Ogden Glazer + Schaefer is a proud affiliate member of the Wisconsin Brewers Guild and the Wisconsin Winery Association.
Wisconsin is one of the best places in the world for food and beverage companies. Agriculture is a cornerstone of our economy, and value-added agriculture is central to the continued development of the industry. We believe in sustainable and regenerative agriculture; we believe in sustainable and regenerative businesses. We not only believe in your triple bottom line, but we believe in ours, too.
Wisconsin is synonymous with beer; our clients include numerous breweries, wineries, meaderies, distilleries, and alcohol-producers of all types. Our attorneys are recognized experts in state and federal alcohol regulation (article: A Web of Regulations: Starting a Brewery). We can make sure you get help with your brewery, winery, or spirits permits and licenses and get through your label or recipe approvals. We work regularly with the TTB, DOR, and municipalities to get your product in front of customers.
Producers, Distributors, Retailers
Our Food and Beverage Practice
Recipes, Trademarks, Package Design
Label Approval and Guidance
Regulatory Compliance
Federal, State, Local Licensing
Agriculture and Real Estate
If you are a retailer looking for an on-premise or off-premise beer, wine, or liquor license we can help with that, too.
We even work with distributors to help find and secure their locations and all of the licenses necessary to get product out to market.
We aren’t just beverages though. We help food entrepreneurs of all stripes with services spanning startup packages for putting your team together to asset purchase agreements when you are ready to find your next passion. We have negotiated distribution and wholesale agreements, contract production agreements, alternating proprietorship and custom crush agreements, and any of the numerous other ways you might find yourself doing business. We’ve worked with farm, processing, wholesale, and retail clients on cannabis and related products including CBD and other cannabis derivatives.
Our attorneys know farms. In our agricultural practice we work with your farm to protect your valuable assets and real estate, help you finance your production and growth, and move your value-added production on-site.
Recent Blog Posts about Food and Beverage
Breaking Bond – Why Withdrawal Coverage Matters For Your Distillery - As an extension filer for almost the entirety of my adult life, I’m all too well aware that while the US Treasury might give you an extension on the time to file, there is never an extension of the time to pay your taxes. This applies to income tax and excise tax – and if ... Read more
Bottles Up (Revisited) - As promised in an earlier blog post about Bulleit, bottle shapes, and blurring (“dilution” was the word I mostly used last time, but I was really eager for that alliteration), I am back with an updated blog post. As a recap to the earlier post, the case involves Diageo, the company that owns Bulleit Frontier ... Read more
Licensing Agreements Ltd. - If you’ve been keeping up with our blog, you’re aware that Wis. Stat. 125 – Alcohol Beverages recently got a major overhaul. The updated statute, effective as of May 1, 2024, brings significant changes, especially in the area of contract manufacturing for beer, wine, and spirits. We’ve already covered Alternating Proprietorships and Recipe Production (aka ... Read more
Full Service Retail is Here! - The application for full service retail permissions under the new version of Wis. Stat. 125 is available HERE. Please reach out with any questions on submitting your application!
Wineries to Relinquish Their Class B Licenses - The renewal deadline for municipal liquor licenses is coming up soon and because of the coming changes to Wis. Stat. Ch. 125 (2 weeks away!) we’ve gotten a lot of questions about what wineries are supposed to do this year with their license renewals – renew, or not renew? Our suggestion is not to renew. ... Read more
Cheers to Change: The New Wis. Stat. 125 – Changes for Wedding Barns & Other Venues - I suppose this blog post could be called “All Good Things Must Come to an End.” As part of our series on the changes to Wis. Stat. 125 under Assembly Bill 304 (“AB304“), today we are focusing on some big changes coming down the pipeline for wedding barns and other wedding venues. Read on for ... Read more