Hop Forged Brewing Company to Close After Years of Economic Struggles

We have tried everything within our power to keep business going, but it's time we accept our fate." That's the message Aj and Brian posted to social media on March 19, announcing that Hop Forged Brewing Company, their taproom at 106 W. 7th St. in Hanford, California, will be closing its doors after nearly seven years in business.

The two owners, both born and raised in Hanford, started the brand in their garage in 2012 and built everything from scratch before finally opening a taproom in 2019. Nine months after they opened, COVID hit. The lingering effects of the pandemic combined with a punishing economy made the obstacles, as they described it, too overwhelming to overcome.

No final closing date has been set. The company said the doors will stay open until the remaining beer is gone, which means there's still a narrow window to show up and raise a pint at the bar where Hanford's craft beer community gathered.

For regulars, that window feels brutally short. Mackenzie Jacobsen and Caileigh Barlow, who made Wednesday bingo nights at Hop Forged part of their weekly routine, showed up after the announcement to start saying their goodbyes. "We decided we would come today and hopefully a few more times before they closed," Barlow said. "We're going to miss this place for sure."

The closure is resonating well beyond the regulars. Jeff Pfaff, a visitor from Washington, framed the loss in terms that any small-market beer drinker would recognize immediately. "This is it," he said. "If we don't go here, where do we go? We go to Visalia? Well then, now Hanford loses out." Pfaff called Hop Forged one of the few breweries left in the area and a genuine community hub, not just a place to grab a craft pint.

That description holds up. A taproom that started as a garage homebrew project, scaled up over seven years into a physical space on Main Street, survived a pandemic that shuttered countless other small breweries, and still managed to build the kind of loyal Wednesday-night crowd that shows up on short notice just to say goodbye — that's not a business that failed for lack of effort. It's one that ran out of runway.