Crafting An Island

On my recent travels I met with Garrett Marrero, founder of Maui Brewing to chat changes in industry, where it all started and of course brewing in paradise. 

So where did the idea for Maui Brewing come from?

Maui Brewing was born from the simple idea of creating a truly authentic locally brewed Hawaiian craft beer. At the time when I was just visiting Hawaii the “local” beer was Kona, being brewed and bottled on the mainland. I felt cheated and being from San Diego, SF, and Davis I saw what was happening in craft at the time. To me it was a no-brainer, Hawaii needed a real local beer.

What large changes have you seen within the industry since you've been operating?

The industry today is hardly recognizable from when we first began. There were less than 1000 breweries in the country when we opened. We were the 10th craft brewer to put beer in cans, the first to brew with elements like coconut and pineapple. There is a lot more attention by the public on craft, “craft” now.

Itself as a term has been usurped by the big brewers making “crafty” beers and by all industries really. You now see “craft juice”, everything it seems is “handcrafted” whether or not it truly is. I still believe wholeheartedly in the vision of what Craft Beer is and who a craft brewer is but I believe that independence is a critical factor as is quality. Not to mention the amount of money that craft beer has attracted, not just strategics and private equity, but the small breweries opening up seem to have huge investment behind them building state of the art 7-25bbl Brewhouses and impressive facilities. That wasn’t the case 13 yrs ago. Back then most of us couldn’t get even get a loan and investors were pretty skeptical of us.

Where do you see "craft" or "independent" brewing moving to the next couple of years?

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Mahalo you beautiful bunch!