Craft BeerCo

Ambiance: The Taj Mahal this is not. Anonymous strip mall in Leesburg, the interior of this store has all the charm and sensibility of an abandoned Soviet airplane hanger. Shelves line the left and march up the center, with coolers on the right. Part of the issue here is that the shelves and coolers are only half full, giving the appearance that the store is in the middle of a Venezuelan-style economic crisis. All that’s missing is a line of a thousand people waiting for bread. The back of the place features the main attraction, a "bar" area with 40 taps (another 10 coming by summer); this area is also rather sparse looking, and the faux wood front is pretty cheap looking. All that said (and verily, said as douchily as possible), the ambiance is not why you come here. Service: Any place that lets you drink up to six free samples from the 40 taps before filling your growler gets at least a B+ in the service department for me. The beer bros on duty were friendly enough, and seemed to know a bit about the beers, and were happy to provide the samples when asked. Selection: Really excellent. The shelves may have looked like a East German commissar’s dream, but what they did have on them was a great mix of local craft brewers and the bigger craft stuff from the national stage, with lots of good varieties. And the tap list (as noted above, soon to expand all the way to 50) is well-curated and balanced, and organized on the menu by style, with good tasting notes for each. This is where the effort is going. At least one of the coolers is a build your own sixpack station. Value: Appears to be on the very reasonable side. Nothing surprisingly expensive, and many things showed markdown pricing. The growler fills were entirely reasonable, and they’ll fill just about any growler. Overall: A decent place. Excellent stop to sample and fill a growler--come here en route to a cookout or beach party--and also worth checking out for their bottle selection.