The Lost Abbey is leaving its Vista brewery, but the brewery is not going away. Co-founder Tomme Arthur has reached an agreement to exit the production headquarters and tasting room at 1347 Keystone Way in Vista by the end of 2026, and he is now searching for a smaller North County facility to become the brewery’s production home in 2027.

The move is the latest chapter in a strategy Arthur calls growing down, an idea he began discussing publicly in 2022 as the economics of craft brewing changed. Rather than operate a brewery built for growth that never came, Arthur has argued that The Lost Abbey should become comfortable being smaller now while keeping the ability to grow again if demand warrants it.

That thinking led to a major restructuring that began in 2023, when The Lost Abbey announced it would leave the large San Marcos production facility that had been its home for more than 16 years. The brewery then moved into Mother Earth Brew Co.’s Vista facility, sharing space and using its 20-barrel system, before moving again in late 2024 into the former Eppig Brewing production facility on Keystone Way in Vista.

That arrangement changed in 2025, when House of Mason shifted toward contract brewing and exited the Vista facility, leaving The Lost Abbey as the primary operator of a brewery capable of producing roughly 10,000 barrels a year. That is about five times the roughly 2,000 barrels Arthur says he actually wants the brewery to produce each year. Contract brewing for other partners filled tanks through much of 2026, but it did not fix the underlying problem.

“For much of 2026, we have been contract brewing for other partners and trying to fill the void with beer,” Arthur told San Diego Beer News. “While tanks got filled, that didn’t really do much to assist our bottom line.”

Arthur said the rent on the space was too high and occupancy far above normal, putting the brewery back in the same position it had been in at its original San Marcos home: a building that costs too much for the business it actually has. The goal now is to find a right-sized home, and Arthur is inviting owners or operators with suitable North County brewery space to contact the company.

The departure will also eventually mean the end of the current headquarters tasting room, and Arthur expects the closure process to include a warehouse sale of beer and inventory that cannot be transferred. The brewery’s four satellite tasting rooms will keep pouring: The Church in downtown San Diego’s East Village, The Confessional in Cardiff-by-the-Sea, The Sanctuary in San Elijo Hills, and The Monastery in Miramar.

The move matters because of what The Lost Abbey is. Arthur helped launch the Belgian-inspired brand in 2006 alongside Port Brewing, building an international reputation for barrel-aged, sour, and Belgian-style beers including Duck Duck Gooze, Carnevale, and Devotion. The brewery plans to keep producing about 2,000 barrels a year from its next home. For one of San Diego’s most celebrated breweries, the point is not to get bigger. It is to get to the right size and stay there.