Mark DeVito/Standard Deviant Brewing
Mark DeVito, co-owner and COO of Standard Deviant Brewing, wouldn't last a day in a police lineup. But it might not be his curly handlebar mustache that gave him away. Mark has an outsize personality, to put it mildly. And back in December, I sat down with him and one of the SDB dogs, Beans, at the Mission brewery for what turned out to be quite the wild ride of a recording.
In Part 1, we learn about Mark's upbringing in smalltown New Hampshire—Hopkinton, to be specific. It's still a town-with-no-stoplights small. The summers were hot and the winters cold and snowy.
After hearing about two rather unfortunate stories from Mark's elementary school days, we move on to his teen years. He learned to play drums from a neighbor who taught music at his school. His parents placed him in a preparatory boarding school for high school, where he found an entire room full of instruments where he and his friends could play. And play they did. They formed a band that started playing around the area.
We go back a little so Mark can share his Italian grandparents' story of migrating to the United States and landing in Boston, where his dad grew up and where Mark soon found himself after high school. The gigs, mostly Grateful Dead covers but eventually more like jazz improv with a Miles Davis influence, were stacking up for Great American (named after a grocery store chain and having nothing to do with 9/11).
After his college years, some band members went their separate ways. But Mark and one of his buds decided to take a chance on San Francisco. Mark had visited and was blown away by the natural scenery and human creative energy here. Which, duh.
And so, in 2004, he moved here. From 2005 to 2010, Mark would spend around five months a year touring the country from his new hometown. The story of how he found a place to live—where he's still at today with his wife—is remarkable only in the sense that it doesn't really happen that way anymore. He was walking around the Mission taking down phone numbers written on "for rent" signs in windows when someone leaned their head out one of those windows and asked Mark if he wanted to see the place.
In Part 2, we pick up right where we left off in Part 1. Mark was walking around the Mission taking down numbers of places with "for rent" signs. A resident in one of those spots leaned out the window and invited Mark in to see the place. Mark reveals that he and his wife still live in that same apartment 20 years later.
Paul Duatschek lived nearby in the Mission. He and Mark were introduced by a mutual friend at Bottom of the Hill. Soon enough, Paul was coming in regularly to Luna Park on Valencia, where Mark managed and bartended. His new friend kept urging Mark to carry his homebrew at the restaurant, something Paul most likely knew couldn't happen. The same thing happened when Mark opened his own place—Dr. Teeth (now simply "Teeth") on Mission.
It was around the time of two major events—his 30th birthday and the dissolution of his band (see Part 1)—that Mark decided to branch out. He ended up opening several other alcoholic-beverage-heavy establishments around SF: joints like Wild Hare, Royal Tug Yacht Club, Soda Popinskis, Cease and Desist. But it was at Dr. Teeth that Paul, by now a pretty damn good homebrewer, would pressure his friend.
The idea was that Paul knew beer and Mark knew how to open places. They hired a branding company to help come up with the name, while they also poured Paul's homebrew at parties. They got a good reaction to the product, but encountered challenges finding a spot. Eventually, Craigslist saved them.
Today, Standard Deviant lives on 14th Street just off Mission in an old body shop. They signed the lease in 2015, built the place out, and opened in 2016. The brewery produces around 2,000 barrels a year.
The conversation then turns to San Francisco craft brewing. When Mark and Paul decided to work together, there were about 10 craft breweries in SF (places like 21st Amendment and Magnolia, to name just a few). A year or so later, when Standard Deviant opened its doors, that number had doubled. Mark says of the entire operation that it's about the place as much as it is the beer. I for one can attest to that.
We end the podcast with Mark's response to our theme this season: "We're all in it ..."
PS: An exciting bit of news dropped since we recorded back in December. This fall, Standard Deviant is opening its second location in San Francisco’s Pier 70. For reference, we featured this exciting new area of the bayside waterfront back in Season 4 Episode 20.
We recorded this podcast at Standard Deviant Brewing in the Mission in December 2023.
Photography by Jeff Hunt
