Continental Divid Brew Pub to be housed in former bakery building

By Tucker Henderson

Reporter

The New York Mills community has been abuzz with talk of the new renovations going on at 32 North Main Avenue. The former bakery building has new roof, new glass storefront and new interior work done in the past few months.

The renovation work is being done by Scott McCall Construction, who recently sold to a new investment group on Tuesday, Aug. 1. The building will house the new Continental Divide Brew Pub, which will feature craft beef and brick oven pizza, among other offerings.

“We were looking at different places in Mills, just trying to find the right place that felt like home,” said investor Latham Hetland. “We were looking at the old bakery before Scott McCall bought it. We thought the building was really cool, but that it just needed so much and we didn’t have that capacity. When Scott bought it, we started a relationship with him and started those conversations. We got to an agreement that he would fix the building up to a point where we can come and move in there. That’s what we needed.”

Hetland began as the very first investor when, in 2021, he was sitting around his kitchen table chatting with a friend about the need for another restaurant in NY Mills.

“We had a conversation about how it would be a really cool idea to have a place like that in town,” said Hetland. “I said, ‘Yeah, let’s do it!’ I called him the next day and said, ‘Ok, here is what I’m thinking for the next steps.’”

While his friend realized he wasn’t ready to move forward with the idea, Hetland certainly was and he quickly found some others to come aboard the investment idea.

“We got a group of investors together and starting talking about it,” Hetland said. “In 2022 a lot of conversations happened. When we started the conversation with Scott McCall, we grew our investment group a little bit more, we got more community stakeholders involved.”

The business, which is still a work in progress as construction continues, will feature locally sourced craft beer, wine, seltzers and cocktails, as well as brick oven pizza and “small bites,” which includes appetizers and other offerings. The City of NY Mills has already granted a full liquor license and e-tabs gaming permit for the business and the investors are only waiting on the State of Minnesota to provide the final approval. Many non-alcoholic options will also be available.

“It’s a big community investment project,” said Hetland. “Lots of different local investors, local community members that want to help revitalize downtown. That’s the real goal of this, to hopefully get some more traffic in Mills.

“One thing that’s important to us is that we don’t want to be in competition with any of the other places in town,” he continued. “We try to offer something that isn’t already in town, a little bit unique and a different place for people to go. Another stop along the way, another way to make NY Mills a destination.”

Through the process, Hetland admits that the investor group has gone an unconventional route, building and creating the business prior to hiring a leading manager, but he said that it’s been a great learning experience all around.

“I’ve learned a lot,” he said. “All of us have learned a lot. We have a guy that has researched different kinds of pizza ovens for months and now he’s almost an expert on them. So it’s been good. We have some really seasoned investors too, people who have done a lot of stuff in the community, so it’s nice having different generations of investors.”

Although the estimated opening date is ambiguous as of now, Hetland said that the business is slated to open anytime from this coming fall to January 2024, although hidden obstacles are always a hurdle when opening a new business and could change that date.

“There’s also 10 million things that could happen,” said Hetland. “I would just keep your eyes peeled for future updates.”

Despite the uncertainty of the opening date and what lays in store the next few months, Hetland and the group of investors are excited about the progress they have seen so far and will be eagerly awaiting the start date as well.

“The day when we turn the key and open the first day—it’s going to be the coolest experience ever,” said Hetland. “We’re already working on different plans that we have for stuff like that. We’re going to have a big celebration opening week and do as much stuff as we can. Really try to highlight the community and bring people in. It will be great to have another cool place to go in NY Mills.”