Today we’d like to introduce you to Adam Hiner, Todd Kent and Andrew Clark.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
We started Boochcraft to give people a drink they could enjoy and feel good about drinking. We also wanted to inspire connection and hopefully spark interesting conversations around the unique ingredients. The initial idea to do a kombucha brewery came when Adam was selling it at his restaurant, Local Habit. It was one of the first restaurants to serve kombucha on tap in the country. Years later Adam and Todd were discussing business ideas and Adam mentioned a kombucha brewery, Todd was very interested. Adam immediately called his brother in law, Andrew, who was an avid beer, meade, cider and kombucha brewer in his spare time. We decided in very short time to move forward and began to concept what would eventually become Boochcraft. Shortly after the initial idea, Andrew, the Brew Master, decided they should make high alcohol kombucha and everything went into high gear from there. 8 months before having any product ready for commercial sale, Stone Distribution signed us for distribution. When we finally launched, Stone helped to catapult us forward very quickly with lots of traction in Socal. We have since expanded our production 3x the initial capacity and also our geographic reach to include all of Socal, San Fran Bay Area, Sacramento to Tahoe, and Maui. We are also in the planning phases for a 10x expansion which will help us to expand even farther.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
We have had many challenges along the way, namely that nobody had every built a large scale high alcohol kombucha brewery nor did anybody seem to know how to do it. So we have made countless mistakes along the way and learned from all of them. We have also found lots of help from within the craft beer industry, where people have a very open door policy and are always happy to help. We have also hired a full time Microbiologist who is also our Operations Manager, Maxi Richmond. She is dedicated to constantly improving both our production and quality control. Now, in the planning phases of our 10x expansion we are using all of the lessons learned from the first build out to make the new brewery operate as efficiently as possible.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
We make High Alcohol Kombucha. We start by making lower ABV kombucha which is around 1% alcohol. Then we do a secondary fermentation to create high alcohol kombucha which still has all of the health benefits and probiotics of regular kombucha. We also flavor with organic cold pressed juices, made in house, and herbs. This makes for a very bold and bright tasting kombucha which never tastes watered down. We also compost all of our organic waste created from cold pressing the juice and send it to a commercial composting facility in Chula Vista.
Finally we are dedicated to giving back to the community by supporting programs like the Farm to Families CSA and education program at Wild Willow Farm or the Family Literacy program at Words Alive, which we will be donating 100% of the proceeds from Batch 100 next month.
What were you like growing up?
I was always super motivated to be better at everything. To always improve. I had high expectations for myself and I still carry that with me today.
Contact Info:
- Address: 684 Anita Street
Suite F
Chula Vista, CA 91911 - Website: www.boochcraft.com
- Phone: 6197818848
- Email: info@boochcraft.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/boochcraft
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/boochcraft
Image Credit:
Hale Production Studios
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