The interview ended when an older man walked by, pulling a wheeled suitcase behind him. Evidently he’d heard us talking; he said he couldn’t see, and that he was looking for the downtown bus station. After a minute of trying to explain, Brandon Woodruff, owner-brewer of Manifest Beer Company decided to walk the gentleman to his destination. This is part of life in downtown Eugene, and Woodruff takes it in stride.
We were sitting at the wide open roll-up windows at Manifest Bar & Brewery, formerly Doc’s Pad and Joggers and a deli before that, on the southwest corner of 7th and Willamette. Manifest has been in downtown Eugene since 2016, when Woodruff moved the brewery into the space adjacent to Doc’s Pad and partnered with owner Gary Miller.
Now, Woodruff and his wife Kasia own both the brewery and bar, having bought Miller and his wife’s shares of both the brewery and sports bar. Kasia, an underwriter for Oregon Community Credit Union, runs the financials for the two businesses.
The transition wasn’t easy, as most of the kitchen staff left upon the transfer of ownership. Woodruff spent weeks working in the kitchen as well as running his brewery. Now, with new staff and a new menu, he found some time to talk with Beerstone.
“It was like starting over, which kinda sucks, but all of the equipment is paid off,” he says of this new chapter. Manifest first operated as Mancave Brewing in the Whiteaker, then as an alternating proprietorship at Elk Horn Brewery, and finally moved to its current home on Willamette. Manifest built out a pub at the corner of Broadway and Willamette in 2019, but that closed last year.
Manifest Bar retains the sports bar atmosphere of its predecessor, with multiple screens, two pool tables, a pinball and arcade game, and video lottery in the back. The high ceilings, open seating arrangement, and roll-up windows to the patio, with its picnic tables outfitted with fire pits, make the space purpose built for a crowd.
The menu, completely made over and from-scratch, covers all of the bases, from breakfast til 3 to tacos, smash burgers, and other pub staples. My classic smash burger and fries were well-seasoned and cooked just right.
The taplist is unusual for a Eugene brewery; Manifest beer constitutes around half of the 22-tap list, with the rest being guest taps from other craft breweries and a handle of PBR. There is also a full bar. Woodruff voiced his disdain for what he sees as a stigma around guest taps:
“It’s OK. I’m not good at all the styles; we have two nitro taps and I don’t brew nitro beer. Sometimes when I go to breweries, it feels pretentious, like everyone should know about beer. So this place felt right; the beer can be more a part of the food, the whole thing. When given the option to choose fine dining or Sunday Night Football and a shot of whiskey, I’ll choose the latter.”
Given Manifest’s brew system, the guest taps are no surprise. Woodruff brews three times to fill a single tank, a 20-something hour operation that starts with milling hundreds of pounds of grain 30 pounds at a time through a homebrew-scaled mill.
“We’ve bootstrapped this whole thing,” he says. “We saved money at the wrong times. I opened the pub [at Broadway and Willamette] two months before Covid. We were supposed to get a canning line, and the city was supposed to build out the breezeway next to the brewery. The only way we survived [Covid] was by doing a delivery service. Some weeks, we didn’t make any money.”
Manifest’s beer is solid. A couple different IPAs distinguished themselves with bright, well-rounded fruity tones and pleasant bitterness. A mainstay and one of Woodruff’s personal favorites, Halte Die Frucht hefeweizen, starts with a sweet banana aroma, but finishes with grainy flavors and a lighter, less filling body than one might expect. It’s kind of a German hef-American wheat beer hybrid.
On my visit, a flight of “Drip” series fruited sour beers had just been tapped. Leaning into the trend of smoothie-like brews, Woodruff adds fruit puree directly to the keg. The base beer, a Berliner-style Weisse, is quite tart with a light, airy wheatiness. It proves to be a good match for the fruit, as the beer flavor isn’t lost in the blender.
“It still is weird,” Woodruff says of the fruiting process. “Seven years ago, if you told somebody you did that, they’d tell you it was wrong.” He started that process while brewing his beer at Elk Horn. He was only allowed to brew 15 barrels of beer a month, and would split a tank of sour beer into four different fruit blends so he had more variety to sell.
Woodruff, whose family has been in the area for generations and also includes Yakima Valley hop pickers, identifies with Eugene’s blue collar community. He also worked in kitchens for over a decade before starting Manifest. He’s seen downtown Eugene change over the decades, and spoke about some details of owning a business there within the context of the area’s recent development history and issues on the streets.
“The city built this building in the 70s,” he says, indicating the Brutalist concrete parking structure under which the Bar operates. “They took down all but two of the cool old buildings and the McDonald Theater between here and 13th. There’s no history anymore. And on these six blocks along Willamette, there’s only 22 apartments.”
He also cited former Eugene Mayor Brian Obie’s development in the 5th Avenue shopping district for taking business and foot traffic away from downtown. “The tough part is that there’s no opportunity for advancement or investment” in downtown proper.
Manifest’s location has brought Eugene’s homeless crisis to his doorstep. He routinely asks people, many of whom he knows by name, to relocate so he can operate his business. “95% of them are fine” to interact with, he says.
He believes that a combination of lax drug enforcement and a high amount of homeless traffic coming through Eugene are partly to blame for the city’s issues. Adding to that, public perception of downtown as not safe has created a cycle that keeps locals away.
He’d like the Bar, and downtown in general, to be more family friendly. Currently, minors are only allowed until 8pm; at McKenzie Brewing, just two blocks north, it’s 10pm. He’s working with the OLCC to change that, but has to prove that food sales are a larger proportion than they were before he took over.
Manifest has gotten by on a shoestring for its entire existence. Hopefully, this move will keep the brewery up and running, and good craft beer flowing in the heart of downtown Eugene.
Manifest Bar & Brewery, 740 Willamette St. Eugene, OR 97401
Hours:
Saturday 10 AM–1 AM
Sunday 10 AM–10 PM
Monday 11 AM–10 PM
Tuesday 11 AM–10 PM
Wednesday 11 AM–11 PM
Thursday 11 AM–11 PM
Friday 11 AM–12 AM
Beerstone 