Chris Burns thought he had escaped the uncertainty of working for the federal government when he left his IT contracting job five years ago to open a craft brewery in the Washington suburbs.

But even with the government shutdown over for now, he cannot widely distribute two new beers and had to cancel the release of a third. He also could face delays opening a second location.

“It’s been real,” Burns, the owner of Old Ox Brewery in Ashburn, Virginia, said about the consequences of the 35-day shutdown.

President Trump and lawmakers reached a deal Friday, but the pain isn’t over for the nation’s craft brewers.

They lost revenue they will never recoup and will continue to lose money while they wait for federal agencies that process labels, brewery permits and small-business loans to clear a backlog built up during the shutdown.

During the closure, the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau within the Treasury Department stopped approving new labels, hamstringing businesses that consistently churn out new products.

“Growth in our industry is driven by innovation,” said Bill Butcher, the founder of Port City Brewing in Alexandria. “If we can’t introduce new beers into the market, it stalls our business.”

His company spent the last four months of 2018 planning release and production schedules for six new beers. The shutdown threw those plans “out the window,” he said.

Wineries and small-batch distilleries don’t face the same conundrum because their products take longer to produce and are not released as often as craft beers.

Last year, the federal government received 192,000 applications for new lines of wine, spirits and beer; more than 34,000 were for beer.

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