Quaff ON! Brewing closes Indiana brewery, shifts to Sun King contract brewing

Quaff ON! Brewing Company closed its production brewery in Nashville, Indiana, and moved beer production into a contract-brewing arrangement with Sun King Brewery in Indianapolis. For Brown County, that means the company’s name stays in circulation even as its own production footprint disappears from town, taking with it the jobs, logistics, and physical presence tied to running a brewery of its own.

Quaff ON! says the brand was born in 2012 in the heart of Brown County in response to demand for beers developed at Big Woods Brewing Company. Indiana business filings show Quaff On Brewing Company, LLC was filed on April 1, 2013. Big Woods restaurants still list Quaff ON! beer on their websites, and Hard Truth Distilling Co. continues to list it as its sister brewery beer, so the label remains visible in the local hospitality network even as production shifts north.

Sun King gives the deal the scale Quaff ON! was looking for. The Indianapolis brewery first shipped kegs in July 2009 and says it became Indianapolis’s first full-scale production brewery in more than half a century. It also says it is the second-largest beer brewer in Indiana, which helps explain why a smaller Brown County brand can lean on its capacity instead of trying to carry its own load. Quaff ON! and Sun King said the partnership also includes a switch from glass bottles to cans for packaged Quaff ON! beer.

Jeff McCabe said Quaff ON! is not as capacity-limited with Sun King and added, “Over the next six months, we expect to see a meaningful uptick in production.” Timothy O’Bryan said the transition had already begun and should be complete in summer 2026. Sun King said Quaff ON! beers will still be sold at Big Woods restaurants, Hard Truth Distilling Co. locations, and through statewide retail and draft distribution. The brewery also framed the move as part of a larger industry adjustment, saying breweries are increasingly collaborating “to maximize production capabilities, streamline operations, and continue delivering beer in a rapidly evolving marketplace.”

That’s the survival story inside this closure: not a brand vanishing, but a brewery shedding its own tanks and brewhouse to buy time, flexibility, and output in a tighter market. With Indiana’s craft beer industry shrinking again in 2025 and U.S. craft beer production down 4% that year, Quaff ON!’s Nashville shutdown reads less like an isolated retreat than a test case for how regional brands in the Midwest are trying to stay alive.