Kona Brewing Company has announced that it will invest approximately $15 million to expand its brewery operations in Hawaii. The expansion project, which will include a new 30,000 square-foot brewery, will increase annual production capacity to 100,000 barrels per year. Kona Brewing is currently narrowing its list of possible locations for the new facility, with plans to break ground in the second half of 2015 and be fully operational by early 2017.
Kona Brewing is part of the Craft Brew Alliance, a group of craft brands including Widmer and Redhook. CBA is in part owned by Anheuser-Busch.
Currently, bottled Kona Brewing beers are brewed on the mainland by CBA and shipped to the Islands. Kona has been criticized for portraying itself as a Hawaiian craft beer when in fact the bottled beer is brewed on the mainland. The new production facility on the Big Island will allow for Kona to resist local efforts that have attempted to require where the beer is brewed on the label