The Sad Spiral of Rockmill Brewery: How the Craft Beer Darling Ended up in Foreclosure

There was a time when it seemed like Rockmill Brewery was untouchable. Between 2011 and 2018, co-owner Matthew Barbee wasn’t bottling Belgian-style beer but lightning.  

Ruggedly handsome and charismatic, with a taste for fine wine and expensive steak, Barbee was the face of Rockmill. In 2010, he launched the brewery from his mother’s 23-acre farm in Lancaster, an idyllic tract of land with a farmhouse and a rolling green lawn that runs into a pond and a quaint, little white chapel right out of a storybook.  

A trip to Rockmill quickly became an obligatory pilgrimage for local craft beer lovers who, after spying someone drinking a Rockmill petit saison in Columbus, would inevitably ask, “Have you been out there?” The picturesque Fairfield County farm developed into a darling of Central Ohio’s food and beverage industry, as well as a preferred wedding location for local chefs and many others. 

The rural location, the type of beer, the large bottles—it was an unheard-of concept, says chef Anthony Schulz, who was introduced to Barbee and his beer over 10 years ago while working as executive chef at the Inn at Cedar Falls in Hocking Hills. “If you know Matt, he's just got an aura about him that you want to be around him and what he's doing,” says Schulz, who later worked for Barbee. “And the product was really good. That, above all else, was really what mattered.” 

The Rockmill brand was burnished in October 2016 with the debut of Rockmill Tavern in Columbus’ Brewery District—the rural brewery’s urban foil dressed in reclaimed barn wood. With talented chef Andrew Smith leading the kitchen, the restaurant was an immediate hit and landed a place on Columbus Monthly’s 10 Best Restaurants list in 2017 and 2018.  

But in 2020, the pandemic brought new challenges to Rockmill. The tavern closed for good in April 2022, and by mid-2022, this onetime star of Ohio’s craft beer scene had fizzled out. Even before the pandemic, though, trouble was brewing at Rockmill. Debt and litigation had begun piling up, and former employees say Barbee was MIA for much of Rockmill’s waning days. He now lives at an oceanside address in San Juan, Puerto Rico. It’s “a place to start over,” Barbee said when reached via email in early December. “I moved here full time when it was clear everything I had tried to build in Ohio had failed.” 

Most people assumed the pandemic killed off Rockmill Brewery—that is, until it curiously reopened one weekend in June 2023 without much of a peep from its new operators. Did Barbee sell the property? Who was brewing beer? And what really happened to Rockmill?  

Rockmill Takes Root 

Rockmill’s origin story begins before the brewery’s 2010 launch, when Barbee was living in California. At a restaurant in Venice Beach, he happened upon a large-format glass bottle of the legendary Belgian beer Saison Dupont, complete with Champagne-style, cork-and-cage enclosure. He’d never seen beer like that before. As a wine guy whose own grandfather was a winemaker, he loved the pop of the cork, the aromatics. “I thought, ‘Whoa, this is a beer?’ ” Barbee told Vice in 2016. “It paired beautifully with the food. That was the first time in my life when I got excited about beer.” 

When Barbee returned to Ohio more than a decade ago, his timing was impeccable. His mother, Judy Jones Smalley, and stepfather (they later divorced) had bought a bucolic, 19th-century horse farm on Lithopolis Road just outside Lancaster. At the same time, Ohio’s nascent craft beer scene was starting to take off. (Ten years ago, there were around 60 breweries in Ohio; today there are more than 400.)  

With his mom's business backing, Barbee decided to convert a barn on the property into a brewhouse and began hosting chef dinners with beer pairings. He knew he wanted to brew Belgian-style beers in the style of Saison Dupont, the famed brewery located in the Wallonia region of southern Belgium. 

Before long, the water used to brew Rockmill’s beer became part of the brewery’s mythology and was often cited by Barbee—specfically, that the water sourced on the property was nearly identical in minerality to the water in Wallonia. The brewery’s hard water is, indeed, excellent for brewing Belgian styles, says one former Rockmill brewer. But the suggestions that Rockmill’s well water “mirrors” the mineral content of Wallonia, as the Rockmill website stated in December, is an exaggeration. According to a water test conducted by the former brewer, Rockmill’s water had “nearly twice the calcium, seven times the chloride and half the sulfate” as Wallonia’s mineral profile. 

Regardless, Rockmill’s farmhouse ales earned rave reviews from customers and critics alike. Barbee signed on with Ohio Beer Co., a new local distributor, in 2016, and Rockmill’s large-format, cork-and-cage glass bottles began popping up regularly in markets like Weiland’s and restaurants around Ohio. 

An Expansion, Then a Pandemic 

In 2019, Rockmill completed a big expansion at the farm on Lithopolis Road, including the addition of a separate taproom, an enlarged production facility, landscaping and renovations to the farmhouse. Meanwhile, Rockmill Tavern was bringing the rising brand’s rustic charm to the Brewery District’s urban setting. 

By this point, Barbee had tempered his dream of one day growing Rockmill into a national brand—and a plan to build a boutique hotel on his Fairfield County property had fallen through—but the expansion project was still ambitious. Its timing, however, was terrible. 

When the pandemic hit in March 2020, Rockmill struggled along with its service industry peers. But there were financial strains even before then. “It costs a lot of money to run a restaurant. And when you put so much into it at the beginning, it's hard to dig your way out just by cutting food costs,” says Smith, the initial Rockmill Tavern chef. Not long after opening, Smith says Barbee fired him despite the restaurant’s successful debut. “The reason that I was given was that they just couldn't afford me,” Smith says. “The very next day, [Barbee] hired me back because almost the entire kitchen crew threatened to walk out.” 

Smith's relationship with Barbee—whom he considered a friend—was never the same. Smith departed Rockmill in 2018, wanting to take a break from the fast-paced restaurant industry altogether. 

“I think all of that fast, unrestrained growth put a major financial strain on the place,” says one former Rockmill Brewery employee. “He had opened this restaurant, which was at first a success. It had a great honeymoon phase. … [But] people in the industry will tell you, ‘Just wait before you decide this is the new normal.’ ” 

During the height of the pandemic, Rockmill Tavern briefly shifted to carryout and then reopened the dining room in May 2020. When chef Schulz joined the team in July, he assumed the company was healthy financially—in part because of its recent expansion. “You don't get a bank note if you can't prove that there's a form of repayment,” says Schulz, who began serving wood-fired pizzas at the farm, taking full advantage of the ample social distancing space and open air. “Because we had all of that green space down by the pond, our music series really took off. ... Once the farm was operational as far as food service, we made a lot of money, and we were able to cover a lot of that debt.” 

In addition, Rockmill was awarded two Paycheck Protection Program loans: one on April 10, 2020, for $191,700 and another the following January for $271,538, totaling almost half a million dollars. Both loans were forgiven in 2021. 

According to staffers who worked at Rockmill Tavern at the time, business was good once they reopened the dining room. Weekends were especially busy. But from that point in May 2020 until Rockmill Tavern closed for good in April 2022—after having briefly rebranded as a pizza concept called Bandit Pizza & Pairings—former employees describe a restaurant adrift: serious staffing shortages, a perpetually broken dishwasher, a front door that wouldn’t lock and a chaotic atmosphere with no structure and little management. 

“Pretty much every weekend, there was somebody's friends in the kitchen doing dishes for us that we were paying under the table, because we didn't have staff to do it,” says Sydney Janssen, Rockmill Tavern’s main bartender from May 2020 to June 2021. 

Then there were the roaches living in the receipt printer and “crawling on the bar during service hours,” Janssen says, which required roach spray and a copper mug to smack them. 

Barbee was hands-off during that period. When he showed up, former staffers say, it was not in any management capacity but as a VIP who would visit during the rush on Friday and Saturday nights with little to no notice, expecting a table and a specially prepared steak. 

“I never saw him there on business,” Janssen says. “I only ever saw him come in to eat and drink and show the tavern to his friends. If we said anything to him about needing something, he would tell Anthony [Schulz] about it.” 

In early 2021, one of the tavern’s general managers left, and then a bar manager was fired for stealing wine. Janssen was thrust into their roles, all while making a tipped wage. “I was suddenly and without warning in charge of inventory ordering, tip reports, paychecks,” she says, noting that she eventually negotiated a raise to $8.80 an hour. Janssen felt like she and her co-workers were abandoned in a burning house. “All of [Barbee’s] attention was going to the brewery,” she says. “If his plan was just to let the tavern close, I wish we would have known that, and then [we] probably would have made less of an effort to keep it running the way that we did.” 

Barbee says he was focused on finding a buyer for the business, which meant less time in direct management. “I don't know if that was the right or wrong choice,” he says. 

Though Smith wasn’t at the tavern during its final few years, he doesn’t believe the pandemic led to its failure. Instead, he points to Barbee’s inexperience and the restaurant’s isolated location in the Brewery District (and persistent construction around it). 

Another former brewery employee says the pandemic is “a convenient story. That makes it sound tidy. It's easy to blame it on COVID and supply chain issues and everything else. But I think the honest answer is that COVID bought [Barbee] more time. … He got some government assistance to kind of pull him through for a little while longer.” 

Barbee disagrees. “Since I didn't have a network of private investors [who] would fund the company, l leveraged my personal net worth to borrow the required funds to launch Rockmill,” he says. “National failure rates for that type of business are well over 50 percent. Add a pandemic shutdown that disproportionately impacts food and beverage, and you'll end up in the situation I found myself in. ... The pandemic really was the breaking point for the business.” 

Puerto Rico Beckons 

Rockmill Tavern’s former dining room is still full of furniture, an espresso machine, barrels, old saddles and lots of wood. During the restaurant’s stint in the historic Worly Building, Barbee leased Suite 101 from William Schottenstein, an Arshot Investment Corp. developer who owns Brewery District properties. In November 2022, Schottenstein’s 503 South Front Street LP filed a civil suit against Barbee and Rockmill Brewery LLC (including statutory agent Judy Smalley) in Franklin County Court of Common Pleas, claiming the restaurant had stopped paying rent in 2020 and defaulted on the lease agreement. In court documents, Schottenstein says he is owed over $250,000 plus interest.  

In an affidavit, Barbee argues that in early 2022, he and Schottenstein discussed Barbee selling the business and turning over the space to a new tenant, including all the equipment, furniture, point-of-sale system and more, which would cover any payments Rockmill owed. Attorney Erica Probst, who represents 503, disputes Barbee’s claims. “There was no settlement agreement indicating that the value of the materials was X dollars and that would cover the remainder of the lease payments,” Probst says. The case was still pending in early December.  

Meanwhile, in May 2022, Heartland Bank secured a judgment of around $390,000 against Rockmill in Fairfield County Court of Common Pleas for defaulting on a loan. (Schottenstein also sits on Heartland’s board of directors.) A couple of months later, in July, Barbee briefly listed the farm property for sale with a $6.75 million price tag. 

“For the last 18 months, I have been actively trying to sell the business,” Barbee says. “I had a broker at first, then when it was clear there was no way to do a normal sale (where all debts are covered in the transaction), I had to move to pursuing a short sale.” (In a short sale, a property sells for less than the debt that is owed.) 

Litigation involving Barbee continued into 2023. Fairfield County’s first civil suit of the year was a foreclosure case against Rockmill that included a laundry list of entities—multiple banks, an excavation company—that claim Rockmill owes them money, and they’re hoping to get those funds through the sale of the farm. In August, Judge Richard Berens ordered that the property should be “appraised, advertised and sold.” 

Neither Barbee nor his mother formally responded in the foreclosure case. (Columbus Monthly also contacted Judy Smalley for this story, but she did not respond.)  

“Participation in court proceedings requires counsel. Counsel requires cash,” Barbee says, adding that he has been communicating with plaintiffs and secured parties outside of the “official record.” “I didn't need an attorney to call creditors and work out a deal.” 

Chef Schulz says that for much of Rockmill’s final year under Barbee, the brewery’s founder was traveling in and out of the country while his mom was handling things on the farm. Another former Rockmill employee painted a similar picture: “His mom was there still bartending every weekend and dealing with probably a mountain of bad letters showing up.” 

Barbee insists he hasn't been needed in the country, and that he didn’t move on from Rockmill while leaving others to pick up the pieces. As he looked for a buyer, Barbee says he “had to keep the business open, otherwise the value would drop significantly since it would be a shuttered business. I didn't have enough money to maintain standard hours, though, so I kept it open for minimal hours, employing as many people as I could. And Judy already lived on-site, so it made sense for her to be the physical presence. ... I was trying to give the business a second chance through a new owner—something that didn't require my physical presence at the property on a day-to-day basis.” 

In addition, Barbee is eligible to receive tax benefits as a result of his Puerto Rico relocation. Over the past decade, the U.S. territory has become a magnet for American investors and those looking for a friendly tax haven. Legislation now known as Act 60 is meant to attract new residents to Puerto Rico by offering them 100 percent tax exemption from Puerto Rico income taxes on dividends, interest, cryptocurrencies and capital gains. 

According to a January 2022 New York Times story about Act 60 and its impact, “more than 4,286 applications have been approved since 2012, with more than 35 percent of them approved in the last three years.” Alongside influencer-turned-crypto-bro Logan Paul and others, Barbee appears to be among Act 60’s successful applicants: A spreadsheet from Puerto Rico’s Office of Business Incentives lists Matthew Barbee as a grantee under Act 60, with an approval date of Jan. 10, 2023. 

Barbee says the tax code wasn’t a big part of his decision to move to Puerto Rico, but that “it wouldn't make sense for any U.S. citizen moving to Puerto Rico not to apply.” “I have invested in crypto before ... but I unfortunately didn't end up as a crypto-millionaire. Things may have been a lot different with Rockmill if I did,” he says. “The weather, beach and a place to start over were much more impactful in my decision to relocate.” 

A New Beginning 

Last year, Austin Caulk planned to propose to his girlfriend, Taylor Scribner, while hiking at Christmas Rocks State Nature Preserve in Lancaster, one of the couple’s favorite spots. But the moment never felt quite right, so after the hike Caulk suggested they get a beer at nearby Rockmill. Scribner had never been there before, so Caulk took her to the little white chapel next to the pond. It was magical. The moment finally felt right. “You want to get married here?” Caulk asked.  

She said yes, but the couple’s emails to Rockmill inquiring about a wedding date went unanswered. After finding out the property was for sale, they decided to approach the owners. “We started talking to Matt and asked him how the sale stuff was going,” says Caulk, who previously worked in construction and real estate development. “He's like, ‘It's still for sale.’ And then he told me the price, and I was like, ‘Oh, that's pretty awesome. That's kind of within reach for me.’ It wasn't easy by any means, but we started going down that road.” 

The road has been rocky, to say the least. “We've ran into, my God, every roadblock,” Caulk says. “I can't even name them all.” Caulk describes the pending purchase of the Lancaster property as a “humongous” short sale that requires the approval of several entities. “It’s been delay after delay getting people to sign off,” he says. 

In June, Rockmill reopened on the weekends without any fanfare or announcement about its new operators. Caulk says Judy Smalley kindly trained him on how to run things at the farm. For months, he has spent Monday to Thursday talking to multiple attorneys, creditors and Barbee, trying to get the property sale across the finish line, while his weekends are spent running Rockmill’s taproom with his wife, whom he married at Rockmill just like they’d hoped. (They now live on the property, too.) Caulk serves some high ABV Rockmill beers that have aged nicely, and, using Barbee’s recipes, he brought in a contract brewer to help make a couple of batches of fresh Rockmill beer. (Caulk plans to purchase only the Rockmill property, not the LLC, but he hopes to retain the name, branding and recipes through another LLC.) 

Caulk estimates he has probably had 10 different closing dates for the sale, but something always got in the way. “Back in September, we entered into a lease because I didn't want the business to close. I wanted a smooth transition, which I thought was going to be a couple of weeks,” he says.  

Despite all that, Caulk says the effort is worth it. “The love for Rockmill is still super strong,” he says. “At this point, we're just trying to keep the deal together and save it before it goes into foreclosure. But those wheels are turning quickly.” 

Rockmill Revived? 

On a sunny Saturday afternoon in late November, a food truck from Ironton, Ohio, is slinging barbecue while customers wander the serene property and gather around an outdoor fireplace. The original farmhouse is closed and dark, but Caulk serves guest beers and a few Rockmill brews (petit saison, pilsner) in the open, airy taproom, which still looks and feels new. 

Despite all the litigation and drama and an owner who left the continental U.S., Rockmill hasn’t lost its charm. The vibe is still bucolic paradise.

In November, the newlywed operators invited chef Andrew Smith out to the property to host a tasting menu dinner, just like old times. Smith got married at the farm several years ago, and meeting the new couple left him hopeful that a place he and his wife care deeply about could have a joyful, new chapter. “Getting to know [Austin and Taylor], they seem like hard workers, and they're excited about it,” Smith says. “I feel like there's a lot of untapped potential out there and feel like they're excited to untap it. It's nice to see it alive again.” 

At press time, Caulk and Barbee were still working on the short sale while the foreclosure process continued. “The Rockmill saga isn't over,” Barbee says. “I'm going to fight until the day the foreclosure auction happens to try and get a short sale done.” 

If the deal doesn’t go through before the property goes to auction, Caulk still hopes to buy it. “It'll be heartbreaking if someone outbids me,” he says. “I've been in this for seven months at this point, and if that doesn't happen, it's going to be a huge waste of money and time.” 

Rockmill, Caulk says, will either be “the best thing that's ever happened to me or the biggest mistake of my life.” 

This story is from the January 2024 issue of Columbus Monthly.