Magic Hat Brewing Company was formed in 1994 in
Burlington, Vermont by serial entrepreneur
Alan Newman and Bob Johnson, the company's original brewmaster. In 2008 the company purchased
Pyramid Breweries, makers of the Pyramid and
MacTarnahan's brands, expanding to 129 employees.
Acquisitions and eventual shutdown of Vermont space In 2010, Alan Newman sold Magic Hat and all of its assets to North American Breweries, a subsidiary of
KPS Capital Partners, a
private equity firm with a business model described by Newman as "
stripping out expense and
flipping." FIFCO soon began producing some Magic Hat beer at their
Genesee Brewing Company plant in
Rochester, New York. The Vermont brewery continued to operate until June 2020, when FIFCO announced that it intended to consolidate the rest of Magic Hat's brewing operations to the Rochester location. Another Burlington based brewery, Zero Gravity, assumed the lease on Magic Hat's physical plant, along with the brewing and retail assets within the space. 43 of Magic Hat's 46 Vermont employees were laid off, although Zero Gravity was in talks to rehire some of them. Zero Gravity moved into the space and began producing beer there in July 2020. ==Brands==