Pearl Brewing Company
The Pearl Brewing Company (also known as the Pearl Brewery or just Pearl) was an American brewery, established in 1883 in Downtown San Antonio, Texas, USA. In 1985, Pearl's parent company purchased the Pabst Brewing Company and assumed the Pabst name. In 1999, the Pabst Brewing Company began transferring its production to Miller Brewing, on a contract basis, and closing all of its breweries. Pearl beer is still in production at Miller's Ft. Worth, Texas facility, but the Pearl Brewery in San Antonio was closed in 2001. Since then, the former brewery was purchased by Silver Ventures, Inc., which has made the property the crown jewel in revitalization efforts of southern Midtown and northern Downtown San Antonio.
Jacob Schmidt Brewing Company
In 1991 a group of Local investors reopened the Brewery under the name of the Minnesota Brewing Company. With the reopening of the brewery a contest was held to name the flagship beer for the brewery, the two names with the most votes were Landmark in first and Pig's Eye in second; the former for the Breweries iconic status in the West St. Paul neighborhood and the latter for the man credited with founding St. Paul. It was at this time that the iconic flashing Schmidt's sign that had long spanned the cat walk connecting the grain silos and the breweries tower was removed and replaced with the non-lighting "Landmark" sign. Landmark beer was met with little success and in 1992 the brewery released Pig's Eye Pilsner to much affair. It was at this time that the company started to revitalize the Grain Belt brand, and began contract brewing for many small independent companies including Pete's Wicked Ale, one of the first craft brewers in Minnesota.
The brewery saw some success in the mid and late 1990s, running the brewery at almost its capacity of 1.2 million barrels per year. The Brewery was also able to hire back employees laid off by Heileman's closing of the brewery who still needed work. Trouble found the brewery though and a combination of the brewery being too big to distribute just in the immediate area, but not large enough to distribute on a national level, outdated inefficient equipment, and the companies that contracted through them sometimes going out of business leaving the brewery full of vats of unpaid for beer as well as labels for said brands, caused the brewery to shut down for good in 2002.