Adams Street Brewery

A Historic Icon

Project Overview

For 120 years, The Berghoff Restaurant has been an integral presence in the Chicago food scene. Herman Berghoff began selling his beer outside the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893 before acquiring the space for a small café in the heart of downtown Chicago. The Berghoff’s popularity was widespread thanks to the hearty German family recipes and the production of “near-beer” and root beer sodas during Prohibition. After Prohibition ended, The Berghoff was the recipient of Chicago’s Liquor License #1 and has been for every year since.

Now an extensive 40,000 sq. ft. operation in the coveted Chicago loop area, The Berghoff hosts a restaurant, a bar, a café, an in-house bakery, and a café location at O’Hare airport, one of the busiest airports in the country.

Services

Website Design
Website Development
Website SEO
Local SEO

Generations of families and friends have built memories within the walls of The Berghoff. One of those families is that of our very own co-founder, Josh Meyer. “My dad has always been such a huge fan of The Berghoff,” Meyer recounts. “When they approached me to help develop their website presence, it was a huge deal.” Meyer chuckles, “My dad is still so proud.”

Over the course of six months, Got IT Digital was able to elevate The Berghoff’s presence online to a new generation of Chicago diners and event planners. On the heels of this success, The Berghoff approached us for a full-scale website build for their latest and largest undertaking—an in-house brewery.

The Challenge

“The Berghoff came to us with this huge news—building an in-house brewery,” Meyer explains. “They wanted it to be an integral part of the restaurant but, at the same time, they wanted it to have its own unique presence on the web.”

Blending the Past with the Present

It was up to Got It Digital to create a modern, intuitive website experience that also remained in keeping with The Berghoff’s historic significance to the city of Chicago.

And If That Wasn’t Enough…

Furthermore, the website was to launch prior to the brewery being fully built and ready, which meant we had to anticipate the brewery experience without even having photography as a guideline.

Given the unpredictable schedule of construction, we worked within a flexible time frame, making our teams available as needed and providing updates within 24-48 hours.

The Work

The Content

We started with the baseline—why is this brewery so important?

We had our dedicated copywriter work in close consultation with The Berghoff to understand the entire history of the restaurant, the family, and the significance of beer to the city of Chicago. This allowed us to determine how to integrate the stories of the past into an experience from the future.

Awareness Campaigns

Within two weeks, a splash page was developed to garner immediate awareness.

This splash page was utilized in all of The Berghoff’s brewery PR efforts, driving early e-mail subscribers and local press.

Got IT Digital also served as a consultant for lead generation A/B testing via the splash page.

The Concept

Got IT Digital worked with The Berghoff’s design and marketing team to develop a multimedia-based website that would display seamlessly on any device. Website highlights included: a navigable historic timeline, sliders to showcase before and after photography, cinemagraphs, e-commerce capabilities, and animations