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Archive record · Brewery

Trail Beer Refinery

Trail, British Columbia, Canada

Closed · 2025Ownership unknownMicrobrewery
Founded
2017
Closed
2025
Archive ID
TB-40HBVM8K
Last checked
Not yet checked

Who owns this brewery?

Mike Konkin; Sheri Konkin; 13-partner local ownership group historically

Not yet mapped as a company, so the chain above it is still open.

Tally Answers Beta

Who owns this brewery?
Mike Konkin and Sheri Konkin (since 2017)Verified
01

From the record

Summary

Former Trail brewery. Tailout owners purchased it in 2024; the TBR operation closed as Tailout moved into the space in 2025. PURCHASED BY Tailout owners 2024; TBR CLOSED 2025.

A summary written during research. The sourced facts are in the sections below.

Tally’s Take

A modern Trail brewery with no founding year established here. The Tailout owners purchased it in 2024, and the Trail Beer Refinery operation closed as Tailout moved into the space in 2025. The archive closes TBR and does not extend it into its successor — the same call made everywhere else in this collection where one brewery's room became another brewery's, which is a pattern it has now documented in a dozen cities.

Ownership & corporate history

  1. Founded by Mike Konkin; Sheri Konkin; local partner group2017 – 2024
    What the sources say

    BC Ale Trail documents Konkins and 13-partner ownership group.

  2. Founded by Mike Konkin2017
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0231 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). CEO and accountant (Selkirk College faculty); with wife Sheri and eleven other local partners opened Trail's first craft brewery 2017-03-25, its name honouring the city's smelting heritage. The wider 13-partner group remains a held claim — the partners are unnamed in the cited sources.

  3. Owned by Mike Konkin2017
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0231 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). Founding partner.

  4. Founded by Sheri Konkin2017
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0233 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). Co-founder and Brewmaster — a former respiratory therapist mentored by Mill Street's Andrew Anker.

  5. Owned by Sheri Konkin2017
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0233 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). Founding partner.

  6. Sold to Mary Lusty and Hedin Nelson-Chorney2024
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0235 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). The owners of Castlegar's Tailout Brewing (founded 2019; Nelson-Chorney co-founder/GM, Lusty a Bishop's-trained brewer ex-Canmore Brewing) bought Trail Beer Refinery in 2024 and by early 2025 announced Tailout would take over the 1299 Bay Avenue premises, relocating from Castlegar. The pair is the source's framing, kept whole; recording the buyer as 'Tailout Brewing' would put a brewery record on the owner side of a brewery — the category error the archive refuses.

  7. Owned by Mike MartinDate unknown
    What the sources say

    Resolves held claim HOC-0235 ("FOUNDERS / HISTORICAL OWNERS"). Documented partner in Trail Beer Refinery — a former Trail mayor and 40-year Teck Trail veteran. Owner-provided research (2026-09-08) sourced to a Kootenay Savings publication documents his wife Debbie Martin as a partner alongside him (by 2019); that publication is not reachable for citation, so Debbie stays a recorded lead, and NEITHER Martin's membership in the ORIGINAL 13-person 2016-17 group is confirmed. Of the original 13 (Konkins already canonical): two are described but unnamed — Mike Konkin's brother in Vancouver, and a local construction-company owner (Greg Seib of Seib Contracting worked the renovation but is NOT established as that shareholder and must not be entered without evidence) — and nine are wholly unidentified. Research routes: corporate records, shareholder registers, Trail Times archives, Community Futures documentation.

Ownership history is kept as dated events, so a change of owner never overwrites the one before it.

Where it brewed

  1. 1299 Bay Avenue, Trail, BC V1R 4A5
    Trail, British Columbia

    PRODUCTION

    Operated by Trail Beer Refinery

    Site detail

    Former Trail brewery. Tailout owners purchased it in 2024; the TBR operation closed as Tailout moved into the space in 2025.

02

The Museum

Timeline

  1. 2024
    Purchased by the Tailout owners

    The founding year of the Trail Beer Refinery is not established.

  2. 2025
    TBR operation closes

    Tailout moved into the space; held as a separate brewery.

03

The People

Behind the beer

Sheri Konkin
Co-founder / Brewmaster

Historical brewery co-founder/brewmaster.

Mike Konkin
Co-founder / CEO / Accountant

Historical brewery co-founder/CEO/accountant.

04

The Beer Library

Beers

Silver City Lager

Retired

Lager

BC Ale Trail historical brewery feature. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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Trail Ale

Retired

Ale

BC Ale Trail historical brewery feature. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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Thunder Road IPA

Retired

IPA

BC Ale Trail historical brewery feature. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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Sixty-One Lager

Retired

Lager

BC Ale Trail historical brewery feature. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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Oh Bourbon

Retired

UNKNOWN

Name documented; style/ABV not inferred. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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Dirty Secret Stout

Retired

Stout

BC Ale Trail historical brewery feature. (HISTORICAL) [Canada Pass 102]

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07

Follow the money

How it changed hands

1 recorded move
  1. 2017Founded
  2. 2024Purchased by the Tailout owners

    The founding year of the Trail Beer Refinery is not established.

No current parent in the archive's records — the moves above are history, not present ownership.

08

Show your working

Sources

  1. recordProbable

    Brewery record taken from Tally's British Columbia master, Pass 57, which cited https://bcaletrail.ca/road-trip-journals/rivers-brews-and-mountain-views/ for this entry. The cited page has not been opened by the archive.

    Tally's British Columbia master, Pass 57 (research workbook) · Tally's Beer Universe research workbook · 2026

    CommercialMedium reliabilitySource accessed 2026-08-19
    Claim last checked 2026-08-19
  2. historyProbable

    Continuity dates as recorded in BC Pass 57: 2024, 2025.

    Tally's British Columbia master, Pass 57 (research workbook) · Tally's Beer Universe research workbook · 2026

    CommercialMedium reliabilitySource accessed 2026-08-19
    Claim last checked 2026-08-19

Only the claims above are sourced. Everything else on this page is the archive's own research and has not yet been tied to a document — which is worth knowing rather than hiding.

09

Straight answers

Common questions about Trail Beer Refinery

Who owns Trail Beer Refinery?
Trail Beer Refinery is recorded as owned by Mike Konkin; Sheri Konkin; 13-partner local ownership group historically, which does not yet have a full company profile in this archive.
Is Trail Beer Refinery still open?
No. Trail Beer Refinery has closed (2025). Former Trail brewery. Tailout owners purchased it in 2024; the TBR operation closed as Tailout moved into the space in 2025. PURCHASED BY Tailout owners 2024; TBR CLOSED 2025.
When was Trail Beer Refinery founded?
Trail Beer Refinery was founded in 2017 in Trail, Canada.
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