Pearl Brewing Company
The site owned and operated by the Pearl Brewing Company was originally known as both the J. B. Behloradsky Brewery (1881–1883) and the City Brewery. Privately held and poorly run for two years, the City Brewery was purchased by an investment group in 1883. The investment group was composed of local businessmen and several moguls already involved in brewing at San Antonio's other major brewery, the Lone Star Brewing Company. Together they formed the San Antonio Brewing Company (1883–1888), and began to raise capital to fully restart and improve operations at the brewery. In 1886, after three years, the company had secured the necessary capital and began full-time operations at the brewery again. The name San Antonio Brewing Association was used as a parent to the brewing company, since it also managed some of the founding members' other business interests. Functionally, the business structure worked, but it caused confusion with city officials, customers, and business partners; therefore, in the end, the investment group dissolved the San Antonio Brewing Company and used the San Antonio Brewing Association (1888–1918) name for all operations and business transactions. Thus, in seven years, the same brewery had three different names. In addition, the name City Brewery was frequently used. The first logos used for the San Antonio Brewing Company/Association even featured the name City Brewery in the logo. City Brewery was carried over from the Behloradsky days and was used until the beginning of Prohibition in 1918.
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.