Amid a changing alcohol industry that has seen brewers close their doors and teetotaling taken up by many members of the younger generation, the village of Skokie named Sketchbook Brewing Company its “Business of the Year” in early December.
Runner-ups for the award included Will’s Place, Kneads & Wants Artisan Bakery and Cafe and Schaefer’s Wines & Spirits.
At the Dec. 2 award presentation to Sketchbook owners, the chair of the village’s Consumer Affairs Commission, Biju Krishnan, made it clear that there’s more to a business than what it sells in order for it to be the Business of the Year. Krishnan said Sketchbook’s practices of hiring locally, collaborating with community members and pursuing environmentally sustainable practices are what helped the commission name Sketchbook as the recipient of this year’s award.
“On behalf of Sketchbook Brewing Company, my partners, Amy (Wilkinson), Shawn Decker and Alice George… and my entire staff and team at Sketchbook… we’re honored to receive this award, and this recognition reflects not only our hard work and dedication of my team, but also the incredible support we’ve had from Skokie as a community,” Cesar Marron, a co-founder of Sketchbook, said at the presentation.
“Skokie shows up every day, and that’s what basically gives us that support and belief in our vision and making it possible for us to grow,” Marron said.
Cesar Marron, head brewer and managing partner at Sketchbook Brewing Company, posed at the company’s taproom and brewery in Skokie on April 1, 2022.
In an interview with Pioneer Press, Marron spoke about Sketchbook’s origins and its trajectory to the honor.
“Our partnerships were formed with our business community around it,” Marron said. “I always felt like in the way olden days you would have the brewery, the baker, the butcher shop… and those were important places.”
“When we started in Evanston, and likewise here in Skokie, the number one thing we did was actually talk to the business community — bars, restaurants, stores — places where the community goes to shop, to hang out. We didn’t want to steal customers from them. We want to actually enhance their experience by saying, ‘Look, now you can get something that’s made right here in your town,’” Marron said.
Evanston growth
Marron said Sketchbook’s origins come from operating out of a building on Evanston’s Chicago Avenue in November 2014 that had its sole entrance in the alley between Main Street and Kedzie Street. At that point, it was Marron and a few other home brewers from the Evanston Home Brew Club. The service was retail only at that point, he said, and years later brews would be named in honor of those first steps.
“The Orange Door,” one of the brewery’s more popular drinks, earned its name because customers were told to search for the orange door in the alley to access Sketchbook. “No Parking” also earned its name after Sketchbook was required to call the city of Evanston when customers would park their vehicles in the alley. By the time Sketchbook opened in Skokie, the brewery also created a beer named “Main Squeeze” because of the two locations’ proximity to Main Street in Evanston and Skokie.
“Amistosa,” meaning “friendly” in Spanish, is a Mexican lager that’s a call back to Marron’s Brazilian roots. “It’s a friendly beverage to everyone,” he said.
After functioning as a retail-only service for nearly two years, Sketchbook expanded to include a taproom by April 2016, Marron said. By 2018, Sketchbook had continued its growth and was serving larger accounts such as Whole Foods, and other restaurants, bars and shops.
“We were sort of against the wall,” Marron said of Sketchbook’s expansion. “Do we grow or do we keep things the way they are?” The group began to look for a larger space to expand.
Skokie ties
Marron said by 2019 the Sketchbook partners found 4901 Main Street, Skokie, the new home for most of Sketchbook’s brewing operations and a 200-seat room with a beer garden. The row of buildings that Sketchbook operates out of was repurposed from industrial use.
Per previous reporting, Sketchbook was also the recipient of $150,000 in tax increment financing from the village of Skokie.
“We always wanted to make a space that’s welcoming to all and everyone, whether you actually like beer or not,” Marron said. “We want you to come here with your friends, you know, and maybe enjoy something else that we have on the board, you know, whether it’s a cider from somebody else that we don’t make in the house, or a soda, it doesn’t really matter. We just wanted a space for people to hang out.”
Before Sketchbook set up shop in Skokie, Marron said the group posted on a site similar to GoFundMe that asked Skokie residents if they were interested in a brewery opening up in their neighborhood.
“That’s how we got out first 200 customers,” Marron said, adding that the first month that Sketchbook launched its community-supported brewery membership program, it had 180 members. That number has since increased to about 500 members, he said.
Sketchbook Brewing Co. in Skokie is located at 4901 Main Street.
Production has also ramped up significantly because of the new brewery’s capacity, Marron said. On an annual basis, the group brews about 5,000 barrels a year. With 31 gallons to the barrel, it adds up to 155,000 gallons of beer a year. Each batch of beer creates about 1,400 pounds of spent grains, Marron said, which aren’t so useful to the brewery, but are for farmers because of its nutritional value for animal feed.
One of the brewery’s sustainable practices is to transport the spent grains using an electric Ford F-150 Lightning truck and a trailer. Marron said it is a time-sensitive process lest the product goes to waste.
Nowadays, 35% of the beer brewed by Sketchbook is sold at its tap rooms in Evanston and Skokie, Marron said. The remaining 65% is sold wholesale, he said, to restaurants and shops.
Among local establishments that carry the brand are Don Julio Cafe, Village Inn, Binny’s and a few restaurants at Westfield Old Orchard Shopping Center.
Sketchbook in Skokie also is the home to the 2023 Skokie Business of the Year Soul Good Coffee. Marron said the partnership was in line with Sketchbook’s practice of collaborating with other businesses, as the brewery isn’t open in the morning, and the coffee shop isn’t open in the evening.
In October, Sketchbook was named a recipient of the Cook County Businesses Reducing Impact on the Environment program. The brewery received $185,000, per a news release from Cook County, that said the county will assist Sketchbook and five other businesses in Cook County to look for opportunities to reduce energy and water usage, increase waste diversion from landfills, reduce use of toxic chemicals in operations and help determine if the location is suitable for on-site renewable energy.
Per Skokie’s Economic Vitality Manager, Rodney Tonelli, Sketchbook is also one of 16 Skokie businesses that has partnered with the village and the University of Illinois. The purpose of the program is for Skokie businesses to search for efficiencies or improvements in energy, waste management, water waste, water transportation, mobility, local food and agriculture, green spaces and trees.
