Author: ARLnow.com Sponsor

Editor’s Note: This biweekly column is sponsored by Dominion Wine and Beer (107 Rowell Court, Falls Church). It is written by Garrett Cruce, a Cicerone Program Certified Beer Server.

Opened in 2013, this Charlottesville, Virginia brewery drew upon the historic surroundings for their name and inspiration.

Their name — Three Notch’d — a peculiarly spelled moniker is derived from the old road that leads to Charlottesville. The road was made famous in 1781 by Jack Jouett, who rode it sounding the alarm that the British were advancing.

Three notches, like small slashes, mark the road. They used to also mark Three Notch’d Brewing Co., but recently they rolled out a complete rebrand. Three Notch’d ditched the slashes and historical looking fonts in favor of a clean, modern take on the historical references. They’ve also added bottles to their packaging options.

I reached out to Jack Murray, the Brand Manager at Three Notch’d to shed some light on the big changes we’re seeing. I wanted to find out more about this new design and whether they plan to phase out cans in favor of bottles. He started by explaining the new mark of three axes:

“The three crossed axes represent the tools used by Colonists to mark the original Three Notch’d Trail in Virginia.  Symbolically the tools represent three values our business strives for everyday — Radical Independence, Freedom of Expression and Civic Responsibility.  We hope our new mark grows our community and inspires them to live everyday to the fullest.”

Why redesign now?

“Three Notch’d has been continually and rapidly expanding both our product line and our distribution/locations since our launch in 2013. As is the case with many brands, as we’ve grown, our brand has evolved and over the course of the past year or so, we discussed the idea of refreshing our design elements to reflect this evolution.

“Most importantly, we wanted to tie the ‘red thread’ throughout our products and locations to create consistency for our customers, so that whether they are drinking a Minute Man, 40 Mile or new Blackberry Gose at a bar in Northern Virginia or visiting one of our locations in Richmond, C’ville, or Harrisonburg — or soon to be opened (in) Roanoke — they identify their experience as something unique to Three Notch’d. And, the timing of our rebrand nicely coincided with the opening of our new production facility and craft kitchen at IX Art Park in the heart of Charlottesville.”

Who did you work with on the redesign?

“We worked with local artists and designers on the redesign. We enlisted the original artists to re-create the illustrations on our Flagship cans to better suit the new look, and had a local designer create the system template from which to work with. Each new packaged beer is then designed to suit the product by an in-house team.”  (more…)