Bridge Up Brewing Company: Serving memories taproom by taproom

by Mary Ann Hermansen

Among the bikes or a car, garage gear and equipment, sometimes what's nestled neatly in bins or organized along the walls can reveal a budding artisan. This is the story of Bridge Up Brewing Company and Trent Snyder.

“My brother was your realtor and saw brewing equipment in your garage. Why don’t you come and meet with me? I want to start a brewery,” stated Jason Estes over the phone. Trent Snyder and his family had recently moved back to the Door County area in pursuit of returning to his roots for his daughters.Trent planned to apply his experience as a teacher into figuring out a career path when he got settled, but the Estes brothers, Steve, Trent’s realtor and friend, and Jason, owner of Sonny’s Pizzeria in Sturgeon Bay had other plans.

Shortly after that phone call, Trent met with Jason and they talked beer, talked Door County, and talked about the space Jason and his wife, Laura, had designed for Sonny’s. A few hours later, Jason abruptly announced to Trent that he would be the brewer. To put Trent at ease, Jason sent him to California to meet various brewers who had started relatively the same way, as guys with a hobby who sat and brewed with their buddies. In California, Trent talked, took notes, asked questions, exchanged ideas, took more notes, and came back to Door County to start brewing for Jason and Laura. 

The learning he did among California brewers continues back home in Wisconsin. Trent and other brewers maintain that brewers are a group who work together and help each other out. 

“Especially up here. We have about six months to make our hay. We have to help each other.  I have no problem calling another brewer and asking why a new recipe tastes a certain way and working through what might have gone wrong. I do the same for them. We share ideas and we share ingredients. Someone runs out of wheat, someone gives them a bag.”  Phone calls like, “Have you tried this?” are common. Trent asserts that brewers are generally not competitive; many of them started with a kit in their garage. “We are all just brewing beer.”  Trent’s gregarious, easy-going way undoubtedly makes it easy for others to reach out to him.  

The taproom
“‘Beer people don’t want to sit at a bar,’  Trent recalls telling Jason at Sonny's. ‘They want a tap room, an area where they can even see where the beer is created.’”

Trent approached building a tap room the same way he approached becoming a professional brewer. He asked questions, read a lot, and figured things out along the way. Bridge Up Tap Room became reality.  

The tap room in Sturgeon Bay is a small brewery. In fact, they still brew one batch at a time. Demand eventually dictated that Trent needed to contract out to Three Sheeps Brewing in Sheboygan. He provides them with his recipes for popular beers that are on tap regularly. His brews are ale heavy; lagers take more time to create and also require a lot more physical space because they have to sit longer. Trent likes to experiment and the products in his surrounding community allows him to do so.  He will not use extracts in beer; he creates his Coconut Blonde Ale from real cookies, throws fresh dill, dill seed, and a gallon of pickle juice in his pickle beer, and uses a dehydrated peanut butter powder for his peanut butter beer, among others.

Trent took the leap into a new career for himself but also the Esteses, his staff, local farms, vendors, and the Door County community, which paid off. Eventually, Jason and Trent started planning to move their brewery north and casually looking for space.

Enter The Cherry Hut
The Cherry Hut, which Ray Slaby opened in 1950, was built to be what the name suggests. For decades it was a roadside stop to buy cherries from the owner’s orchard. Its one oven provided pies and eventually it became a small market of jams, pickles, postcards, and other items tourists sought.  Jason Estes purchased it and told Trent, “Here you go.  Make another tap room.”  Trent used the COVID stay at home orders to plan and put into motion this new business and The Cherry Hut tap room, called Bridge Up North, is now in its fourth season.

“Sturgeon Bay is a fly over area—people think that when they are in Sturgeon Bay they aren’t in Door County yet.  That's just not true, but building up in Fish Creek brought Bridge Up beer to people who vacation further north,” Trent explained. 

While the Cherry Hut was never designed to be a full kitchen, Trent and his staff have industriously figured out how to bring his patrons food in a small space. Anyone enjoying beer or wine on the patio can grab the list of choices, their names indicating Trent’s charisma—the Doco Loco, the Flip Flops and Flannels, the Backroads Style. Guests complete the order form on their table, walk it inside to a zip line of sorts and swing it into the kitchen. There's a sense of nostalgia seeing handwritten orders hanging on the line, beckoning Mike to turn them into nachos topped with beer cheese or pecan smoked rib tips. 

The order “zip line” is only a small part of The Hut’s unique space. The wine area offers hundreds of bottles for guests to choose from and the tasting area is in its own quiet corner.  Trent sources his wine from Lo Duca Wines out of New Berlin, WI.  The small market features items from local artists, orchards, bakeries, and well known Door County products such as Elsie Mae’s pie and Door County Custom Meats.  Trent expressed that one of his favorite parts of his job is designing the space, and generating ideas for guests to feel at home. Brewing itself is a lot of cleaning and waiting, but being among people is invigorating. The Cherry Hut’s space allows for an experience to shop local, enjoy wine or family spaces, including bag toss and grass games.

And that is exactly what Trent wants. He wants his guests to just be who they are, be at home in the space he has created. Trent is emphatic that he does not serve beer; he serves people. He serves his fellow door county residents, the worker in his jeans and boots, the families who have just spent the day at the beach, the college students who work long days and just want to hangout with their friends after a shift. “We are about building positive memories. While I do have some favorite beers, when I think about the best beer I have had, I don’t know if I think of a specific beer, I think of a day, a space, the person I was with, the entire experience, and that is the memory that stays with me.” Trent prides himself on hiring staff that will help him ensure that guests feel at home in his taprooms. In fact, Trent credits much of his success to having a staff of incredible people. “I take great care in making good hires, people who love the work and love people. I hire people with diverse backgrounds and awesome personalities, as I find they enjoy interacting with patrons and take pride in helping to create positive memories.”    

Maybe the next beer should be called "Serendipity" representing both beer and memories because of a messy garage. 

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