San Marcos Former Brewery Spaces Find New Dining and Beer
Three San Marcos brewing companies went out of business in 2024: My Yard Live Beer Co., Double Peak Brewing and Rip Current Brewing. All three of those buildings are open again under new names. Two kept the beer. One now serves pie.
Two years later, every one of those spaces has a tenant. When San Diego Beer News published its list of 2025 closures, no San Marcos company was on it. Breweries have closed in San Marcos, and some recently. The buildings have stayed useful anyway.
| Former occupant | Address | Closed | What's there now |
|---|---|---|---|
| My Yard Live Beer Co. | 288 Rancheros Drive | November 15, 2024 | Mama Kat's Restaurant & Pie Shop, reopened late August 2026 |
| Rip Current Brewing | 1325 Grand Ave. | 2024 | Craft Coast Beer & Tacos, opened April 2024 |
| Double Peak Brewing | 1801 Diamond St., Suite 101 | 2024 | Michi Brew Co., opened May 3, 2025 |
| The Lost Abbey production headquarters | 155 Mata Way | Taken over by Pizza Port in 2023 | Pizza Port San Marcos tasting room, opened April 19, 2024 |
288 Rancheros Drive shows how long a big room can sit empty without the right tenant. Hometown Buffet ran there for 18 years and closed in 2016. After that, the site sat vacant for several years before My Yard Live moved in. When My Yard Live announced its last day, Friday, November 15, 2024, the owners pointed to the lasting effects of the pandemic and rising costs for goods, utilities and insurance. They said further changes would have compromised their original concept.
This time the building did not sit empty for years. Mama Kat's had reopened there by the last week of August 2026, according to The Coast News. That puts the gap at about 21 months, compared with the multiyear vacancy after the buffet closed.
Mama Kat's is an easy name to recognize. Michael Herrera and his wife, Kristen, bought Grandpa Allen's Family Restaurant in 2005 and renamed it in 2008 to honor his mother. Over the years they expanded into neighboring units on West San Marcos Boulevard as those units opened up. That added seats but never added parking to a small lot. The move two miles to Rancheros Drive took the restaurant from a 4,000-square-foot strip mall space to an 18,500-square-foot indoor-outdoor building. That more than doubled its seating.
Parking is still the first thing to plan for. At 9:45 a.m. on a Monday in late August, The Coast News found the lot full, cars waiting for spaces and the waiting areas packed.
The new layout keeps parts of the old one. My Yard Live's central bar is gone, but the brewing tanks are still there. The Union-Tribune reported that the owners are thinking about making their own signature beer someday. You can order at the table or at the walk-up counter, which has free seating indoors and out.
Current hours, as of the Union-Tribune's September 9, 2026 report:
Those hours may get longer. Signs at the new location said Mama Kat's plans to extend its hours and is working on a new lunch menu. The restaurant's own website still had some older "moving" text this fall, so recent news coverage is the better guide for now.
The other two 2024 closures went to beer operators who could use what the brewers left behind.
Craft Coast Beer & Tacos took over Rip Current's San Marcos headquarters at 1325 Grand Ave. in 2023 and opened it to the public in 2024. Rip Current had been open for 10 years or more when it closed. Its building now has posted hours seven days a week. Craft Coast's website lists 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday.
Double Peak Brewing's former space at 1801 Diamond St. was still on the market at the end of 2024. Michi Brew Co. opened there at noon on Saturday, May 3, 2025. This fall, Michi's website was still posting a September 2026 events calendar.
The Lost Abbey change on Mata Way was a different kind of handoff. Pizza Port took over the former production headquarters at 155 Mata Way as part of a business restructure, not a sale. Its San Marcos tasting room opened to the public on Friday, April 19, 2024. The Lost Abbey still has a San Marcos tasting room at The Sanctuary, 1215 San Elijo Road.
The most recent change shows that these buildings can outlast more than one new idea.
1784 La Costa Meadows Drive was home to Stumblefoot Brewery and then Creative Creature Brewing. Early this year, Zane Curtis bought Creative Creature. Curtis owns the Monday Morning non-alcoholic bottle shops in Pacific Beach and Ocean Beach. He worked with veteran brewers to turn the site into a non-alcoholic production facility called The Lab. The building is just over 6,000 square feet, and Curtis set aside 800 of them for a taproom with a pool table, a non-alcoholic tap line and a crowler machine. Its first planned beer was a non-alcoholic West Coast IPA called Haymaker.
The taproom opened July 18, 2026. It was the first non-alcoholic brewery tasting room in San Diego County. By September 15, San Diego Beer News reported that Curtis had shut The Lab for reasons he chose not to share. The Monday Morning retail shops are still open, and Curtis hopes to restart the brewing side at another location later.
So as of early October, the building on La Costa Meadows Drive has housed three beverage businesses, and the tanks are still in place for the next one.
Not every brewery space in San Marcos gets a quick second act. Ten-75 Brewing, at 1075 Linda Vista Drive, Suite J, opened during the 2022 San Marcos Harvest Fest and closed two months later. As of the Union-Tribune's May 2026 report, it had not reopened. Wild Barrel Brewing closed at 692 Rancheros Drive in December 2023 after about a year and a half of running at a loss. Rising costs for goods, utilities and rent were among the reasons it gave.
Across San Diego County, the Union-Tribune counted 11 brewing-company closures in 2024 and 12 in 2025. Four of the 2025 closures had been open at least 10 years. The paper's annual review listed pandemic-era debt, higher costs for goods, rent, utilities and wages, more competition and softer demand for beer as common pressures. A May 2026 report added that fewer new breweries and venues have been opening countywide in recent years. With fewer new breweries opening, an existing brewery building gives the next tenant tanks, drains and a taproom layout that a new business would otherwise have to build from scratch.
Dos Desperados Brewery is still listed at 1241 Linda Vista Drive. Its website lists weekday and weekend tasting-room hours but asks visitors to call for updates, so check before you go.
This list covers the spaces above that are open now:
The 2026 San Marcos Harvest Fest is Sunday, October 11, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at North City, with more than 250 vendors plus food, drinks and live music.
If you follow how buildings like these change hands and want to know what that means for your own property in San Marcos, I'd be glad to share what I'm seeing locally. Madison Khavari is here when you're ready. Let's Connect.
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