via Garage Beer
Carbonatix Pre-Player Loader
Audio By Carbonatix
It seems like just yesterday that Jason and Travis Kelce were those lovable, oafish brothers from Cleveland Heights, Ohio, taking the NFL by storm. One was the beer-chugging, Mummer-costume-wearing heart of the Philadelphia Eagles, screaming about how hungry dogs run faster with that epic beard, and the other was the flashy, touchdown-scoring life of the party with a *Bachelor-*style dating show for the Kansas City Chiefs.
We’ve had both of them on BroBible before they became cultural main characters (…as long as they’re in the cultural limelight, I’m going to brag about that). We’ve marveled at their on-field prowess, and we’ve laughed at their podcast antics. Meanwhile, your girlfriend and her entire group chat have been obsessively tracking Travis’s every move, culminating in his engagement to Taylor Swift, which confirmed for an entire generation of women that they are, in fact, in their “End Game” era.
Now, they’re the undisputed kings of the NFL attention economy. Their latest ventures prove the Kelce brothers have the Midas touch, as if the reported $100 million bag they secured from Amazon two years ago for their New Heights podcast didn’t already scream ‘these guys print money’. At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if a stake in an NFL team eventually comes their way. You know the NFL Illuminati is quietly conspiring, since they’re at the center of minting a new generation of NFL fans.
First, the big tamale. According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, the Kelce brothers’ Garage Beer company just closed its first institutional funding round. The deal values the company at a staggering $200 million. The money comes from Durational Capital Management, a consumer-focused private-equity firm that also owns the chicken-and-biscuit fast food empire, Bojangles. As part of the deal, they’re bringing in a heavy hitter to lead the charge: Bill Hackett, the former beer head at Constellation Brands (the people behind Modelo), will join the board. Not that anyone was doubting, but the move signals to the beverage market that this is a legitimate power move, not just some celebrity vanity side quest.
Two hundred. Million. Dollars.
For a beer company that, until recently, was a regional Midwest beer specializing in a crushable “beer flavored beer” with low-calorie, low-carb, and low-alcohol content (4% ABV).
The numbers, as reported by the Journal, are just silly. Garage Beer is projected to pull in between $60 million and $70 million in revenue this year, a massive leap from less than $20 million in 2024. This is happening in a market where beer sales are supposedly struggling, as everyone from Gen Z to your buddy on Ozempic to your wellness-obsessed cousin, who now frets about a single IPA throwing off their circadian rhythm, thanks to Andrew Huberman, seems to be sobering up. Yet, the simple, Kelce-backed beer is bucking the trend.
So where did this $200 million beer even come from?
It wasn’t brewed in a lab by big beer marketing execs. Garage Beer has actual roots. It started back in 2018 at Braxton Brewing Co., a respected brewery in Covington, Kentucky, right across the river from Cincinnati, where the Kelce boys played college ball. It was designed as a simple, no-frills “lawnmower beer” and quickly became a local favorite. But it was so different from Braxton’s other craft brews that in early 2023, they made a brilliant move and spun it off into its own company.
This is where the story gets good. The new standalone company was helmed by a CPG veteran named Andy Sauer. And Sauer wasn’t some random suit talking a sweet game with big numbers; he and Travis Kelce had a history. They’d been business partners since 2019 on a sports nutrition company called Hilo.
So when the Kelces, who were already looking for a beer brand to get behind, saw a CPG pro they trusted take over a beer from their college town, the dots connected themselves, and it became a calculated takeover built on a pre-existing relationship.
Hilariously, the LLC name on the bottom of the Garage Beer website is “Garage Beer Jock Beer, LLC”
Yep, makes perfect sense.
So, how are they pulling this off?
It starts by skipping the simple spokesperson check from Bud Light or Miller Lite. Sure, those gigs are good money, but it’s the easy route—a couple of commercials, a few social posts, zero actual business risk. That’s the playbook for entertainers who just want to cash a check, not for guys building a legitimate empire. This goes way beyond slapping their name on a can. This is about “vibe marketing,” the same playbook celebrities like Hailey Bieber (whose Rhode Skin just got snapped up by e.l.f. for a cool $1 billion) and Miles Teller (The Long Drink) have used to build empires.
A couple of months ago, Garage Beer announced it snagged a 1% stake in the St. Joseph Goats, a professional indoor football team in Missouri. You know, Arena Football—that glorious spectacle once dubbed “FOOTBALL IN A BLENDER.” With a little Kelce magic, it might just be back. Who knows, maybe Taylor Swift will show up and sing the national anthem, all for the lore. As their hilarious press release put it: “Some brands buy arena naming rights. We bought The Goats.”
Marketing today is a narrative play. The goal is to memify everything. It’s lore-building. The Kelces are masters of it. Their entire multi-million dollar enterprise is built on the lore of two regular Joes from Ohio who play the saxophone and, at least for Travis, once showed up at the BroBible office in insane outfits. Jason once delivered a message to my dad’s marching band.
They’re just so damn likable. There’s a good lesson here! When you’re well-liked, it puts the American Dream into action.
This is the new playbook to study in business school
If you look at what’s happening closely, I think you’ll notice a business pattern and formula to how a simple beer brand gets hyped into a $200 million valuation. The product itself is really only one sliver of the pie.
The hype and cultural alignment, meanwhile, are major factors.
I also think it’s important to note that they are following the Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney business playbook with Wrexham AFC to a T.
Turn a tiny sports team into a global brand, make content about the highs and lows, and sell merch and lager along the way. In fact, Wrexham Lager, the UK’s oldest lager, brewed since 1882, just landed in the U.S. and Canada, a direct result of the team’s explosion in popularity.
It’s the perfect example of the playbook I’m talking about: Celebrity ownership, clever content, merch drops, beer, repeat. Eventually, finance guys with spreadsheets who summer in the Hamptons sipping Aperol spritzes send you offers valuing everything you touch in the hundreds of millions.
I personally think it’s cool that the Kelces aren’t silent partners. They are the faces of the brand, and they are deeply involved.
Garage Beer’s CEO, Andy Sauer, told the Journal that he got a call from Jason on Labor Day to talk strategy. Dude is a dog as a business partner as much as he was a center in the City of Brotherly Love.
“It’s pretty emblematic on how they both operate,” Sauer tells the Journal. “It’s an always-on relationship. It’s two people with the same vision and belief in beer, jumping into it.”
So yeah, the Kelce brothers’ beer is worth $200 million. Surprised? You shouldn’t be. At this point, they could sell branded air and make a fortune.
This is the new playbook for building an empire is going to be studied in business school for a long time. The kings of football are now the kings of beer. Cheers to that.