In 2012 we passed the bill that allowed the brewery Renaissance that we are currently in. Previously breweries could not sell beer without food and also could not directly sell beer. Legend had to sell their beer to Brown distributing and then buy it back. That's how we went from 2 breweries to dozens.

https://m.styleweekly.com/richmond/bill-allows-brewers-to-skirt-abc-food-laws/Content?oid=1688886

They passed special laws recently for breweries, which i believe Hardywood's founders were involved with, to put them on par with wineries. Because it's good for Virginia and nobody gets their knickers in a bunch about people drinking beer until 10 or 11.

There are some agricultural loopholes wineries can take advantage of. Something about actually using the land of the establishment to grow crops allows them to operate differently. It was explained to me once but I can’t remember much of the details.