City Brew Tours offers unforgettable all-inclusive tours and beer-focused experiences in some of the best beer cities throughout North America. With over a decade of experience, City Brew Tours has created the ultimate craft beer experience that blends history, beer knowledge, transportation, and great food with unrivaled access to an area’s top breweries and their beer.
Our mission is to be the leading curator of craft beer experiences for visitors, locals, and the community as both an ambassador and an advocate for the brewing industry.
Meet the Team
Ken Carrano is the owner/operator of the City Brew Tours Franchise in Milwaukee, WI. Ken has been a craft beer enthusiast since a visit to the then-new Great Lakes Brewing Company brewpub on a visit to Cleveland in 1989. Ken spent many years being called a “beer snob” by friends and family until all realized that great craft beer was worth the effort to find!
Ken and his family have been exploring the Milwaukee beer scene for several years, and decided that partnering with Chad Brodsky and City Brew Tours would be the best way for everyone in Milwaukee; visitors and residents alike; to enjoy craft beer, to learn about the process of making it, and to travel to breweries in a safe and fun environment.
Ken is an amateur baseball historian as well as a craft beer lover. He and his wife Ann have two grown children and two Golden Retrievers who keep them as busy as the kids did.
Where City Brew Tours began
City Brew Tours was founded in Burlington, Vermont in 2008 by Chad Brodsky, a college kid who had fallen in love with craft beer while studying in Vienna. Thirsting for more, he returned home and enrolled in the University of Vermont’s “Beer Making 101” class. Fortunately, Chad quickly realized he wasn’t cut out to brew beer. Instead he bought a used church van, put on his lederhosen, and set off to spread the gospel of craft beer.
Chad’s timing was perfect. MSNBC had recently pronounced Burlington the fourth best beer city in the world, and Americans were starting to get a taste for craft beer. Vermont Pub and Brewery founder, Greg Noonan, was the first to open his doors to the new business, and Burlington Brew Tours was born. At the tender age of 21, Chad became the first to establish a brewery tour company on the East Coast.
Burlington Brew Tours became well known for its unique tours led by beer geeks who doubled as designated drivers. By 2012 Chad had perfected his business model. He left his full-time job in finance and opened a second location in Boston. With tours running in two cities, Chad changed the company’s name to “City Brew Tours” and set off to add more locations.
By the end of 2017, Chad was juggling operations in five cities and needed help. Enter Barry Hansen, Jr., a professional brewer and part time City Brew Tours beer guide who was instrumental in launching operations in Washington, DC a couple years prior. Barry grew into the role of COO, became co-owner and used his background in leadership, biotechnology and the brewing industry to streamline logistics and expand the company.
With Barry on board, City Brew Tours grew quickly. The company opened three new locations and launched a franchising program in a span of just two years.
As of September 2022, City Brew Tours operates in 16 cities and continues to expand. City Brew Tours jumped to the West Coast in November, 2019, when it acquired a majority stake in BREWVANA, a brewery tour company in Portland, Oregon. In 2021 CBT opened three new locations: Des Moines, I.A. and two franchises in North Carolina, one in Charlotte, the other in Raleigh.