Hop Lot has been nominated for the USA TODAY 10BEST for the third straight year.
The Suttons Bay beer garden has finished second in 2025 and 2024.
“We are thankful to everyone who voted for us in the past and who has kept us in the running this year. It’s fun to be recognized and to put a spotlight on the area itself,” Hop Lot cofounder Drew Lutke said. “When we started conceiving this idea of a brewery and beer garden, we knew this was something special and felt that Suttons Bay was a perfect location to offer this experience.”
Hop Lot has earned the nomination thanks to its true outdoor northern Michigan environment, which has grown into a top family destination for a night out.
When the family was starting to come up from Chicago, they really just wanted to sit outside.
“We set out years ago to make this an enjoyable spot for families and for locals ... there is no sense of time here,” Lutke said. “Our mission is to embrace northern Michigan’s natural beauty.”
Lutke admits they didn’t know if Hop Lot would transition to the winter months as well.
Now, if you are looking for a Valentine’s reservation within Hop Lot’s igloos, you are out of luck, buddy, as of the beginning of February.
Since the pandemic, Hop Lot has focused on the winter experience, and now you can’t get a spot in an igloo on a weekend at least a week in advance.
“Sundays are as busy or busier than Fridays,” Lutke said.
Hop Lot is currently focused on enhancing what they have right now, including bar improvements in the tap room and its seasonal tent area located adjacent to the tasting room.
“We always envision small steps every year,” Lutke said. “We have a lot of large groups, businesses, and families for different gatherings. We want to be inclusive with all of those groups.”
Leelanau is known to like a few alcoholic beverages. But with the new Michigan law, breweries can now sell nonalcoholic beer made by other breweries.
Before the change at the New Year, breweries could only sell beer they produced in their tasting rooms.
Senate Bill 512 changes the definition of beer to “a beverage obtained by alcoholic fermentation of an infusion or decoction of barley, malt, hops, sugar, or other cereal in potable water.”
“We’ve always wanted to do nonalcoholic beer, but the equipment is costly,” Lutke said. “The market is shifting to lower ABV and nonalcoholic products.”
Hop Lot now offers nonalcoholic options from Heineken and Athletic Brewing, two of the largest nonalcoholic beverage brands in the country.
Drew, Steve and Sarah Lutke started the hopping local business in 2015.
Hop Lot has year in and year out been ranked in local awards, including ‘Redhot Best’, which ranked the brewery as a top-10 new brewery in the State of Michigan when it first opened nearly a decade ago.
Other Beer Gardens nominated include: Anderson Valley Brewing Co. (California); Booneshine Brewing Co. (North Carolina); Cerveceria La Tropical (Miami); Faded Bistro & Beer Garden (Florida); The Hangar Lake Tahoe (California); Henmick Farm & Brewery (Ohio); Hill Farmstead Brewery (Vermont); Jester King Brewery (Texas); Lost Cabin Beer Co. (South Dakota); Maui Brewing Co. (Hawaii), to name a few.
Vote here: https://10best.usatoday. com/awards/best-beergarden/
