Wico Street Beer Co. to close, another blow to Pigtown brewery district

Wico Street Beer Co. will close at the end of May, cutting short a little more than three years in Pigtown and removing one of the original anchors of the South Baltimore Brewery District. The arcade-themed brewery at 1100 Wicomico Street announced the shutdown on social media Tuesday morning.

The business opened on Nov. 18, 2022, in a 4,200-square-foot first-floor space in the 1100 Wicomico building. It quickly became part of a small cluster of breweries near the stadiums, alongside Checkerspot Brewing Co., Pickett Brewing Company and Suspended Brewing Company, which joined forces to launch the South Baltimore Brewery District with an inaugural event on Oct. 28, 2023. The district’s breweries were marketed as being within a mile of one another, a selling point meant to turn Pigtown and nearby South Baltimore blocks into a walkable craft beer destination.

Wico Street was owned by cousins Jordan McGraw and Michael Richardson. McGraw brought 14 years of brewing experience to the project, with past work at Hysteria Brewing Company, Full Tilt Brewing and Oliver Brewing Company, while Richardson brought a finance background. The brewery was pitched as more than a taproom from the start, with pinball machines, game-night programming and a retro, game-room feel that made it a neighborhood hangout as much as a beer stop.

That identity helped the brewery build a following. In November 2024, Wico Street marked its second birthday with a four-day event centered on beer, food, pinball and the arts, underscoring how deeply it had become tied to the district’s social life. Its closure now leaves a gap not just in the tap list, but in the daily foot traffic that supports nearby merchants, workers and other small businesses trying to draw people into the area before and after games.

The shutdown also lands at a difficult moment for independent beverage businesses across Baltimore and beyond. Wico Street’s owners pointed to rising costs, changing consumer habits and a tough sales climate, the same pressures that have forced many small breweries to tighten margins or scale back ambitions. In Pigtown, where the brewery district was built around the idea that customers would move from one local taproom to the next, losing one of the founding stops weakens that pitch. By the end of May, one more storefront in the corridor will go quiet, and the neighborhood will feel the loss well beyond the brewery’s front door.