Boulder’s Fate Brewing Co. will keep its name after coming to a $20,000 agreement last month allowing its use by an Arizona brewery that once lost the title in a legal battle with the Colorado beer business.
The headline on an earlier story by the Camera that Boulder’s Fate incorrectly stated the brewery appeared to have lost its name to the Arizona firm was incorrect; Fate leaders declined to comment Thursday on a news release posted by Scottsdale, Ariz.-based McFate Brewing that it “reclaimed its original name, Fate Brewing Company.”
Boulder’s Fate prevailed in a legal battle over the moniker, forcing the Arizona brewery to stop using it, according to a 2016 Republic report.
Online documents from U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Denver show Boulder’s Fate Restaurants will allow Arizona’s Southern Brewing Co., of which McFate was an affiliate, to use the registered trademark “Fate Brewing Company.” In exchange, the Boulder business, which filed for bankruptcy last year, will receive $20,000 from Southern Brewing.
The Boulder group is giving up the name for use only in Arizona, as it “has no intention of operating in Arizona,” and the money will help the financially troubled brewery in its “reorganization efforts,” the documents state.
But Robert Runco, a Denver attorney for the Boulder brewery said the decision to relinquish the exclusive right to the name had nothing to do with its current financial situation.
“Any business dealings (Boulder’s Fate) has are going to be registered with the court,” Runco said. “The bankruptcy had no weight whatsoever on the decision with the licensing matter.”
Boulder’s Fate, per the agreement, retains the rights to the name and can still use it anywhere else in the world, outside Arizona.
“Fate is who we are, and we are thrilled to be called by our true name again,” Steve Ellefson, general manager of the Arizona brewery, stated in a news release. “To our fans and loyalists, we were always Fate.”
Steve McFate, for whom the Arizona brewery was named, announced he sold his shares in the business in the release — it is set to open a third location in Tempe next month.
