The Abbey has developed commercial enterprises including breeding of black Angus cattle, a brewery and taproom, and its own hot sauce.

While located within the territory of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Little Rock, the Abbey has independent authority as an institution of the Benedictine order.

In 1877, the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad (LR&FS) owned thousands of open acres in Arkansas that it wished to develop with settlers.

Deciding to offer land only to German Catholics, the company approached Martin Marty (bishop), O.S.B., the Abbot of St. Meinrad Abbey in Indiana, with a proposal.

Due to financial and personnel difficulties, St. Meinrad requested assistance from its mother house in Switzerland to aid the growth.

He was a monk from Einsiedeln Abbey who had been serving at the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kansas City–Saint Joseph in western Missouri.

The third Abbot of Subiaco, Paul Nahlen, O.S.B., obtained Pope Pius XII's blessing for the construction of the present church on the Abbey campus.

[1] In January 2023, Jerrid Farnam was arrested for public intoxication, theft of property, criminal mischief, breaking or entering, and residential burglary for breaking into the Abbey, vandalizing the marble altar, and stealing two boxes of relics containing 1,500 year old relics related to Catholic saints.

[21] Great Big Story, a media company of CNN, produced a segment on the Hot Sauce operations of the Abbey.

[23] KTHV, a media company in Little Rock, Arkansas, produced a segment on the new CountryMonks Brewing and the Hot Sauce operations of the Abbey.

On September 10, 2018 the Roman Catholic Diocese of Little Rock released a report disclosing the names of clergy who at some time served in Arkansas and who have been credibly accused of child sexual abuse.

[25] As it is independent of the diocese, on January 24, 2020 the Abbey of Subiaco released its own report; it disclosed the names of three deceased monks with established allegations of abuse: Nicholas Fuhrmann, Francis Zimmerer, and Patrick Hannon.