Great Escape Beer Works co-owner Jake Duensing says Republic will now be the brewery’s sole home after its exit from Galloway Village.
A soft opening should be less than two weeks away for Great Escape Beer Works LLC’s new brewery in Republic, officials say.
However, while the Republic facility at 6021 W. U.S. Highway 60 was originally expected to be a second brewery for the company, it will now be its lone location. Great Escape co-owner Jake Duensing said May 22 is set to be its final day at the Quarry Town development in Galloway Village at 4022 S. Lone Pine Ave. Duensing and his wife, Jen, opened Great Escape in December 2018.
“It’s sad to see it go, but I think ultimately it just came down to a business decision,” he said May 20 from Great Escape’s new Republic property, which the company purchased in 2022. “We’ve got so much more space over here and the rent over there was going to be a little higher than we were comfortable with.”
Duensing declined to disclose lease terms in Galloway Village with Green Circle Projects LLC.
“We did an extension on our first lease, and then now that extension’s coming up and we are going to let that space go,” Duensing said, adding he has nothing but good things to say about Great Escape’s time in Galloway Village, where it has occupied 3,000 square feet. “We had probably more hurdles than we thought we would in the beginning couple of years, but I think that ultimately probably made us a little wiser in our decision-making.”
As for Republic, Duensing said he is targeting a soft opening period for Great Escape to launch by month’s end. The company’s 11,000-square-foot building includes a taproom, offices and a production facility.
“Our ultimate goal is to do our soft opening starting May 30. We do need some stuff to go right to get that,” he said, noting that includes hiring additional staff, moving furniture from the Galloway Village location and receiving permit approval from the Springfield-Greene County Health Department. “If it’s not the 30th, it’ll be pretty quickly after that, a matter of hopefully days.”
Duensing said last year that the company’s expansion plan would be a two-phase project, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting. Phase I is the taproom building, while Phase II will consist of a larger production facility in a 16,000-square-foot building, which Duensing said has an undetermined construction timeline.
“Assuming people are happy with what we’re doing here, then yeah, we’ve got a lot more equipment, bigger equipment stored in the back that we won't actually fit in here,” he said, noting cost will also be a factor for when the larger building on the property will be utilized. “We need that bigger space eventually to be able to use it.”
Declining to disclose the company’s investment, Duensing said Nesbitt Construction Inc. is general contractor on the project designed by Buxton Kubik Dodd Design Collective. Construction began in April 2024 at the former Burk Bridge Co. property on the north side of Highway 60, south of the James River Freeway interchange. Great Escape owns the 6.3-acre site.
The taproom occupies roughly 5,000 square feet of the building and the company’s brewing operations were moved late last year to Republic. However, Duensing estimated in December the licensing process would take about six to eight weeks, putting the facility on schedule for a February opening.
“The licensing just took a little bit longer than we thought. And then we’ve been doing everything after the construction crew finished up,” he said, adding that’s included assembling the brewhouse and its canning line. “There’s a lot of conveyor belts, a lot of parts and pieces that we have to get operational.”