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Community first.

This was the goal when Legends FC and Beacon Brewery formed a relationship that sent ripples throughout the semi-pro soccer community.

“Legends is doing things with Beacon that is blowing people’s minds in the (United Premier Soccer League),” Club founder John Fuller said. “A lot of the teams are in major metropolitan areas and don’t have the feel where you can walk up to somebody and ask them to make a beer for you. When we put a picture of the can on the internet the other day, it was a big deal in UPSL.”

The brewery has designed, crafted and now serves a Legends FC beer. Packaged in bright blues cans with the crest of the fledgling team imprinted on every one, the beer will be quick to draw the eye of any customer coming in. On game day? This will be the beer for winners after hard fought games at Callaway Stadium.

“The goal is to funnel people here before and after games,” Fuller said. “After every game, we are going to do our best to have coupons and stuff we can put on tickets to get fans from the stadium over to Beacon because it is literally right over the hill.”

The design of the beer was a simple English-style pale ale because when Hudson thinks of soccer he thinks of going and “grabbing a pint of bitters after the game.”

“I love that it is something they put a lot of thought into, they didn’t just slap something together,” Fuller said. “They looked at our logo and the history of soccer and came up with something that is pretty unique. It’s really awesome work.”

Want a Legendary ESB beer? You will not find it anywhere outside of LaGrange in what Hudson calls “a LaGrange beer for the city of LaGrange.”

When Chase Hudson founded Beacon back in 2018, his goal was to keep it all in the community. 

“We try to make sure all the beers we make out here are very heavily tied with the community,” Hudson said. “We have this one with Legends, we have one with Sweetwater (Amphitheater), one with JSL. The point of small town breweries is to be about the community and we are excited to see Legends FC join our community.” 

Fuller and Hudson have known each other for a few years now and when Fuller started the club back in 2022, Hudson was on board from the get go. It is a relationship forged in caskets and cleats but it is also a relationship that goes much deeper. 

Beacon Brewery houses the Legends FC headquarters and hosted the signing day for the inaugural roster. With the home field of the club being Callaway Stadium just up the road in the Hillside community, it was a natural fit and Hudson was happy to share the space with the team.

“This is what it is all about,” Hudson said. “So many breweries today are getting lost by focusing so much on distribution and they are losing the soul and spirit of what a craft brewery should be. It is a community spot.”

This is a completely symbiotic relationship with Beacon receiving foot traffic from the club already, which is set to increase once the games start coming along. 

Fuller is quick to praise Hudson for getting on board so early and could never dream that his team would have formed the community connections so early in its lifespan like the one it now shares with Beacon.

“I had no idea this would be possible. I would have said no way,” Fuller said. 

That inaugural game is on the horizon with Legends traveling up to Riverdale for their opening match on Sunday. That is what it has all been building too. Months of hard work and it is about to pay off. The months of forging a bond between club and brewery will have to wait a week longer with Legends set for its first home game on Saturday, March 25. The players are almost as excited to have a craft beer as they are to take the field, and a week from now, the Beacon-Legends relationship will start a new chapter as they charge forward into the newfound waters together.