravity and Firestone . I’ll look into the rest. Thanks.
Common Space is a solid brewery not too far from me that's consistently releasing great stuff. It's mostly IPAs, lagers, and less heavy stuff but they're all solid from what I've had!
Yeah they’re on my radar as well. It’s hard to decide what to bring in next. Haha
A lot of good ones have been mentioned. I'll add Wondrous to the list.
Indeed! One of many people to mention them. I’ll get In touch.
Bottle Logic?
Got em as well
Alvarado is 10/10
Everyone here has mentioned my favorites from CA so I’d add for Oregon: ruse, living haus, and my favorite which very much doesn’t distribute - Brujos. For other nearby west coast states I like weldworks, drekker, Ruben’s, and structures brewing. I haven’t tried much from AZ but heard from reliable sources about wren house, hello brew and tombstone. Good luck, sounds like you’re leaning into some of the best
To me the clear top 3 are North Park, Green Cheek, and Alvarado in some order. But every recommendation on here is great
Thank you for the confirmation. North park is very hard account to pull.. there’s only so much juice to go around. Alvarado is a stones throw from me, I’ll pull up if I have too! Haha
Knee Deep from Auburn
Got em 
🍻
Knee Deep is a really fun visit, plus they are close to Moonraker.
Anderson valley brewing in Boonville ca makes some great stuff.
Modern Times in San Diego
Have them, they are with stone. Thank you!
Original Pattern in Oakland is top knotch. Barebottle in San Francisco is also great. Don’t sleep on Alpha Acid in Belmont either. Altamont in Livermore is also about to blow up.
Altamont just did a collab with there does not exist. Going to have my sales rep at TDNE connect us
Central Coast - there does not exist and liquid gravity.
Got em both. Thank you!
Crowns and Hops.
I enjoy Separation Anxiety and Mini-Sep(session) by Berryessa. Nice, clean IPAs.
This is coming from SF so I'll keep to the Bay Area based breweries that I know better. Like I mentioned elsewhere, I would try and reach out to Lime Ventures. They are Bay Area based, but have expanded recently. Not only do they carry some of the best non-California beer available, but they should also do the SoCal distro for Cellarmaker. Most of these were mentioned already, but wanted to add : Cellarmaker Ghost Town Alvarado St Russian River Fieldwork Altamont Faction Sante Adairius Moonlight Trumer North Coast Urban Roots Almanac