Brewed in Hawaiʻi, For Hawaiʻi

In recent years, Hawaiʻi’s brewers have built a thriving local beer scene from the ground up. Their craft is inspired by a passion for beer, and deep appreciation for the islands’ unique tastes. In spite of the many challenges of brewing beer locally, these brewmasters are creating a huge range of flavorful craft beers that are intended to be enjoyed locally, and make a perfect accompaniment to local style cuisine. We got the chance to talk story with  brewers from three of Hawaiʻi’s favorite local breweries, Maui Brewing, Beer Lab Hawaiʻi, and Honolulu Beerworks, to learn more about what makes our island beer scene so special.

Passion

Making small batch beers is often called craft brewing because it truly is an art form. Achieving the different styles and nuances unique to each beer requires a deep appreciation for the subtleties and flavors of beers. Hawaiʻi’s brewers are first and foremost beer lovers.

Nicolas Wong, Kevin Teruya, and Derek Taguchi, founders of Beer Lab Hawaiʻi cultivated their love of craft beer through experimentation. Nicolas and Derek worked at a Naval shipyard and the role often took them to different areas of the continent which weren’t necessarily tourist destinations, so they made a hobby out of tasting local beers. Not only did they get to sample a variety of beers that they hadn’t experienced in Hawaiʻi, they also cultivated an appreciation for freshly brewed beer. Back home they teamed up with Kevin who had recently started experimenting with beer brewing. The three realized that a lot of local friends shared their curiosity and enthusiasm for the craft. Beer Lab HI was created as a way to experience, and experiment with different brews. Other local beer lovers took notice, and Beer Lab HI now has three taprooms around Honolulu.

Honolulu Beerworks’ owner Geoff Seideman’s passion for brewing found him close to home, or rather at home; it started with a home brew kit that was a Christmas present from his wife Charmayne. Geoff’s affinity for brewing was no surprise, he had a background in the culinary world and went to school at KCC. Geoff and Charmayne put the pieces together and found they had a recipe for success. They opened their first brewery in Kakaako in 2014 and the business took off. It’s continued to grow over the last ten years, and earlier this year they moved into their new larger home at 1632 Hart St. in Kalihi.

Maui Brewing is now Hawaiʻi’s largest craft brewery, but they also started small. As a student at UC Davis in San Diego Garrett Marrero developed an appreciation for craft beers. When he traveled to Maui he fell in love with the island but found the local beer scene essentially non-existent. With his genuine passion for Maui and for beer he felt an obligation to bring craft brewing to the island, and the state. He built Maui Brewing from scratch into a beloved local brand, and industry leader in Hawai’i.

Island Style Beers for Island Life

Unlike wine, beers don’t have strict provenance. If you see an India Pale Ale (IPA) in the cooler it’s more likely to be brewed in Indiana than India. But like wine, palette matters and pairings matter. While there may not be any official “Hawaiʻi style” beers, there are certainly some brews that pair better with the local vibes and the local food.

Hawaiʻi’ residents’ unique preferences have impacted which beers have taken off here. At the same time increased exposure to different types of beers means local preferences are changing. Garrett talked about how tastes here are evolving, “People here have always loved lager, but we’ve moved so far beyond that and one of the first steps of that was IPA.” And just as IPA changed Hawaiʻi beer lovers’ palates, their palates also changed IPAs. The original IPAs imported to the islands were heavier with piney and earthy notes at the forefront. Now there are a variety of popular local IPAs that are more floral and citrusy.

And it’s not just IPAs that have been inspiring Hawaiʻi beer lovers to branch out. Honolulu Beerworks’ first brew was the Pia Mahi ʻai Honey Citrus Saison. Geoff explained, “It’s delicious, a classic wheat beer, but a lot of our customers weren’t familiar with what Saison was when we started, so we got to introduce people to it.”  This positive feedback loop where new styles of beer are available to Hawaiʻi beer lovers, and their preferences influence how local brewers are developing their offerings has created the thriving beer scene we’re enjoying now.

And it’s not just about the flavors. One of the core values at Beer Lab Hawaiʻi is that beer is best enjoyed within a few weeks, or even a few days of brewing.  Nicholas emphasized, “Beer is supposed to be hyper local. Beer is supposed to be consumed fresh.” Brewing locally means that these companies can share their unique offerings right away. Being hyper local also gives small local brewers the flexibility to experiment with new styles and flavors in small batches and get immediate feedback from their target customer base in their tap rooms.

Of course one of the biggest advantages for local beer and food lovers is that local beer pairs perfectly with all our other local flavors. Nicolas of Beer Lab HI explained what Hawaiʻi beer drinkers want when it comes to pairings, “We want to be able to taste the food, not have it overwhelmed.” A dish with nuanced flavors like saimin pairs well with a pilsner or larger, like Maui Brewing’s original Bikini Blond. For poke pairings it depends on the poke, but the team at Honolulu Beerworks love their lightest beer, the Kewalos Cream Ale with classic poke. For local foods with bigger flavors, beers with bigger flavors can be a perfect match. Beer lab’s smoke meat is expertly smoked and seasoned and anyone up for a bold pairing should try it with their Obake Files Raspberry, Yuzu & Hawaiian Chili Pepper Ale.

The Challenges of Local Brewing

When Garrett started Maui Brewing, he didn’t think that beer would lead him to the State Legislature. But soon he realized that in order to allow his business, or any brewing business to succeed, would take legislative change. In 2005 Garrett was one of the champions of legislation to allow the sale of growlers and other provisions crucial to the expansion of brew pubs in the state. HFIA supported this measure as well. The measure passed and has helped enable the thriving landscape of Hawaiʻi brewing that we’re enjoying today. But work at the state level to help local brewers thrive is not done. This fall Garrett participated in a briefing at the Capitol about the expense and administrative burden of recently opposed audits for deposit beverage retailers. HFIA has also been involved in working to fix this issue for all deposit beverage retailers and we look forward to working with everyone to passing a solution in 2026.

Other challenges for local brewers have recently come from the Federal level as well. Honolulu Beerworks prioritizes local flavors and local ingredients, but many of beer’s necessary inputs like barley and hops are simply not grown in Hawaiʻi and have to imported. Tariffs and associated inflation have impacted prices of ingredients, raw materials, and equipment needed to brew locally. And of course even without added tariff’s business in Hawaiʻi faces a range of logistical challenges to overcome. As Nicolas from Beer Lab Hawaiʻi explained, “having a big ocean between us and all of our supplies makes things hard.” And the struggle applies to getting beer out as well. Local brewers can’t easily expand their markets by trucking beer to another state.

Creative Collabs

Brewers in Hawaiʻi have overcome these challenges by prioritizing their local customers, and by finding creative ways to work with other local businesses. Beer Lab HI has teamed up twice with Rainbow Drive Inn to create brews based on some of their favorite fountain drinks. They also worked with Zippy’s earlier this year to create the limited edition “Sip Pak,” a four pack of Beer Lab HI’s signature Hazy IPA that pairs perfectly with Zippy’s Zip Pak.

One of the great things about being community focused is getting to know your neighbors. One of Honolulu Beerworks’ neighbor happens to be Big Island artist Kai’ili “Kai” Kaulukukui whose work is inspired by the natural beauty of Hawaiʻi, especially the unique ocean life. His art is featured on Honolulu Beerworks’ core and seasonal can labels and decorates their brew pub walls and beer garden. They’ve also recently done collabs with different environmental groups to use their beer to promote awareness endangered species, like their Kāhuli Brewli beer that helped raise funds for the endangered Kāhuli snail.

Over the years Maui Brewing has created opportunities for several unique partnerships with important missions. They’ve teamed up Patagonia Provision to promote regenrative agriculture by introducing a Kernza® Pilsner brewed with Regenerative Organic Certified® Kernza® and organic ingredients. In 2023 they created the Kōkua Project, which raised over $1.5 million in relief funds for those impacted by the 2023 Maui wildfires. The Kōkua Project involved Maui Brewing creating a recipe, artwork and marketing materials for a beer that breweries around the world could brew, with proceeds going to the Global Empowerment Mission via the Maui Brewing Company Fire Fund.

This year both Maui Brewing and Honolulu Beerworks collaborated with the team at Island Distributing to bring the Made in Hawaiʻi Festival Beer Garden to life. The Beer Garden has become a signature feature of the event and it’s the perfect place to showcase these unique local products and help local customers connect with their next favorite local beer.

The Future of Local Brewing

The love of beer drives these local brewers to keep innovating and growing, even if it takes them beyond beer. Several years ago, Maui Brewing saw shifting beverage trends and responded with Maui Seltzers and even brewed up some hard peach mango iced tea. They continued to branch out and mow their facility is the only fully licensed combination brewery, winery, and distillery in the state of Hawaii. Garrett was excited to share the possibilities, “It means we can produce every single type of beverage alcohol at our facility, and we do everything but traditional wine fermentation! We do make some ciders now and again, and that’s considered wine. On the spirit side this year we launched our Maui Island Spirits line.” It’s a new line of premium handcrafted spirits-based cocktails made with real vodka, cane sugar, and natural flavors.

For those looking for a beer alternative Beer Lab HI offers their Li Hing Pop hard seltzers. At their locations around town they’ve been hosting some classic brew pub events like trivia and movie nights, but also some events that you may not usually associate with a brewery. This October they had keiki cookie decorating and a lei po’o workshop. In November they’re hosting a release for their latest CollaBREWation with local hair clip makers Coop Monster.

Geoff of Honolulu Beerworks explained what drives them to keep innovating, “just being craft beer isn’t enough, you have to diversify.” Their new home in Kalihi is up and running as a taproom now and will soon be hosting even more types of events. When you visit the tap room you may notice some barrels stacked around, these will be used for some very special limited edition barrel aged brews coming soon.

Local brewing is a uniquely challenging endeavor, but our local brewers are uniquely passionate about their craft. These artisans and their teams have built remarkable local companies, and a remarkable local beer scene for Hawaiʻi, with diverse offerings that are specially crafted for local beer lovers. As local beer continues to grow, we’re excited to see, and taste, what’s next!