Success Stories: Threshold Run Club

Sara Szymanski has been running most of her life. She started running as an adolescent and was part of a youth team who participated in Hood to Coast (an arduous 196-mile relay from Oregon’s tallest peak to the beach). Long before she started a brewery with her now-husband Jarek, she ran and biked from work. “In 2007, I commuted by running to work at Oregon Health and Sciences University. I would bike to work and leave my bike and run home, and the next day I would run to work, pick up my bike and ride home.” Running and biking are a large and enduring part of her life.

A bit more than a year ago, she brought her old passion to her new one at Threshold Brewing, which she co-owns with her husband, founding Threshold Run Club. I saw a post for the group on Instagram—a smiling clutch of runners in t-shirts and shorts, along with a few four-legged friends. The idea is simple: everyone gathers at the brewery at 5:30 on Tuesdays and by 5:45 they’re off for a 5k (about three miles) through the neighborhood. The route is always different, and Sara sends out a map along with the invitation to the growing number of regular participants. Afterward, they end up at a brewery where more than a few stay for a beer.

It’s one of those organic programs breweries are ideally positioned to host—and a case study in how bringing outside passions into the brewery creates a virtuous cycle of fun and community.

Sara wasn’t sure if anyone would show up, but in August last year, she announced it on social media and in the brewery’s newsletter, and crossed her fingers. “I thought about it for two or three years before I pulled the trigger,” she said. The first night was a success: eight people showed up. The next week it was twenty. Today she has an email list of 200 and on any given Tuesday, 25-30 people show up. In classic Portland fashion, people are more likely to attend on the dark, rainy days of winter than the sweltering days of summer. (I canceled twice because we had heat waves in the upper 90s and I didn’t want to have to ride my bike in that heat.)

“I’m generally the fastest,” Sara told me, “so I run ahead and chalk out the turns. I used to go forward and then to the back to check on everyone.” The group has now coalesced, however, and is more self-directed. As we chatted over fresh-hop beers, people arrived, heading straight back into the brewery area, where they could store their gear. She chose Tuesdays because that was a slow day. Since the run club has found its audience, however, it’s now one of their busiest. The crowd even attracted a bluegrass band, who regularly materializes to serenade the crowd. “A lot of the runners will bring their families while they’re running, too,” she added.

The run club grew out of Sara’s interests, and gave her a way to bring her two worlds together more conveniently. But it’s also been good for business—and this is what caught my eye in the first place. Breweries have been struggling to attract drinkers, especially in their pubs, since Covid. Since starting Celebrate Oregon Beer, I’ve been managing our Instagram feed and I see these kinds of programs happening in breweries across the state. They’re small-bore, hyper-local efforts that don’t reverberate much beyond their neighborhood. This is nothing new, of course—for centuries (millennia, probably), breweries have been community hubs. Following their passions, whether it’s role-playing games or chess or sports fandom or running, has given breweries a way to build that community around shared interests.

Most of the people in the run club also come from the neighborhood. And of course, once they get to know each other and people at the brewery, it makes stopping in for a beer outside of run club all the more alluring. “Every time I bartend, I see three or four members of run club,” Sara said. “A lot of them come from the neighborhood, which makes sense.”

It’s a good lesson for brewery owners looking to expand business, and make connections with their customers. And the more breweries that do these kinds of things, the more opportunities drinkers have to get out of their houses and have some fun. We see a lot of stories about societal dysfunction right now—it’s cool to know there are countervailing forces out there bringing people together. Feel free to add any stories you have in comments. This is one of the more important, but unsung, benefits of having a brewery nearby.