Ornery Beer Company is downsizing, sacrificing its Fairfax City restaurant to focus on ensuring the future of its other locations.
The brewpub announced today (Monday) that its location at 3950 University Drive, Suite 106, will permanently close on Sunday, July 26 after nearly eight years of operating in Old Town Fairfax.
“After much consideration and hard work to navigate an ever-changing restaurant and craft beer environment, Ornery will scale back our operations to meet today’s market realities and become leaner, so that we may weather these challenging economic and financial times,” Ornery founder and CEO Randy Barnette said in a message posted to the restaurant’s Facebook page.
According to Barnette, the past few years in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic “have been extremely difficult,” resulting in a pile-up of unspecified “challenges” that left the Fairfax City location unable to pay for its rent and operating expenses.
Initially started in Woodbridge in August 2015 out of Barnette’s desire to give the community its own brewpub, Ornery Beer Company relocated its full-service restaurant to Fairfax City in 2018 after closing its original location due to stalled negotiations with the landlord for a smaller space, Inside NoVA reported at the time.
The business also added a production facility with a taproom, but no restaurant, in Bristow.
News of the Fairfax City brewpub’s closure comes just months after Ornery opened a second restaurant in Herndon last November after years of planning.
With the Fairfax restaurant closing, Ornery plans to relocate the three-barrel brewery it established there to produce small batches to its Bristow taproom, which is scaling back production from its existing 20-barrel operation.
“We will be reducing our brewing capacity, selling our large production brewing and packaging equipment, reducing our leased space, and scaling back to become more of a locally-focused community brewery and taproom,” Barnette wrote.
Ornery’s Herndon restaurant will remain in business, but Barnette said he was “deeply saddened” to leave Fairfax City, which he has considered a “second home” since attending George Mason University’s nearby campus in the late 1980s.
The Fairfax City location has seen a decline in annual sales as a result of a “changing craft beer and restaurant market,” along with more general economic uncertainty, Barnette told FFXnow by email.
According to Barnette, Ornery’s Fairfax City brewpub faces stiffer competition than its Herndon counterpart because it’s vying with other businesses for a smaller residential population in the immediate area around Old Town Fairfax.
“Therefore increases in competition have a more significant impact on the local restaurants than may be realized in other local areas,” he said. “We have amazing fans in Fairfax City, however, decreased sales could not continue to meet the rent and operating costs.”
Like its Fairfax City predecessor, Ornery Beer Company’s Herndon public house (2310 Woodland Crossing Drive, Suite F) serves a variety of pub-style food, including burgers and sandwiches, salads, shareable appetizers, seafood, pasta and desserts. It currently has 14 beers on tap, all produced in the Bristow facility.
Barnette encouraged supporters to “visit and enjoy our Herndon Brewpub and Bristow Taproom often,” expressing hope that the reorganization will make Ornery more sustainable going forward.
In addition to operating its own locations, the company sells its craft brews at restaurants, stores and bars across Virginia and D.C.
“As opportunities present themselves, we will look to strategically grow with new locations and partnerships,” Barnette wrote. “We look forward to what the future holds for the company and our team.”
Hat tip to Jared Serre
