President
Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co. | Chippewa Falls
Tony Bugher is president of the Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co., serving as the face of the brand since taking over the family business in 2023. Bugher represents the sixth generation of Leinenkugel family leadership at the Chippewa Falls-based Molson Coors subsidiary, best known nationally for its Summer Shandy.
During his college years, Bugher worked at the brewery in bottling and at its hospitality center. He began his career at TDS Telecom in Madison, working in various sales and marketing roles. In 2014, Bugher’s uncle and then company president, Dick Leinenkugel, encouraged him to join the beer business. Bugher was first hired by MillerCoors as a craft and import development manager in Dallas and later promoted to field marketing manager in Atlanta, followed by senior distributor sales executive. In early 2022, Leinenkugel announced his plan to retire at the end of the year, and the company announced its succession plan, transitioning leadership to Bugher.
In his role, Bugher shares the Leinenkugel’s story and history with distributors, retailers and brewery fans as a representative of the family and advises on brand marketing efforts, production and the Leinie Lodge. In recent years, Leinenkugel Brewing Co. has launched a small-scale innovation brewery, which allows the brand to develop new beers and receive immediate feedback from customers who visit the Chippewa Falls brewery. In 2024, Leinenkugel partnered with Athens, Georgia-based Terrapin Beer Co. on an exclusive beer at American Family Field, called Pitch Clock IPA.
In November 2024, Molson Coors announced it will close the Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Co. brewery in Chippewa Falls and its craft beer brewery near downtown Milwaukee and will consolidate beer production from those facilities at its Miller Brewing Co. facility on the west side of Milwaukee.
Education: Bachelor’s, Edgewood College; MBA, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater
