Brewers transforming food, beverages, concession areas

MILWAUKEE (AP) As the Milwaukee Brewers reshape their on-the-field roster, the home ballpark will undergo the single largest improvement since it opened in 2001, team executives said Wednesday.

An approximately $20 million transformation of the food and beverage concession areas on all four levels of Miller Park is expected to be completed in time for the April 3, 2017, home opener.

The Brewers are partnering with concessionaire Delaware North to overhaul, reconfigure and rebuild the concession areas and bars. The restaurant group Hospitality Democracy will add new local offerings into the menu lineup, including Zaffiro's Pizza, Smoke Shack barbecue, AJ Bombers hamburgers and Holey Moley Coffee and Doughnuts.

''A critical element of the project is going local,'' said team chief operating officer Rick Schlesinger. The project will build on Milwaukee's flourishing restaurant industry.

''We are now joining in that renaissance,'' Schlesinger said.

A redesigned bar on the right-field side of the loge level will feature 30 taps of craft beer from around Wisconsin.

The Brewers will create a ''first base ward'' and a ''third base ward'' on the field level that will include 11 concession stands and two new bars open to views of the field.

Delaware North's general manager at Miller Park, Ken Gaber, said 100 additional cash registers will move fans through the concession areas faster. Concession staffing will increase to about 2,000 part-time workers, which includes 400 additional employees.

The project is being funded by the Brewers ownership and Delaware North. Planning started a year ago with input from the fans, the Brewers said at a Miller Park news conference Wednesday. Executives in hard hats picked up sledgehammers and knocked holes in the wall of a concession building to signal the start of the project, which was already underway.

Uihlein-Wilson Architects is the project architect, and Hunzinger Construction is the general contractor.