The city of Portland has abandoned an effort to take away a local brewery’s right to using an iconic logo. Old Town Brewing secured the exclusive rights to use the leaping deer logo found on the city-owned Portland, Oregon, sign in 2012.

The city hired a private trademark attorney and spent four years contesting Old Town Brewing’s exclusive rights. The Oregonian reports city officials announced Portland will no longer seek to secure the trademark for use of the logo on beer, wine and liquor products.

In exchange, the Old Town brewery will allow the city to license the image for certain local alcohol-related uses such as festivals, events and advertising for local trade organizations. Old Town Brewing will not allow use of the logo on any alcohol-related products or packaging.

Smuttynose Brewing Co., founded in 1994 and the largest craft brewery in New Hampshire, will be sold at bank auction March 9 unless a buyer is found before. The company employs 68 people and generates more than $10 million in revenue a year.

The sale includes the Smuttynose brand, its facility on the historic Towle Farm in Hampton and Hayseed Restaurant located next to the brewery on its 13-acre site. The brewery is capable of producing 75,000 barrels a year, but in the last year it has been running at 50% capacity.

“The company’s financial models were based on 20 years of consistent growth but the explosion of microbreweries has led to changing dynamics in the marketplace,” Smuttynose owner Peter Egelston said in a press release. “This dramatic shift occurred just as Smuttynose committed to a major infrastructure investment with the construction of the new production facility. As the turmoil in the marketplace stabilizes, Smuttynose, a trusted brand with strong consumer loyalty, can regain its footing with a major infusion of capital.”

Egelston stressed that the company is open and will conduct business as usual.

Lead lender Provident Bank is managing the auction process. “Smuttynose Brewing Company has been a valued customer and an important part of our community. Provident Bank is committed to working with the company during these challenging financial times to produce the best outcome for everyone involved,” Provident Bank President Chuck Withee said.

Egelston, along with partner Joanne Francis, is also owner of the Portsmouth Brewery, a brewpub located in downtown Portsmouth. It is not part of the sale.

Green Flash Brewing, which operates breweries on both coasts, announced it will withdraw distribution from 32 states and reduce its workforce by 15%.

“We were doing pretty well close to the breweries, and in some strategic markets we had some strongholds, but we had a lot of territory that was in pretty steady decline,” co-founder Mike Hinkley told Brewbound. “Rather than to continue to fight that battle, we took the resources from out there and brought ’em all into a smaller territory — as much as we could, anyway.”

Green Flash sold only 18% of its beer in the 32 states it will not longer ship to. “We kept about 82% of our wholesale trade business,” Hinkley said. “We were pretty sparse and in decline in that other territory, so reeling it back to strength. Now we can put our sales and marketing resources into a tighter geographic footprint.”

Green Flash will continue to supply Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nebraska, Nevada, Texas, and Utah, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Virginia from two breweries — the original San Diego location and its second brewery in Virginia Beach. Green Flash also recently acquired a brewpub in Lincoln, Neb., and expects that could be a model for the future.

“If that’s successful, that’ll be the model for how to go to another city,” Hinkley told Brewbound. “And then the 100-year plan is maybe there’ll be 10 Lincolns over the next 20 years of my life. But who knows? I just can’t support all of that territory. I don’t have the resources to compete on that broad a scale.”

A federal trademark court has ruled that Innovation Brewing in North Carolina is clear to register its name and branding. Bell’s Brewery in Michigan had argued the microbrewery’s name is too close to two of Bell’s marketing phrases.

In opposing Innovation’s trademark registration in 2014 Bell’s argued Innovation’s name sounded too much like the bigger brewery’s unregistered advertising slogan, “Bottling innovation since 1985.” Bell’s also claimed the word “inspired,” which Bell’s has used on some logos and marketing materials within the phrase “Inspired Brewing,” carries the same meaning as the word “innovation.”

The trademark court found that the slogan in question had not been “used and/or advertised … in connection with a single product (so) that they have come to be associated together, in the mind of the purchasing public” with Bell’s products.

Mendocino Brewing Co., which has a direct link to the beginning of the American craft beer movement, will close its California taproom Saturday and the future of the brewery is in doubt.

Originally located in Hopland and later relocated to Ukiah, the taproom was the first brewpub to open in California and second in the United States after Prohibition. Some of the brewery’s equipment came from New Albion, the first post-Prohibition purpose-built microbrewery.

The closing comes as Mendocino Brewing is in discussion with an investor to help rescue the company, said Michael Laybourn, brewery co-founder who is still a board member. Its Ukiah brewery is located about a half-mile away from the taproom. “If it happens in the right way, he will save the company,” Laybourn said of the investor, which he did not name but said was from Northern California.

The brewery, which opened in 1983, has struggled recently under its chairman and indirect majority shareholder, Vijay Mallya, who bought the company in 1997. Mallya resides in London and is fighting extradition to India on charges of fraud and money laundering, according to news reports.

Keith Villa, who wrote the recipe for Blue Moon Belgian White in 1995, is retiring from MillerCoors. “While I am stepping away and retiring from MillerCoors, this company will forever hold a special place in my heart,” Villa said via a statement. “Over the last 20 years, I have witnessed the growth of Blue Moon from a local beer that we developed at the SandLot (a brewery that began inside Coors Field in Denver) to a brand that is sold around the world.”

Villa served as head brewmaster and global brand ambassador in recent years, continuing to write recipes for other Blue Moon brands.

According to market research firm IRI Worldwide, Blue Moon Belgian White Ale ranks as the No. 1 craft brand with sales of more than $258 million in grocery and convenience stores.