If you brew it, they will come?

By Richard N. Velotta

Friday, July 30, 2010 | 3 a.m.

A company that has begun producing an authentic Irish beer in the United States aims to bring a successful formula to Las Vegas and turn it into a tourist attraction.

Tony Davies, managing director of Ireland’s Strangford Lough Brewing Co., discovered in 2006 that his Legbiter brew was a winner, taking first place in an All-Irish Beer competition. Davies decided to turn his attention to exporting Strangford Lough to America’s beer connoisseurs.

Instead of outsourcing the brewing, Davies decided to do three-quarters of the process in his home country, then turn the last steps over to U.S.-based partners. Strangford Lough does everything up to the fermenting in Ireland and ships wort extract by the ton to High Falls Brewing Co. in Rochester, N.Y.

Since January, the New York brewery has been producing 23,000 bottles of beer for every ton of wort extract shipped.

Meanwhile, Ken O’Neill, a former police officer and military paratrooper who studied broadcast journalism in college, answered an ad for an Irish beer company opportunity. Now, he’s the CEO for the Western Region of Strangford Lough and plans to build a beer finishing facility in Las Vegas that would serve Nevada, California, Washington, Oregon, Utah, New Mexico and possibly Arizona.

The big difference in his brewery here that would set it apart from the 11 Southern Nevada brewpub locations is that the Strangford Lough facility would offer tours and be a manufacturing tourist attraction. O’Neill is being wooed by the Fremont Street Experience, but he hasn’t nailed down a location for the facility.

O’Neill had a coming-out party for the Strangford Lough brews — Legbiter, St. Patrick’s Best and Barelegs Brew — at Town Square’s Cadillac Ranch last week.

He hopes to have the new facility open by St. Patrick’s Day next year in time for the Celtic Festival in Las Vegas.