Monday Night Brewing deals with backlash from GA governor candidate Kemp's visit.

I talk directly with MNB co-founder Jonathan Baker about it.

So I woke up this morning ready to post my new Cruisin’ For A Brewsin’ video I did with SweetWater Brewing, but I got a couple calls and texts about Monday Night Brewing “hosting an event” with the very controversial Georgia Secretary of State and governor candidate Brian Kemp. I thought I should get this out the way before showing y'all how much fun I had at 'Water and end the week on a good note. 

Now I try to stay away from politics when in the beer scene—or pretty much any public atmospheres—because it can get heated and passions can escalate especially in Georgia. I just know who I am voting for and want the best for where I live and beyond. We need things to get better. Period.

Anyway, with such a history being associated with Monday Night over the years including posting one of my first blog posts covering their homebrewing events on Mondays in ATL in 2010 here, hosting my company’s first Heroes Villains comic art exhibit, documenting their numerous collaborations with Nappy Roots like this, plus numerous other instances, the news did concern me. No lie. So before I could reach out to see what the deal was, I saw this Tweet from Monday Night that linked to this post on their site about their "Core Beliefs." It was well written in my opinion. They also objectively included a link to this article by Atlanta Magazine which gave me a better idea of what went down. After I read both inserts, I texted Monday Night co-founder Jonathan Baker (who I just had brews with two days ago at their original location to sample the new Piranha Dealer IPA), and asked him if he wrote the press release. He said he did and then we continued a lengthy discussion. We talked about what went down and how we both agreed it was indeed a mistake because they have done so much to diversify their audience. (Let’s just say Kemp continues to enforce the impression that racial harmony is not one of his priorities as governor.) With MNB setting up their second location called the Garage in the predominately Black section of the historic West End, having the aforementioned Nappy Roots partnerships, and my good friend Mike Jordan’s monthly LIT book karaoke event alongside his wife Jacinta to name just a few of the instances solidifies what their true mission appears to be as an Atlanta brewing company.

Jonathan definitely sounded regretful of how things went down and are currently perceived, which fueled his spirited write up disclosing what the brewery's true ideologies are. He also mentioned they had an event they were working on with Kemp’s opposition, Stacey Abrams, prior to the Kemp visit but decided not to include that in his write up; he kept the focus on their overall values. He also said this to me:

“We messed up. We didn’t fully think through our decision to allow the NFIB to endorse Kemp at our facilities, I completely understand people’s concern. We have been doing some soul searching as owners and hope to make it up to people through our actions moving forward.”

-          Jonathan Baker, Co-Founder of Monday Night

So with that, let’s see how things progress. I trust they will do the right thing. In the meantime, due to my years of experience with Jonathan and the rest of the Monday Night crew including everyone from their tap pullers to brewmaster Peter, we will still have brews together. And maybe leave politics out of it.

Most importantly, please make sure y’all vote.

Ale