Fifty West Brewing Company

Fifty West Brewing Company first opened in November 2012 inside a roughly 185-year-old building on US Route 50 heading west into Cincinnati, a spot tied to Prohibition-era bootlegger George Remus and once operated as a speakeasy known as Kelly's Roadhouse. Founders Whit Hesser, Blake Horsburgh (the brewmaster) and Bobby Slattery built the brand around the highway's east-west metaphor — "to the east, there's tradition and to the west, innovation" — and grew it from a single brewpub into a Route 50 campus of taprooms and outdoor recreation. The original full-service brewpub listing at 7668 Wooster Pike now shows as closed on third-party review sites; the brewery's own locations page lists the active taproom and burger bar at 7605 Wooster Pike.

For non-drinkers, Fifty West goes beyond the usual soda gun. The house lineup centers on a 0.0% ABV sparkling Hop Water brewed with pineapple and Citra hops — zero carbs, zero calories and gluten-free — alongside a made-in-house root beer, hand-spun milkshakes, root beer floats, fountain drinks and rotating non-alcoholic options. These are genuinely produced in-house rather than stocked from a distributor. Because it is a working brewery, the same bar pours sixteen drafts, house-made vodka seltzers, hard lemonades and THC seltzers, so this is an alcohol-serving room, not a sober space — but the zero-proof options are real and standing.

Practically, the Wooster Pike taproom runs Monday through Saturday 11am–11pm and Sunday 11am–9pm, with the kitchen closing about an hour before the bar. Expect Route 50 state-inspired burgers, fries and shakes, big patios and sand volleyball leagues in season, a family-friendly crowd and easy parking just west of Mariemont and Fairfax. It suits a group where some people want craft beer and others want a legitimately good non-alcoholic drink.