POCATELLO — The pioneer of craft beer in Pocatello, Penny Pink, was first piqued to the profession by watching her father brew homemade sarsaparilla from their basement when she was just a little girl.

Pink, who owns and operates Portneuf Valley Brewing, remembers spending hours cleaning up the mess of broken glass and sticky root beer soda that would cover the walls and floors after bottles would explode because her father added a little too much carbonation.

About 50 years later, Pink continues to provide the public with not only that same sarsaparilla, but also a wide range of homemade craft beers, in addition to food, wine and an eclectic ambiance at her 9,000-square-foot building at 615 S. First Avenue in Pocatello.

Pink established the first craft microbrewery in Pocatello. Since then, several tap-houses and another microbrewery have graced the Gate City area in recent years, but Pink says the added competition has actually been good for business.

“I have been the only brewery here for 22 years,” Pink said. “When Jim Dandy opened up, I actually saw more people coming here because there is this synergy between breweries that I don’t think happens in any other industry. People will come into town have a few beers over there and then come over here for a beer, or people will go over there and see they have food trucks and want more of a sit-down dinner, so they come over here. I think it’s super cool that we have another brewery in town.”

Portneuf Valley Brewing poured their first beer for public consumption in July 1996. But for seven years prior, Pink perfected her beer recipes brewing on a small system at home. The catalyst that led to her 22-year-plus career in brewing beers was actually a serendipitous accident involving her now late husband, Bob Pink.

“What spurred me to get into brewing was my late husband blowing up a batch of beer all over his power tools,” Pink said. “I won’t repeat exactly what he said but it was along the lines of ‘Woman, you’re the one with degrees in biology and chemistry, you brew the beer.’ It was supposed to be Bob’s hobby and it was his mistakes that got me into this.”

Pink got her first commercial start making beers in the 200-square-foot video arcade room located inside Dudley’s Sports Bar & Grill in the Federal Building on Arthur Avenue. Her setup included a hand-powered malt mill and a two-barrel brewing system that she had built out of scrap metal from her backyard.

“I didn’t even have money for a motor for the malt mill so I would literally grind all of the malt by hand,” Pink said. “I looked like Popeye because I was just cranking hundreds of pounds of malt through my mill. To brew two barrels of beer, which is 62 gallons, I would work 14- to 16-hour days. It was basically a glorified home-brew system.”

Of the 28 taps inside Dudley’s, Pink’s beer occupied eight, with seven beers and the sarsaparilla. She said she also sold beer wholesale, with about 20 to 30 taps in other places around town.

Getting the business off the ground was a challenge.

“I didn’t even pay myself for the first 12 years I had the company,” Pink said. “I frequently would have to go work somewhere else to make enough money to keep the business alive, especially after Dudley’s went out of business in the wake of 9/11.”

In the spring of 2002, Pink was told Dudley’s was shuttering for good and that she had three months to find a new home for her business. Though she had purchased the old East Idaho Brewing Company building on First Avenue in March 1999, it was in need of a significant overhaul before it could serve as her permanent location.

By the summer of 2002, Pink was able to establish the brewing operation inside the facility and work began on the rest of the main floor to create a comfortable atmosphere for the pub.

“We were selling wholesale and filling growlers on the floor of our walk-in cooler,” Pink said. “We were able to offer samples of beer to the customers but I wasn’t able to sell it by the glass.”

At the same time work was being done to prepare the place for on-site consumption, the volume of beer going out the doors in kegs and growlers from the tasting room was increasing exponentially, Pink added.

Renovating the building put a large dent in Pink’s finances, and shortly after the brewing operations were established, she experienced her first significant obstacle.

“Dudley’s closing really put a burr under my saddle and I was faced with either shutting the business down or going back to work,” Pink said. “Contrary to the advice of my husband and many of my friends, I chose to go work at the Idaho National Laboratory for another four years doing environmental and safety work.”

Also a member of the Pocatello City Council at the time, Pink was forced to resign. She continued working at INL until about 2006, which is when PVB was first able to sell brews by the glass. That milestone allowed Pink to cash flow the business enough to attract the attention of an “angel investor.”

“He loaned me enough money to get enough renovation for the kitchen that the bank had enough faith to loan me money to complete upgrades to the second floor and add all of the fire sprinklers,” Pink said. “Today, I have hundreds of thousands of dollars into this building and I am completely debt-free.”

While she could have built a brand new building from the ground up, Pink says she adores her current location.

“I love this building, it has great bones and a great history,” Pink said. “I am the third brewery in the last 100 years in this same block. My thought was to invest putting my brewery in an under-utilized part of town to act as a catalyst for redevelopment of that district and to help keep the center of Pocatello alive and vibrant.”

It wasn’t until 2012 that Pink experienced another setback when Bob passed away from complications stemming from cancer.

“He was always that silent partner, like the Wizard of Oz behind the scenes,” Pink said. “He was my sounding board for many years. It had been a really intense three years of many surgeries and chemotherapy every three weeks, and by the time he passed, it was like the wind had gone out of my sails.”

But with the help of an amazing team, including Danny Paz, Mark Cowman, Lucas Bunzow, Bounchang “Booch” Vannavong, Bianca Arrizon, Ryan Dahmer and countless others, Pink was able to soldier on.

“One thing Bob used to say to me is that the one good thing with this business is that you are going to get to work with many young people,” Pink said. “This is not a career for most people. It’s a stepping-stone along their path in life. Bob would say all of those young people will keep me young. One of the things I am proud of here is that we have helped hundreds of young people along their journey in their lives.”

But again in 2016 Pink experienced some setbacks, going from about four years of double-digit growth to an almost immediate standstill.

“Coming into the end of the third quarter in 2016 I was sitting on record profits coming out of the business,” Pink said. “Then, two dozen chain restaurants opened in town, mostly in Chubbuck, and I just saw those returns bottom out.”

Pink continued, “There aren’t any more people to eat out but there is like 40 times the competition that there was a few years ago. It’s sad, especially for the local businesses. It’s one thing if there is one or two new restaurants, but when you have two dozen new restaurants open at the same time, it takes a while to ride that out.”

In addition to food, wine and beer by the glass or growler — which includes six constant beers and four rotating specialty brews — PVB offers live music every Friday and Saturday night, a jam session every Tuesday night and serves as a social hub for various gatherings.

Though Pink briefly entertained the idea of selling her business a few years ago, she has since decided to ride things out for now. With a kickstart from her boyfriend and assistant manager, JV Cernyar, Pink is confident PVB will continue serving up not only homemade beverages, but also an over-the-top good time for those living in the Gate City.

It’s just a matter of getting folks in the door, Pink says.

“The pig is still flying,” Pink said. “But the pig needs to learn some new tricks.”