174 Workers Face Layoffs as Guinness Brewery Plans Baltimore County Closure

174 workers at Guinness Open Gate Brewery in Baltimore County are slated for layoff as the facility prepares to close, according to WMAR-2 News Baltimore.

The reduction removes a craft-brewing employer from southern Baltimore County, a region where food-and-beverage manufacturing has historically offered stable middle-income work without requiring a four-year degree.

WMAR-2 did not publish a closure date, severance terms, or an effective separation timeline in its initial report. The brewery, which had been producing both flagship and experimental brews for the U.S. market, joins a growing list of U.S. beverage manufacturers adjusting capacity in 2024 and 2025.

What the source doesn't yet say

Three details will determine how severely the 174 workers are affected, and none appear in the initial WMAR-2 report:

• A confirmed shutdown date or phased wind-down schedule
• Whether severance is tied to tenure or role
• Whether the parent company will offer transfers to other U.S. facilities

Under the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, employers must give 60 days' written notice for layoffs of 50 or more workers at a single site of employment. A reduction of 174 jobs at one location will trigger that filing, and the public notice will disclose the effective separation date.

What this means for affected workers

Brewery employees typically hold a mix of roles across production, packaging, quality assurance, maintenance, logistics, and hospitality. Each function maps onto adjacent industries that hire in the Baltimore-Washington corridor:

• Process operators and packaging technicians transfer readily to pharmaceutical and chemical manufacturers in the I-95 corridor
• Maintenance and instrumentation staff fit into aerospace and defense suppliers around BWI and Aberdeen Proving Ground
• Quality-assurance and food-safety expertise applies directly to the broader food-and-beverage sector
• Logistics and warehouse workers are in short supply across the region

Hourly production workers, who usually form the largest cohort at a brewery, will see the most direct displacement. Salaried staff in marketing, sales, and management roles may have more options for internal placement if the parent company chooses to redeploy them.

What to do in the first 30 days

For the 174 affected employees, three steps matter most once a separation date is confirmed:

• File for unemployment insurance with the Maryland Department of Labor as soon as the WARN notice arrives
• Request written terms of any severance package and review release-of-claims language before signing
• Map plant-floor skills — process control, food safety, equipment maintenance — onto openings at other Maryland manufacturers, where the largest local absorbers of comparable talent sit in pharmaceutical, food, and defense-logistics operations

Maryland's labor market has remained structurally tighter than the national average through the past two years, which favors displaced brewery workers relative to peers in regions where manufacturing contraction has been steeper.

The closure, once finalized, will end the brewery's run in Baltimore County. Workers, county officials, and the regional hospitality economy will be watching for a confirmed shutdown date, the WARN filing, and any community-transition commitments the brewer may announce before the facility goes dark.