After a pipe burst overnight in December 2022 and flooded the Flathead Lake Brewing Co. pub house, the Bigfork restaurant and community gathering place finally reopened Tuesday.
To celebrate the occasion, the brewery is offering $4 pints to mark its comeback on April 4, four months after the damage was discovered. The brewery and canning side of the business was spared from the water damage and has continued operating. Sixteen taps will be running with 15 of them devoted to FLBC brews, and an additional tap pouring a cider from Big Mountain Ciderworks. A new menu is also debuting with the reopening. About a month before the unplanned closure, the restaurant had also hired a new chef, Louie Bertino, who previously owned Old Bridge Pub.
“Bigfork is just a great little community, so everybody’s been very excited to get back in here and anxiously awaiting the reopening,” said assistant general manager and marketing manager Sarah Peterson. “Whenever I go out in town it seems like everybody’s heard and is planning to come.”
Throughout the closure, curious passersby have occasionally pulled into the brewery’s parking lot and peered through the front door windows to see if the business has finally come back. With relief, Peterson can say the day has finally arrived.
Recalling the night of the destruction for her brings back memories of alarm company alerts, a flurry of phone calls and messages, and then at 2:30 a.m., an apocalyptic photo from a coworker appearing in a text message.
“That woke me up. I looked at my phone and my heart sank. Because it just looked like a disaster,” Peterson said.
While Peterson said the exact cause remains unclear, the source of the break is believed to be a pipe connected to the building’s main fire suppression system. The water was shut off after around 15 minutes, but an estimated 400 gallons of water was released each minute.
The flooding caused the ceiling to collapse in the restaurant kitchen, covering the space with insulation and other materials, and water swept out of the kitchen and into the pub’s main floor. It felt like there was water everywhere. Other damage was also discovered in the basement area, known as The Cellar, which FLBC had been using as an event space.
It was December 1.
“It was a pretty crazy morning to come in and see actually how bad it was. It was pretty shocking,” Peterson said.
A timeline for reopening wasn’t immediately clear, and Peterson said there were concerns about the restaurant’s ability to retain staff. Fortunately, insurance payments allowed FLBC to continue regularly paying staff during the closure, and Peterson said they only lost one employee.
Flathead Lake Brewing Company opened in 2004 in Woods Bay. The current location at 116 Holt Drive in Bigfork opened in 2015, and the two locations were being operated simultaneously until the business shifted entirely to the Holt Drive location in 2018. It’s a family owned business with Greg Johnston owning the brewing side of the business while his daughter, Sandy Schwartz, owns the pubhouse.
“There’s been a couple things that have happened where we’ve had to close for a couple days to fix things but definitely nothing compared to this,” Peterson said.
One of the main aspects of restoration work to reopen the pubhouse was to entirely replace the flooring on the main floor. Kitchen equipment, including water coolers, freezers and ice machines, all had to be replaced. Drywall and painting work also had to be taken on. For the most part, though, the interior of the pubhouse should be how customers remember it.
The new menu has retained the same pub-food feel the FLBC Pubhouse customers know it for, with some new additions, including a Tuscan salad with romaine lettuce, black olives, red onions, artichoke hearts, cherry tomatoes, Genoa salami, and shaved parmesan served with a house-made ale balsamic vinaigrette. Another new addition to the menu is an Italian sub sandwhich, topped with Black Forest ham, Genoa salami, pepperoni, sliced mozzarella, shredded iceberg lettuce, tomato, red onion, olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, black pepper, and oregano.
One of the biggest additions to the menu is a new Gourmet Burgers section. Those with a burger craving can choose between the flame-broiled Pubhouse burger, served with white cheddar; the Ale BBQ Bacon burger topped with house-smoked bacon, white cheddar, FLBC ale barbecue sauce and grilled onions; the Bacon Bleu burger topped with bacon and bleu cheese crumbles; the Shroom burger topped with cheddar, grilled mushrooms and onions, and FLBC ale mustard aioli; and the Bacon Popper burger, which come with house-smoked bacon and house-made jalapeno popper cream cheese. All burgers come with seasoned fries, lettuce, tomato, onion, and a pickle, and grilled chicken breast or veggie patty substitutions can be made on request.
There will be one new beer on tap this week, a Vienna lager. The Vienna lager is the product of the brewery’s small batch pilot system for trying out new recipes, and it was brewed during the closure.
Reopening week officially kicked off Monday night with an event for the brewery’s roughly 104 mug club members. After Tuesday’s $4 pint special, the next special event will be trivia night on Wednesday, April 12. The pubhouse plans to be open from 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Comedy nights and other events are not immediately returning to the pubhouse Cellar, which remains closed and under repair.
“We’ll just take a little pause on that for now. And just kind of focus on welcoming people back in,” Peterson said. “You know, before we know it, summer’s gonna be here, too.”
