Which of these 14 West Coast breweries could be headed to RVA next?

Another West Coast brewery considers the Finest City on the East Coast for its next operation. BUT WHICH BREWERY? AND WHICH CITY? JK, our city.

March 11, 2015; 10:24 AM • by Ross Catrow

Style Weekly’s Ned Oliver reports that a second West Coast brewery is eying Richmond as an expansion location:

It’s too soon to name the brewery considering Richmond because the talks are at an early stage where publicity could kill them, the sources say, but the company ranks among the top 30 on the Brewer’s Association list of top U.S. craft breweries by beer sales volume.

So which brewery is it?

I pulled the Brewer’s Association list from 2013, grabbed the top 40 breweries, and filtered out those not on the West Coast (or those named Stone Brewing Co.). Then I spent some time Googling around to see if any of them had existing East Coast expansions or plans for such a thing in the works. Here’s what I found:

Rank	Brewery	Location	Expansion?
1	Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.	CA	Asheville, NC
2	New Belgium Brewing Co.	CO	Asheville, NC
3	Lagunitas Brewing Co.	CA	Chicago, IL
4	Deschutes Brewery	OR	Considering South Carolina circa 2014, “several years away from making any decisions about an expansion”, also they just started distribution to Washington D.C. last year.
5	Firestone Walker Brewing Co.	CA
6	Anchor Brewing Co.	CA	Considering a second brewery circa 2012, “a second brewery is an inevitability, although he adds it won’t necessarily be an East Coast branch”
7	Oskar Blues Brewery	CO	Brevard, NC
8	Full Sail Brewing Co.	OR	Sold to a private equity firm this past Friday
9	Rogue Ales	OR
10	Ballast Point Brewing Co.	CA	Construction of a new $12 million facility in November of 2013, “we didn’t think we were at a point yet to go build something on the East Coast”
11	Ninkasi Brewing Co.	OR	Completed $15 million expansion in Euguen this past April, and collaborated with Devils Backbone this in December
12	Odell Brewing Co.	CO
13	Bear Republic Brewing Co.	CA	Doubled capacity onsite in 2014
14	Lost Coast Brewery and Cafe	CA	Construction on a new facility began in 2014