Aaron Uhl is no stranger to taking the road less traveled. The former founder of Boulder’s now-shuttered Uhl’s Brewing took an unconventional path toward realizing his dream of owning his own brewery. And while Uhl’s ultimately shuttered its doors almost exactly a year ago, Uhl himself has announced his return to the Colorado brewing scene by teaming up with new business partner, Dan Colbourne, to revive the Renegade Brewing brand, which announced its own closure just three months prior. And while it’ll be a few months before the revamped Renegade re-opens, they’ll be making a splash by pouring some special beers at this weekend’s Wibby’s Hooplagers Festival on Saturday, July 19.

With no prior formal brewing experience, Uhl first moved to Colorado to pursue a passion as a semi-professional mountain biker while working at a local cycling shop. He was first introduced to home brewing by a co-worker and instead of taking the more conventional approach of enlisting in a local homebrew club, Uhl was drawn more toward biking with brewers leading to close friendships with the founders of Avery Brewing Company, Cellar West Artisan Ales, and Sanitas. Many of those rides often concluded over beers at those respective breweries or others like Mountain Sun Pubs and Oasis Brewing, which inspired Uhl to explore an endless possibility of styles, adjuncts, and techniques like barrel-aging extending beyond just the classics.

Uhl would eventually become consumed by his new hobby to the point where he had to leave his place of employment because he couldn’t stop talking to customers about beer. And by 2018, after tallying a slew of local home brew competitions, Uhl was able to convince the team at Sanitas Brewing to allow him to brew on their system as a “gypsy brewery” as a way to kick-start Uhl’s Brewing Co. in 2018. 

Uhl would use this momentum to open his own brick-and-mortar brewery in the space previously occupied by Wild Woods Brewing, with hopes of carving out a niche focusing on Hazy IPAs and big barrel-aged beers in addition to their wide-ranging styles that include Lagers, Sours and trendy Smoothie-style IPAs. However, just as the rising young brewery was beginning to hit its stride, taking home a bronze medal at the 2023 World Beer Cup for the only entry they submitted with their Coffee Roasters Imperial Milk Stout Aged on Boxcar Coffee Beans and Vanilla, a series of setbacks including a lack of PPP support, distribution hanging ups, and on-going staffing issues all stemming from COVID would force the brewery to call it quits in July 2023.

While Denver’s storied brewing history has often been credited to the successes of pioneers like Great Divide, Wynkoop, and even Tivoli before them, Renegade Brewing, joined by the likes of Strange Craft Beer, Wit’s End, Crooked Stave, and Copper Kettle, helped to usher in of a new wave of breweries that formed the foundation of the modern era of craft brewing in the Mile High City. Joining a handful of other early innovators who pushed the boundary on beer styles, Renegade found early success with bolder styles like their Endpoint Triple IPA, Redacted Rye IPA, Hammer Imperial Stout, and Depravity Peanut Butter Cup Stout, to name a few.

By 2015, Renegade was ready to take its next big leap, opening a 15,000-square-foot production facility in order to keep up with its double-digit growth trajectory. But soon thereafter, a sharp decline in sales forced the brewery to turn to Silver Fox Partners to help finance their expanded distribution and production plans. Renegade’s decline would be further accelerated when a deal-in-place with Good River Brewing for a partnership to contract brew their beer and host their tasting room at Renegade’s production facility ultimately fell through in the middle of COVID. And despite efforts to re-open the brewery and keep it operational by then head brewer, Jack Meyer, Renegade would shut its doors in April 2024. 

In addition to doing things the unconventional way, Uhl has always been a fighter, so the decision to walk away from his first brick-and-mortar brewery was not one that came easy. 

“Letting go is really hard, it’s an emotional roller coaster that can only be compared to losing a loved one,” explained Uhl. 

“Mistakes will be made, but there’s no reason to get angry about them, and some factors are completely out of your control. In the end, it’s about figuring out how to come up with a fix. We as brewers always have problems to solve.”

As Uhl worked through solving the problem of finding a hail mary to save his brewery, he was introduced to Dan Colbourne, a CPA with a successful background in owning and operating several successful self-wellness franchises. Like Uhl, Colbourne is an award-winning home brewer on the side, with a particular proclivity for barrel-aged beers. Colbourne had been eyeing the perfect opportunity to get involved in a commercial brewing investment,  and while the two weren’t able to save Uhl’s Brewing, they did keep in contact with hopes of working together on breathing new life into another struggling brand that just needed some help in righting the ship.

In their search, Uhl and Colbourne began secret shopping a number of breweries that had a certain mold, with the most important factors being a brewery that was community-driven and located within talking distance of a dense residential neighborhood, opportunities for organic growth, numbers that made sense financially, and unlike Uhl’s previously, a brewery that wasn’t centered around outside distribution sales. And while Renegade saw its own struggles in recent years, the legacy brewery happened to check all of those boxes.

“It was one of the very few breweries that was nestled in a community of homes with walking distance to an engaged drinking community,” explained Colbourne. “They did a great job of building a devoted following for many years and we thought the beer was so important to laying the groundwork for Colorado’s beer scene, but I think we can bring some value. Aaron has a gift, the biggest of which is that he’s incredibly creative.”

Uhl and Colbourne will bring that creative flare to the refreshed Renegade Brewing when it re-opens in mid-August. The switch to a brewpub license will allow Renegade to serve outside alcohol and initially will operate like a beer bar serving up specialty beers ranging from locals who helped Uhl along his journey including, Call to Arms, WestFax, River North, CODA Brewing, Twisted Pine, Upslope, Wild Provisions, 4 Noses, and more, as well as rarer offerings from the likes of Russian River and imported traditional Belgian breweries. 

Meanwhile, the taproom and brand itself will initially feel pretty familiar with a slightly refreshed logo, and some minor cosmetic updates to the tasting room, before larger upgrades including expanded indoor seating and a larger outdoor patio footprint get layered in in the months to follow.

Additionally, Uhl is already fast at work installing a new 10-barrel brew system which will be more specifically catered to brewing a wider diversity of beers. The duo mentioned that while they now own all intellectual property and recipes previously owned by Renegade, once the new brew system is finally up and running they will be focusing on styles more aligned with what was brew at Uhl’s ranging from barrel-aged beers, smoothie-style IPAs and Hazy IPAs to crisp clean Lagers.

Speaking to Uhl feels like a man who’s received a new lease on life. Having survived the misfortune of a series of unfortunate circumstances from his first go-around, Uhl is also acutely aware that the craft beer landscape has changed, and is taking precautions to avoid some of the pitfalls that have crippled many small breweries in recent months. While the plan is to begin canning their products once the new brewhouse is online, including wading into ready-to-drink cocktails, Uhl and Colbourne are united in focusing predominately on on-site sales. And while both share an affinity for barrel-aged beers, they also recognize that the specialty style won’t be the primary focus.

“We’re still going to offer everything, we just can’t have a stock of 50 barrels. We’ll be extremely thoughtful of how we approach our barrel-age program as we plan to only release 12 different BA beers a year, mostly through a membership program,” explained Uhl. “The days of people waiting in line for barrel-aged beer releases are over.”

While the new-look Renegade still has a ways to go before their targeted August 17 re-opening date, those looking to reconnect with Uhl and Colbourne will get a chance this weekend at Wibby Brewing’s Hooplagers beer festival. Renegade will have a booth on-site pouring guest lagers from Tripping Animals Brewing and Thin Man Brewing.

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